It's been very interesting to read this discussion. Thank for being so interested! A couple points:
1) I think Mason did a great job on the article. That's evidenced by the fact a lot of the posts here center on the questions I think are most interesting:
a) Is there any way to balance the needs of society with the needs of the individual?
b) How much information can you get out of networks of simple sensors?
c) Are dense networks of simple sensors "better" than dense networks of cameras? sparse networks of cameras? networks of RFID readers? combinations of all those...for various definitions of "better"?
2) That said, Mason's job was to write a very short article about a complex technology he only learned about last week, so it's understandable if some of the subtleties didn't make it through. If you're interested in the nuances, I encourage you to follow through the links and learn more (as many of are already obviously doing).
3) Discussions of privacy are very tricky in the absence of context. Privacy means something very different when you're talking about a citizen and their government, an employee and their boss, a parent and their child, or a lover and their spouse. If I am talking about one context and you have another in mind, then we're not likely to have a useful conversation. Please click through to this TR for a more detailed discussion: TR2006-005
4) It's worth pointing out that security was a good way to fund research these past few years. However the heart of the project is really about intelligent buildings, and how to make our lives better. It started with a focus on elevator efficiency and more recently has shifted to social networking and may yet move on to energy efficiency. Security was just one pit stop (but one the produced undeniably influential demos!)
5) Finally, the project is obviously not just two people, but dozens. Listing them all would have consumed Mason's entire column... so that's how it often is in the news. Many thanks to everyone who has been involved in the project over the years: AmbInt People
Not that anyone is still reading this thread a week later, but for the sake of posterity: if you'd like to hear more, straight from the horse's mouth (I'm that horse), you can click on over to Google Video and catch a replay of the Tech Talk I gave a couple months back: Sensor Networks for Better Buildings
That's a link to an abstract describing a 2004 SIGGRAPH Emerging Technologies demo.
One liner: it's small enough to hold, remember? so what happens when you can wave around a projector? It becomes an input device, as well as a display.
Slashdot Mirror
It's been very interesting to read this discussion. Thank for being so interested! A couple points:
...for various definitions of "better"?
1) I think Mason did a great job on the article. That's evidenced by the fact a lot of the posts here center on the questions I think are most interesting:
a) Is there any way to balance the needs of society with the needs of the individual?
b) How much information can you get out of networks of simple sensors?
c) Are dense networks of simple sensors "better" than dense networks of cameras? sparse networks of cameras? networks of RFID readers? combinations of all those
2) That said, Mason's job was to write a very short article about a complex technology he only learned about last week, so it's understandable if some of the subtleties didn't make it through. If you're interested in the nuances, I encourage you to follow through the links and learn more (as many of are already obviously doing).
3) Discussions of privacy are very tricky in the absence of context. Privacy means something very different when you're talking about a citizen and their government, an employee and their boss, a parent and their child, or a lover and their spouse. If I am talking about one context and you have another in mind, then we're not likely to have a useful conversation. Please click through to this TR for a more detailed discussion: TR2006-005
4) It's worth pointing out that security was a good way to fund research these past few years. However the heart of the project is really about intelligent buildings, and how to make our lives better. It started with a focus on elevator efficiency and more recently has shifted to social networking and may yet move on to energy efficiency. Security was just one pit stop (but one the produced undeniably influential demos!)
5) Finally, the project is obviously not just two people, but dozens. Listing them all would have consumed Mason's entire column... so that's how it often is in the news. Many thanks to everyone who has been involved in the project over the years: AmbInt People
cheers,
Chris
Not that anyone is still reading this thread a week later, but for the sake of posterity: if you'd like to hear more, straight from the horse's mouth (I'm that horse), you can click on over to Google Video and catch a replay of the Tech Talk I gave a couple months back: Sensor Networks for Better Buildings
C
http://www.siggraph.org/s2004/conference/etech/int eracting.php
That's a link to an abstract describing a 2004 SIGGRAPH Emerging Technologies demo.
One liner: it's small enough to hold, remember? so what happens when you can wave around a projector? It becomes an input device, as well as a display.
cheers,
Chris
"Like in the movies" is no accident. John Underkoffler, a former student of Hiroshi Ishii, was the science advisor on "Minority Report".
> I still think the first picture looks
> like Dana, don't you?
Um.... no, and I bet she doesn't weild a soldering iron like Dana, either.
There are some good shots of the gang in the "Behind the Scenes" section.