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Nabaztag the WiFi Bunny
carre4 writes "A French company named Violet, the smart object company, has come out with Nabaztag, a 23 cm tall WiFi-enabled bunny that tells you about the weather, traffic jams, new emails through flashing lights and moving its ears. They have a Flash demo with Nabaztag's different messages. The company also makes 'La lampe Dal', a lamp that changes colors based on the weather and 'Le Pad Osmooze', a USB device that releases an aroma when you receive an email from a loved one."
just put a mini camera in it :)
And yet so far.
As far as I can tell, this is kind of pointless. What it really needs is voice commands. If you have a small cute animal you can ask "What's the weather?" or "Play me a song" and have it follow your commands, that would be on the level of the cell phone, microwave oven, or even television in terms of cultural impact. An actual computer-based interactive device you can set on your kitchen table and ask for current information or to follow basic commands is the kind of near-future sci-fi thing they've been talking about for years. It's the object that we will take for granted ten years from now but will integrate itself into our daily lives.
The thing is, that doesn't seem far off at all right now. Sure, it would be an expensive gadget, but properly designed and marketed it would be bigger than the iPod among the rich, hip gadget people and soon everyone would need one. Sooner or later people wouldn't think anything of spending a thousand dollars on a little toy you can ask for movie listings, headlines, traffic, or just command to call Mom, listen to the radio, or play word games.
This should be possible. Why the hell isn't it already here?
[insert witty quote here]
does this remind anyone of this?