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That's funny. I thought it came from Dr. Steve Mann, who has been using wearable computers since the 70s. He's done a ton of "lookpaintings" which involve him looking around and his wearable computer correcting the images to the same perspective.

Check it out here.

What would I do with 10Mb/s for $150/month? How about:

- running a software company where all developers worked from home, over a VNC, but could all simultaneously videoconference with each other while sharing images of each other's desktops (ala PCAnywhere) in realtime, so it would be possible to do Pair Programming or just help each other debug a problem

- more videoconferencing ideas: instead of needing to fly to a site to have a meeting, you do it over the Net

- sell something like Steve Mann's eyeglass cameras as a commercial product. These allow him to do a lot of oddball but nifty things...from calling his wife and saying "which of these two melons that I'm looking at should I buy?" to keeping an immediately-uploaded-to-his-web-server record of the face of the guy who just mugged him. (I don't know that either example has ever happened to him for real.)

- make the network computer one heck of a lot more feasible

- make distributed computer one heck of a lot more feasible

And that's just off the top of my head.

Dave Storrs

This is Steve Mann. This is Thad Starner. These are the people at Charmed. Steve Mann is not among them.

Ubiquitous means that the computer is always around you, always there. It becomes a part of your lifestyle, to consult the computer just as you consult your wristwatch. Perhaps like a mobile phone, but the goal is that a ubiquitous computer is much more transparent to the user than that.

My father said, "When I'm walking in the woods, I don't want a computer; it would just be an annoying distraction." But even there, how many times have you wondered what something was, or made a mental note about something you later forgot. The idea is that it does not take over your life, but fits seamlessly into it.

In that contest, a flexible transistor is a great benefit. Current wearable computers are very small (for a general purpose computer), but they still are not good things to wear. By making electronics flexible, it becomes much easier to embed them into clothing or other things that are carried around.

As well as the MIT group, check out Steve Mann's work for more information about wearable computers. They are very cool!

Way to go, to the groups mentioned in the article, and I hope they succeed very soon.

Arrgggh!!! Wearcomp this time it works...;-)

I am curious which Internet access provider Steve Mann and his team will be providing for his wearable computers. Fast Internet access isn't something which can be taken lightly in today's world of e-commerce and 64MB multimedia files.

What could be better than broadband for this purpose? With broadband, you'll be able to view highly graphical versions of pages and the most powerful lamp in the world. What more do you want?

Speakeasy has a solution:

I am curious which Internet access provider Steve Mann and his team will be providing for his wearable computers. Fast Internet access isn't something which can be taken lightly in today's world of e-commerce and 64MB multimedia files.

What could be better than broadband for this purpose? With broadband, you'll be able to view highly graphical versions of pages and the most powerful lamp in the world. What more do you want?

Speakeasy has a solution:

This guy seems to know what he's talking about. His syllabus includes specific, high-level applications of the technology, and shows an understanding of the ways this could be more than just another way to frag in (your | your employer's) spare time. However, he also makes the perplexing comment

Instead of the current vision of ``smart floors'', ``smart lightswitches'', and ``smart toilets'' that watch us and respond to our actions, what we will witness is the emergence of ``smart people''

All you folks in tech support can vouch that computers currently seem to be pushing in the opposite direction...

- Michael

Obviously the PC is not going to disappear from the horizon, but more and more cheap 'specialty' gadgets will enter our lifes. wearing computers, wearing more computers, Steve Mann at UofT (Toronto) Personally I find it cool that you can wear all those computers on you, and noone will even suspect it. the photo to the right However, after working with all these wireless phones for over 3 years, I have realized that they give me headaches. So I dumped my PCS.

Obviously the PC is not going to disappear from the horizon, but more and more cheap 'specialty' gadgets will enter our lifes. wearing computers, wearing more computers, Steve Mann at UofT (Toronto) Personally I find it cool that you can wear all those computers on you, and noone will even suspect it. the photo to the right However, after working with all these wireless phones for over 3 years, I have realized that they give me headaches. So I dumped my PCS.

You should see the homepage of Steve Mann, at http://www.wearcomp.org, and the wearable webring


Be ready with a bucket for all that drool. On second thought, better get a boat :)


"Now you can see that evil will triumph, because good is dumb!"

Prof. Steve Mann at the University of Toronto has been doing this stuff since the late 70's. His display is a lot nicer (sunglasses). Most of the system is woven into the lining of a jacket. He actually wears it everywehere.

This was in February's Linux Journal. The article about wearable computers. Dr. Mann talks about the evolution of the WearComp. You can check out that research and innovation at wearcomp.org What I want to know is, who uses this? And how easy is it to learn? Joseph Elwell.

Interestingly, there's a prof at the University of Toronto who walks around with a wearable computer running Linux and has a number of projects going with similar devices. Most readers here should like him, as he habitually refers to certain Microsoft products as "Virus95" and "VirusNT".

More information can be found at
http://www.wearcomp.org/.