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Clothing Yourself In Technology
Sixyphe writes "Burton Snowboards has just released a very, very nice snowboarding jacket called the Analog Clone. It includes a padded pouch designed to hold a Sony MZ-N1 MiniDisc player and, more importantly, a large textile control pad on the left arm that acts as a remote control for the MD player. This pad is based on technology from SOFTswitch, a UK company. Production, 100 units, price tag, around 1000US$, MZ-N1 included. Not the first textile-based application I've seen (textile keyboards have been around for a while, I believe), but a nice one. This is cool, geeky, musical, sporty and damn useful all at once. Wow. The part I like best is where they mention that the coat is machine-washable when the MD player is removed. Thanks to minidisc.org for the tip." skratchjerk writes "Financial Times has a short article about Levi Strauss' new anti-radiation jeans. They state that 'The trousers, to be launched in the UK next year under Levi's Dockers brand, contain mobile phone pockets with "anti-radiation lining to prevent possible health risks".' I guess it's about time we protected 'the boys.'" Update: 09/13 21:13 GMT by T : The updated Burton link should make the folks at Burton happier ;)
Oddly enough, despite the fact that this is hailed as something that snowboarders would use, it is mentioned nowhere that this outfit (or the MD player) is waterproof. Admittedly, I've never snowboarded before (damned snowless FL), but I can imagine with the inevitable wipeouts, some snow would HAVE to get inside the jacket. And what about an actual hardened protective layer for the MD player? I can only imagine if you fall on it, it's toast.
Probably wouldn't be too difficult to adapt the "fabric control panel" to access an MP3 player.
But you're forgetting that Sony had to come up with some kind of "cool" marketing idea to get rid of all of the MD players collecting dist in warehouses across the country.
$1000US... uh, no thanks.
Which is why deaf people don't snowboard or ski, right?
You can't navigate by sound while riding. The tunes don't really matter.
The point is not just that you can't hear what is going on around you, but that you are concentrating on something else instead of on skiing/snowboarding. Listening to music requires a certain amount of concentration which isn't available for navigation - there is a finite amount of stuff you can attend to at one time.
The good news is that the brain is relatively good at not concentrating on music when other stimuli grab its attention. Music processing is a low priority task. This is different from, for example, taking part in a conversation, which the brain will treat as a less interuptable activity. This is why talking on a cell phone while driving is considerably more dangerous than listening to music while driving - your brain will continue to concentrate on the conversation even when something else (a red light, a driver cutting into your lane, a child crossing the street) should grab your immediate attention.
So, I tend to disagree that music is a huge danger when skiing, although it does impose some burden on the listener.
Sailing over the event horizon
OK, so you stich a contact based control panel into the arm of a jacket to control a player you have in the inside pocket. Ohhh, ahhhh, boy aint that too kewl, now that's some advanced tech.
Can anyone explain to me how this is so cool and why people are so impressed? You could take a 20 year old atari joystick control board and wire this puppy up yourself in about an hour.
Hell, my normal attire (work or otherwise) is a pair of shorts and a tshirt, the last thing I need is a wearable anything to clutter up my ensemble. Give me something I can clip to my shorts or stick in my pocket with decent ergos and I'm a happy man. Having a 802.11 antennae in my pocket (are you happy to see me or is that a WiFi antennae in your pocket, then again, with the size of a typical antennae, it had better be an antennae or it will be the only thing keeping you warm down there) is not my idea of enpowering, except in the literal sense.
Harumphhh.