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Algomantra: Collective Intelligence Urban Games Link Algomantra is an urban experiment in smartmobbery, cooked up by Bombay-based writer Rohit Gupta & and visiting Finlander Matti Pohjonen. A Yatra literally means a walk, a pilgrimage, a journey into faith. AlgoMantra is an open source festival. This means that you can download the document which tells you how to hold it in your neighbourhood or city or country, anywhere in the world. Without spending any money, or needing any sponsors, you can hold this festival with your own flavor. What happens in this festival? On a Friday night at 7PM (date to be announced) all the participants of the festival, anywhere on the globe, take a vow of silence for 58 hours, that is till Sunday night 9PM. During these 58 hours, they play three games. What kind of games? Collaborative games / experiments that will demonstrate the phenomenon of crowd intelligence. You will not need any computers or hardware to play these games, all you will need is people - your friends and family, your society. [ permanent link to this entry ]
First Ever Webcast Advert Link FT.com will today play host to the world's first live video broadcast in a simple, on-page advert. The advert, for Cisco, will be carried on the FT's technology section today (01/25/05) at 4pm and tomorrow at 11am. Viewers will be able to participate in the live broadcast by talking to the presenter via an instant messenger chat application held within the ad. Should the experiment prove successful such an ad format could have an interesting effect on site traffic and the dynamics of online media planning and buying. Depending on the content of this and future ads, it is possible that, should the format develop, adverts could be promoted prior to broadcast with visitors flocking to the site to see it, with the consequent knock-one effect for revenues. [ permanent link to this entry ]
Powered By Burgers Link A Japanese hamburger chain is trying to power the future. The MOS Food company is recycling the food waste from their Mos Burger restaurant chain into energy. In the Kanto region, the company is taking all the broken buns and crushed patties and other squished, expired, or otherwise unsellable food and converting it to methane and using it to power a local steel mill. In other regions, the leftovers are being converted into animal feed. MOS is an acronym for: Mountain. Ocean. Sun. Their Motto? "Making people happy through food". Will the real Happy Meal please stand up. [ permanent link to this entry ]
Transmitting Fragrance by SMS Link A researcher at Huelva University in Spain claims to have created a version of XML that can transmit fragrances. The scientist developed a dual pass printing system, using two polymers which degrade by light and by touch, so that the smell is perceptible only when a document is read. To propagate smell over the Web, the boffin created XML Smell, which would define in a standardised way the transmission of smell to allow the transmission of fragrances by email, by SMS to a mobile phone, or via a TV show. Currently, the researchers are designing a device which will sit next to your TV, radio, phone or PC, and which contains a "smell palette". The components in the palette are realised according to instructions contained in the XML Smell language. [ permanent link to this entry ]
Inkjet Printer Prints out Human Skin Link Scientists at the University of Manchester in the UK have developed a type of inkjet printer that can print human cells. The scientists claim that it will be possible to print 'made-to-measure' tissue and bones to be grown simply by inputting their dimensions into a computer. The printer would revolutionize current treatments, which are based on grafting skin or bone from other parts of the body or replacing broken bones with metal plates. These carry carry a risk of scarring and possible rejection by the body. But Professor Derby, leader of the project, said that they are still working out how to print cells on to the 3D plastic scaffolds to produce bone or cartilage. He said: "In theory, you could print the scaffolding to create an organ in a day, but we are not quite there yet." [ permanent link to this entry ]
Ethics for the Robot Age Link The story's writer, Jordan Pollack states his definition of a robot as any device controlled by software that can work 24/7 and put people out of work. The machines are not intelligent. He then touches on the following questions: 1. Should robots be humanoid? 2. Should humans become robots? 3. Should robots excrete byproducts? 4. Should robots eat? 5. Should telerobotic labor be regulated? 6. Should robots carry weapons? 7. Should machines be awarded patents? Of course, these questions are the beginning of a dialog that should precede, rather than react to, the enormous social, economic, and legal changes wrought by continued automation. Managed correctly, the increased labor and intelligence provided by machines can lead to greater human prosperity and improved conditions on Earth. And as Pollack write, "We need reasonable policies informed by the robots of reality, not of fantasy." [ permanent link to this entry ]
Zero Gravity Design Link This new offering certainly reinforces our TrendBank's 'Experience Collecting' consumer trend. Stockholm's Umbilical Design, a firm specializing in designs for space and extreme environments, has been asked by Xero - the first Swedish company to offer zero-gravity flights - to work on a fun and reassuring interior-design scheme for its planes. Using a parabolic flight plane normally used to train Russian astronauts and test equipment, Xero will take passengers on a one-and-a-half-hour flight that features 15 short periods of weightlessness.
In a bid to create a playground-like environment, the firm is developing a concept for an inflatable module that would completely transform the plane interior in about an hour. Aside from the inflatable interior, the cabin will be fairly open, with a few elements like vertical handrails that passengers can use to propel themselves around the space. To further transform the cabin, Umbilical will add mood lighting and integrate some kind of scent design. These elements might also be used to give information. For example, instead of a pilot’s voice announcing when periods of weightlessness will begin, a change in sound or lighting might cue guests to prepare. The design studio believes that zero gravity should affect the way we live, and refers to designs used in our homes as "terrestrial applications". Xero has three flights planned for 2005 - in February, July, and October - each holding 12 passengers. [ permanent link to this entry ]
Flatpak Housing Link Designer Charlie Lazor has come up with the Flatpak House. Just like flatpack furniture, the house comes in flat pieces that are assembled on site to cut down on cost and environmental impact. Lazor lives in one configuration of the 8' by 8' grid system [see images below]; other possible layouts are shown in a PDF on the company's website.
The first step to designing a Flatpak house is playing about with stickers on a floorplan grid. Then you send your creation in and tell the architects about the site. Prefab it may be, but the design is initiated by you. And you might actually be able to afford it, too: the PDF also tells you exactly what will be included in the estimated $130-$145 per square foot cost of your house from a box. [ permanent link to this entry ]
Directory of Mobile Art Link Dr Reinhold Grether has a comprehensive up-to-date directory to mobile art and locative media that spans the domain from cellphonia to identiy control to place based storytelling. For example, there is Drift by Teri Rueb. This installation covers a 2 km x 2 km region that is filled with zones of interactive sound. Sounds play automatically as you wander through these interactive zones. [ permanent link to this entry ]
Refereeing By Wireless Sensor Link Scientists at the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits have developed a wireless ball and player location system that can immediately tell referees and game analysts where the soccer ball or striker is at any point in time. The chips, implanted in balls and players' shinpads, read their position up to 2000 times a second. The data is collected by antennas placed around the field and sent on to a central computer, which processes the statistical information. The new technology could, for example, inform spectators that the ball missed the goalpost by 3.9 centimeters. Coaches could also tell which players were hustling around the pitch, and which were holding back, either out of fatigue or laziness. The technology could help referees when the calls they must make seal the fates of careers, titles and millions of euros. Other sports could benefit from the chips, such as ski jumping, basketball or baseball. And besides sports, tests using the chips in airports are underway. Developers claim the system could also be used in searching for missing persons, guarding prisoners or maintaining security around buildings. [ permanent link to this entry ]
A PlaySpace Made of Wearable Architectural Elements Link txOom is a responsive PlaySpace, where the participants are invited to actively take part in transforming the environment; shaping the sound, playing with visuals, tangling in textiles, and thereby influencing the audio and visual environment around them by the way they move and interact with the space.
The txOom environments "adopt" the properties of living skins. Fabrics, garments and objects in these spaces are shapeable interfaces. The PlaySpace is composed of several wearable architectural elements including wall-shirts, swing-dresses and floor-skirts. By wearing these garments, the participants literally wear the txOom space, causing the physical environment to be reshaped by their activity in it. This activity influences the shape of the physical environment as a whole, simultaneously inciting growth and mutation in the media worlds. Each player is sensed by the PlaySpace using motion sensors and vision tracking systems incorporated into the space. Gradually, the social interaction between the participants, and the responsive sound and visuals projected throughout the PlaySpace, will change and evolve as they begin to play together. [ permanent link to this entry ]
Blogging As Seen Through the Public's Eyes Link If you've heard one of The Futures Lab presentations, you'll probably remember us mentioning the 'C (content) Generation' trend, whereby more and more consumers are creating their own content be that in hard or soft format. In support of this trend it is interesting to note the growth in the impact of consumer generated media via blogging. The Pew Internet and American Life Project - one of the best sources of data on Internet usage - recently released a study on blogging. According to Pew: By the end of 2004 blogs had established themselves as a key part of online culture. Two surveys by the Pew Internet & American Life Project in November established new contours for the blogosphere: 8 million American adults say they have created blogs; blog readership jumped 58% in 2004 and now stands at 27% of internet users; 5% of internet users say they use RSS aggregators or XML readers to get the news and other information delivered from blogs and content-rich Web sites as it is posted online; and 12% of internet users have posted comments or other material on blogs. Still, 62% of internet users do not know what a blog is. [ permanent link to this entry ]
The Future of the Everyday Link The articles, which include The Future of Love and Marriage, The Future of Homes and Housing, The Future of Retirement and the Elderly and The Future of Jobs and Employment. Consisting of a range of forecasts and commentary from several consultants and academics, the articles serve as a reasonable starting point for thinking about the future. [ permanent link to this entry ]
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