DigIn! Blog

CES 2012: Augmented Reality Steps into Toys

by Limor Schafman

Toys and games for kids have become that much more exciting now that interactivity and augmented reality are joining the fore of how children can play and learn.  

There were three examples at CES that are worth noting.  First, during the Microsoft keynote by Steve Ballmer, the Kinect was showcased through a partnership with Sesame Workshop in creating Kinect Sesame Street TV.  Microsoft is taking current TV programming and turning them into interactive experiences - partially streaming video; partially interactive video game - all with the intention of keeping children engaged while learning. (Note: thank you to GameSpot for this video).  In the video you will see the learning component, coupled with the interactive participation of voice and gesture enabled through the Kinect with Sesame Street characters reacting to viewer actions and responding immediately depending on what the viewer - shall we call them now players/actors/active learners do.

         

Internet Blackout Day Protesting SOPA/PIPA

by Limor Schafman

Fraud v. Freedom - this is the context of the protest black out day you may have noticed taking place across United States based websites.  Visit Google's search browser with its black swath across its name and you will have a good visual of their sentiments.  

The issues presented by the legislation under dispute need to be addressed - fraud, security, copyright infringement.    But is legislation the proper way?  And should the legislation be so broad?  Should the Internet be subject to censorship?  Should we have our freedom of expression curtailed and subject to a central authority of review and power?  The furor around SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act)/PIPA (Protect IP Act) is largely around the over-reaching implications of the proposed bills.  

The Washington Post has put together some explanations of the two bills and the surrounding controversey, which are worth looking at.

For the actual text on the bills so you can form your own conclusions, see:

SOPA - HR 3261

PIPA - S 968

I welcome your thoughts and comments - should Congress get involved in Internet oversight?  Why?  Why not?  And if so, to what objective, extent and best way to implement.  

Limor

CES 2012: Do Food and Advertising Mix?

by Limor Schafman

We've all heard of pop up restaurants being done by famous chefs and haute design food encounters created by the likes of David Rockwell (Nobu around the world). Foodies love it when the pairing of food and design come together.  How about when the design is digital, produced by projection, allows for games and interactive location based fact finding right there at table top and advertisers can buy your table for you and even top themselves up on the menu list if they pay enough.

 

That is what Inamo and their restaurant chain offers.  

2012 International CES: Unusual and Cool Finds at CES

by Limor Schafman

You've heard about the Samsung and LG seemingly paper thin 3D OLEDs (let me tell you they are amazing and the wall of 50+ LG 3D screens at the entry of the booth was mind boggling), but there were other small finds at CES that you may not have heard of so I will share them here. 

 

The Intel keynote with CEO Paul Otellini showed us what the power of chips can do beyond the gorgeous ultrabooks that proliferated the show floor.  Here we see the Adidas store footwear wall that was showcased in the London flagship Originals store and resulted in a 5% uptick in new product sales in two weeks.  

Then we move to the futuristic with the Aerial 3D Display made by Burton - these

are laser lights that truly create Star Wars like 3D holograms in regular air (in other words they do not need to have another particles in the air like mist in order to be seen as most laser displays require).  The laser lights can be interactive.  Apparently, you can make the lasers interactive with the Kinect, and probably any other interactive device like a tablet or smartphone. The can go as high as 5M in the air and 3M wide.  They can be multi-colored as long as they do only one color at a time.  

 

 

This is the Printing Dress which was featured at the Microsoft booth.  Made almost entirely out of paper, it allows you to tweet and display the text as art on the skirt.  While clearly a prototype - if you pear closely under the hem of the dress you can see the massive keyboard which is not condusive to elegantly moving through a crowd - the barrier between thought to public communication has lost one more brick.

 

Robitics in small sizes had a presence at CES as shown by Cubelets produced by Modular Robotics.  These are plastic building blocks that have sensors built inside and when you combine them, you can get the combinations to have different capabilities.  Matt, who works for Cublelets, gives us a great demonstration.  The Cubelets are available for direct purchase at the Modular Robotics website.   

 As you may have guessed, mobile devices are becoming the interface to our lives - they will (and in some cases already do) control our HVAC home systems, or TVs and radio systems, our car settings and garage door system, etc. etc.  Shelby.TV enables your iPhone to become your social media interactive video remote control.  Whew!  That was a lot of things together. What they do is they gather your Twitter and Facebook feeds and see what your friends are recommending you to watch. They then pick up the links, and post the friend comment with the video so you know why it is showing up on your Shelby.TV.  While you are watching, you can also comment and it will go back out to your social net.  And all this interaction between you and the TV is done through your iPhone or tablet. The app is free on iTunes.

 Another interactive I liked which was shown at the Verizon booth is the DNA Wall by Downstream which uses a mind mapping tool to display marketing information in a very dynamic way.  If you check out The Brain, you will see it is exactly the same.  I have used The Brain for a variety of projects for mind mapping a solution structure out, but also have used it for presentations.  A great way to keep the visual dynamic and the content visually structured.

And to drive out out of this blog into the next, we have Romotive's little Romo's which is a smartphone based toy vehicle in which one smartphone resides, and then another smartphone can control it.  It works with iOS and Android phones.  Very cute, very fun and just $99 if you want to give it a go.  

More CES highlights to come... 

2012 International CES: Fun Finds at CES Unveiled

by Limor Schafman

Several themes are already starting to emerge as topics we will be hearing a lot about over the next few days:

1. CEA analysts project over 100m tablets to be purchased worldwide in 2012.  But the tablet market is maxing out with purchase rate increments starting to flatten.  
2. The largest buying upsurge in smartphones is going from Africa and the Middle East; and the same with tablets and all forms of mobile devices.  This is attributed largely to the lack of infrastructure in these countries which is forcing people to immediate go mobile.  China also shows the same trends.
3. Ultrabooks are grabbing the market of mobile PCs.
4. Desktop purchases are down. 
5. TV market penetration is maxed out. The belief is that most households that want TVs now own them. 
6. TV tech is going to LCDs which are shifting quickly to LED and will OLED slowly but steadily as prices continue to drop.
7. 3D TV is said to be on the rise.

The pre-conference press expo called CES Unveiled showcased several companies (Picture left show Gary Shapiro, CEO of CEA and Steven Smith Editor in Chief of Twice).  

 

I highlight here below some of the fun and interesting finds:    

House of Marley - (LVCC Central #15237) This company, started in the name of Bob Marley, always have music oriented product (headphones, radios) have fantastic design.  The product materials are strictly conservation and natural in focus- wood is FSC compliant (Forest Stewardship Council – chop one/plant one); plastics, cardboard boxing are all from recycled product; and any cloth is hemp or recycled cotton.  Visit this booth to see a good example of aesthetic, planet conscious consumer electronics.

My PowerBag - Won an Innovation Award – a bag that has a battery charger in it that can recharge multiple devices as well.  Takes 3 hours to charge the bag, and then you are good to go with plenty of power for the road.  Allegedly the bag isn’t heavy but didn’t have a chance to test that myself.

MyCharge - This is a small device – about the size of a smartphone, just a bit thicker – that can be charge through electrical outlet or USB and then used as a portable charge for up to 5 devices simultaneously.  Nice compact charger with all the cord attachments built into it. 

Kivic - This is a streaming multimedia device that takes media from the iPhone and streams it through itself to a car system.  One way to take your personal media on the road.

Eers - by Sonomax, this gadget produces custom fitted earphones within 5 minutes.  You put the SonoFit™ Custom Fitting System over your ears and adjust.  They do not go too far in so no damage to eardrums.  The silicon forms to your ears unique shape.  After 5 minutes, you remove the earpieces and place them on your own headset and you are ready to go. 

Bikn - (LVCC Central Plaza 8) Produced by Tree House Labs, this is a sensor platform for anything you want to track, find and measure.  They are developing multiple products based on the platform – one of the first is a lost and found application.  You have the sensor attached to whatever it is you want to keep track of (phone – has a special casing with the sensor built in); a pet; a child; etc. The iPhone application (Android OS is under development) shows on the phone where the item is.  You can activate the application to show location, to show how close you are to what you are searching for (in case it is not immediately visible) and you can set geographic boundaries so that if an item is suddenly outside the set zone, an alarm goes off.   Another product places sensors in a football helmet so that if a player hits his head, you can know the level of impact sustained.  They are also offering the platform to companies for license or as part of services for the production of privately developed products. 

Invoxia - (LVCC North #6406) This product produces VOIP over iPhone through an elegant handset.  The system is unique in its interface [you interact through the iPhone]; it can manage 8 mikes simultaneously so it acts like a Polycom office system; it auto-configures with existing PBX systems as well; they are beginning to offer their own telecom services (France currently, and coming to the US).  They too won an Innovation Award.

Sculpteo - This was one of the most interesting technologies I saw.  It allows for 3D sculpting based on designs that you can do yourself.  It is a cloud based system in which you can design products; they handle the production of the item in plastic or ceramic.  You can use the application for free, and then just pay for production.  The company is partnering with manufacturers to produce large orders.

3M - (LVCC South 4 #35806)was showing a multi-touch screen which offers a steady base with a min of 20 simultaneous touchpoints.  Works with a Windows 7 computer. It’s being used by the military as a flight simulator- Lockheed Martin has taken 18 screen monitors to create a cockpit and then can train soldiers on multiple aeronautic interfaces by simply choosing another flight sim software application rather than building another actual simulator.   The financial sector is using the screens in brokerage rooms, and they can be found in the retail space as well. (Yep, those are my creative doodles testing 20 points with the sales person.)

 Parrot - (LVCC South #31424 and LVCC Central Plaza CP9) This company was showcasing its flyingrcraft technology which can be used for remote controlled video capture.  Tablets (and presumably smartphones and touch screen laptops) control the drone.  What is shown here is the AR.Drone, the first quadricopter piloted by wi-fi and using augmented reality.