Clothes Make the Network

Roland Piquepaille writes "Howard Rheingold is looking at how "wearable computers create ad-hoc wireless communities." Here is the main idea, introduced by Gerd Kortuem, a 38-year-old assistant professor, who recently moved to Lancaster University in England from the University of Oregon's Wearable Computing Lab. "As he sees it, the crowds who surround us every day constitute a huge waste of social capital. If you live in a city for instance, there are many who pass within a few yards of you each day who could give you a ride home, buy an item you're trying to sell, or consider you as dating material. Dynamic networking makes it possible to tap those resources through a momentary alliance among transient interest groups." Check this column for a summary or the full article if you have more time."

Comments

Finally!

[Quaoar]

This new solution will take the work out of driving, dating, and purchases.

...shit, I'll have nothing to do!

Re:Dont they have something like this.

[handsomepete]

Well, there was this one (scroll down a bit)... The relevant excerpt:

Comverse customer EMI will soon unveil Keychain, a hand-held device for m-commerce, likely to fit on a keyring.

Jay Samit, new media senior vice-president at EMI Recorded Music in Hollywood, explains how it works: 'You're listening to the radio in your car, you love the song but you don't know who it's by. Flick the Keychain and it instantly knows which radio station you're tuned into, and where you are on the planet. It connects to the station, finds out about the track and sends you an e-mail to tell you where you can buy it.

'In a restaurant you find you love a bottle of wine. You could scan the barcode into the Keychain and it will e-mail you where you can buy that wine, on-line or in the physical world.'

Jay Samit says the Keychain will be given away free to listeners by radio stations. The feedback they will get on people's personal preferences as they use it to get details of broadcast songs will be invaluable as well as anonymous, safeguarding personal privacy. Advertisers will benefit from extra marketing data and sales.

Not quite the same thing, but equally frightening.

incidentally, that article is the exact same one

[deft]

that the "borg weekly" ran 250 years ago.

java phones

[austad]

I was thinking about this last week with a couple of friends. With the new mobile phones that are being released which have Java capabilities, it would likely be trivial to write an app which would scan your area for other bluetooth devices running the same app, and do a comparison of the data you've entered to see if you are a match. Whether you are looking to buy or sell something, find a ride, or find a date, you could enter this info into your phone, and when it finds another in range with matching interests, it can beep/vibrate/send your photo to the other phone/etc.

Unfortunately, I think the latest java compliant nokia doesn't have bluetooth, and my t68i doesn't have java. I think the Ericsson P800 is going to have both, and siemens is supposed to be releasing a new one in january that I think has both of these features. The real barrier to this is getting people to install it on their phones, most people aren't technical enough to know how to do it, most people aren't going to pay for the app so it would have to be free, but probably the best way would be to convince some wireless provider to just preload it on their phones and advertise it as a feature to get more customers. Which may not be so hard to do since it's a very interesting use of technology which real people may have an interest in, and it shouldn't be hard to design either.

Re:driving?

[Subcarrier]

Yeah a HUD will work great when driving. Trying to read an email and drive 65mph at the same time?

Who says you have to read emails while driving? Think new applications. You could receive audiovisual driving instructions, alerts, traffic updates, etc. Traffic signs could broadcast a wireless signal so you see them a mile away no matter if they are covered in snow or grime.

In general, the main thing about about wearable computing is about improving the user interfaces. A T9 keypad and an LCD display the size of your thumb just don't cut it.