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MIT Grad To Make Digital "SixthSense" Open Source

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the enhanced-reality-is-the-only-way-to-roll dept.

yuveraj writes to mention that Pranav Mistry, the brain behind the innovative "SixthSense" application demoed earlier this year, plans to open source the technology in order to get this to the streets faster. "Mistry’s decision has meaning beyond Sixth Sense. The desire of inventors is always to get their work into the market as quickly as possible. Usually this means waiting for it to be turned into a useful, profitable invention. Mistry is bypassing this by going straight to open source. There is no report on which license he will use, but whichever one he does choose he has put paid to the canard that open source and innovation are incompatible, for all time."

6 of 151 comments (clear)

  1. paid to the canard? by poetmatt · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Is it me, or does this expression make almost no sense? Regardless of the intent I don't get why it follows with "that open source and innovation are incompatible, for all time."

    Can someone translate this expression about canard?

  2. I don't get it... by gabereiser · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I mean, the tech is cool, don't get me wrong. Having dealt with multitouch for some years now I get it. But seriously, would anyone want to strap on a backpack, attach a bunch of gizmos to his chest, tape colors to his fingers, only to display PRE-PROGRAMMED information? I mean, the video of him is all marketing gimmick. A preloaded video of Barack Obama on the newspaper, clever bit of camera trickery. I don't see this gaining traction anymore than those wearable computers with the little lcd screen in your eye glasses. I would rather have a system that uses Augmented Reality. This "contraption" was deemed open source by it's creator because it's creator knows no one is willing to fork over the cash to bring this to market because it's a terrible concept.

    1. Re:I don't get it... by DeadDecoy · · Score: 2, Interesting
      It's not a terrible concept, it's simply a solution looking for a problem.

      But seriously, would anyone want to strap on a backpack, attach a bunch of gizmos to his chest, tape colors to his fingers, only to display PRE-PROGRAMMED information?

      The object he's showing is a prototype and will naturally have a larger form-factor relative to any final product. The reason for the backpack is to have something to hold his dev machine which runs the software. This can easily be put into a smaller computer or micro-controller at some later point in time. And all those gizmos amount to the coordination of multiple devices: web cam and projector, simply because no one has thought to combine the items yet. Again, once there is a market for the combined features, products will probably follow. As for the pre-programmed information, it's certainly true that this performs a limited number of operations, but common, this is only one guy demoing his prototype. There could be plenty of additional operations once this product is open sourced. You just have no imagination

      Imagine if such a device was attached to 'the cloud' at some wi-fi cafe. I could be browsing some journal articles projected onto the table, and upon finding an interesting item, send it to a friend somewhere else in the world. Feeling the need to discuss, we could then have a video conference on that table. Once done, I might load up pong and wait until my food is served. A lot of this is a "marketing gimmick" because the uses of such a device have not yet been fully explored. There's a huge pipeline of products and software interfaces that need to be hacked out before its ready for the public, but it certainly holds potential. You just have to make it cheap enough for the average consumer and find that killer app. Personally I wouldn't mind such a device in place of a Kindle/Nook with a decent reference manager, and would probably hack away at the open source to make that happen.

      You're probably against this because you have no idea of how it could be useful or popular. But don't worry, a lot of other, smarter people will probably get it done for you.

  3. Simple English Slashdot, Please by TheModelEskimo · · Score: 2, Interesting

    he has put paid to the canard

    Now there's a new one. *fumbles through idiom dictionary*

  4. Re:Pilots are being taken out by vlm · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Um... We do have fully automated drones flying around, both with and without bombs attached.

    We do have fully automated drones flying around, both with and without pilots attached...

    You'd be surprised what a good autopilot can do. Did you know the space shuttle, using 70s tech, lands itself, with the only human interaction being pushing the landing gear doors? No kidding hands completely off from orbit to runway using 40 year old tech?

    --
    "Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
  5. Media Lab? Unless it comes from the 1st floor... by snsh · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The stuff that comes out of upper floors of the Media Lab generally don't commercialize well. Anyone remember Charmed Technologies? A couple of grads from the same group tried to commercialize wearable computers - the company didn't survive the bubble collapsing. The first floor of the Media Lab is different; they're more like traditional researchers and work on things like e-ink. But the upper floors generate demo after demo, that look cute and generate press, but not much commercial value.