Google Gogs

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Self-Powered Gadgets

Another one for cross-posting:
Slashdot | Self-Powered Parts Are the Future

"The idea is that the parts will make external power sources redundant — because they can convert energy from body heat, light and vibrations straight into electricity. Self powered electronics have already sporadically been used in technology like wall-mount remote control units for air conditioners, says Nikkei, but existing parts are bulky and cost a couple thousand yen a piece. 3,000 yen is about $35 — which means they're not the best bet, financially, yet."

In all of the Suki series romance novels, the 'gogs' and earbuds are powered by body heat, or a combination of body heat and saline (contact lens gogs). Gogs contain computer screens and sometimes cameras, earbuds have more advanced processors, speakers and possibly microphones.  Most anything worn on the body is powered by the person's body heat, movement, chemical interaction or a combination.



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More Tech from Suki's World coming true

Mapping Emotions to Video 

EmoRate is an application that demonstrates the power of Affective Computing, a technology that allows computers to detect and react to human emotions and will change drastically the way we interact with them in our daily lives. The last barrier that has held Affective Computing back, an affordable consumer grade EEG headset, has been broken with the introduction of the 14-electrode EPOC headset, created by Emotiv systems, Inc.  Watch the video below to see a demonstration of the EmoRate Emotion Recording system. Then read the FAQ below to find out how I trained the system and what you can expect from this brave new field of computing in the near future.  If you want to be updated about my progress with EmoRate, or get the latest news concerning the fascinating fields of Affective Computing and Brain Control Interfaces, sign up for the EmoRate newsletter using the box on the left.  There’s also a Resources section below with helpful links to find more information . . .

In the environment for the Suki Series, I wanted the interface between people and their devices to have an intuitive look and feel.  Without going into how everything would work, since these are novels not technical manuals, I left out much of the gritty detail.

Once they cook, morph and develop for about 20 years, interfaces like the one above, that maps a user's emotion to video, could add functionality to face recognition systems in the voyeur cams that saturate the industrialized world of the 2030s.

Other devices are voice controlled, like household devices.  In homes, blinds, lights and audio systems are adjusted through voice commands.  Some items, especially lighting, come on to an initial setting as people enter a room (and can be assumed to go to another setting when they leave).  This technology is available today, just not as well developed or in as wide use as what it in the novels.

The technology below is key to the gog interface. Typing in air on virtual keyboards displayed to the user through their contacts or glasses.  What I was thinking about for the future is the device interpret hand gestures accurately with little or no user programming or mapping.

Tired of marking up that touchscreen display with fingerprints? That may soon come to end if device manufactures adopt a new Touchless Gesture User Interface technology developed by Elliptic Labs in their products.

Elliptic plans to showcase their “Mimesign” technology at IFA in Berlin from the 3rd to 8th of September 2010. Mimesign will bring intuitive ways for people to interact with devices. The possibilities range from tablets, remote controls or in-car media controls. The interface is based on ultrasound technology and allows the user to remain in an unchanged state. Meaning, you can pimp slap your way through a photo album.

It’s really as simple as it sounds. A set of gestures are programmed in to the interface allowing the user to navigate with free, unrestricted hand movements. It’s a great invention and has many practical uses, for instance waving your hand to change radio stations in the car is much safer than leaning over to find the button. But waving your hand across the air to change photos on your media player is a bit of extra work for me, I would rather tap the edge of the screen to flip pictures than to wave my hand across two feet of air. Perhaps the movements in the video are more dramatic than they need to be?

 

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Key Gog Technology a Reality

Electronic auto-focus glasses

A layer of liquid crystal sandwiched inside each lens alters its refractive properties according to the current applied, adapting the focal length according to where the wearer is looking.

In the 2030's future that I imagine in the first Suki series, this was one of the unstated features of the glasses people wear.  I addressed the LCD virtual 3D displays and virtual keyboards in the glasses.
 
Sarah and Suki took the concept into contact lenses and I ran with that for the new series, Suki With A Twist.
 
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More Suki Tech in the News

Slashdot scoop:
forgot_my_username writes"The MIT media Lab is developing a motion screen computer. It looks back at you. It measures light, and gestures and uses those to control the interface. 'Imagine every pixel on your LCD screen emitting light could also be receiving light,' said Ramesh Rakar, an Associate Professor at the MIT Media Lab. They even mention the health benefits of not touching displays."

A little more for those who might not have read all the books.  I think that it like everybody besides John, me and the other contributors ;)

John Tagliaferro introduced the concept of "gogs" in the original series and found a similar MIT project, Sixth-Sense, that he posted about sometime last year.  The user has a display in his or her glasses and earbuds, they type in the air on a virtual keyboard in their line of vision.

Sarah built on that a lil' in her fan fiction story, John and Suki: Vacation Fun, where she uses earbuds that are deep in the ear and need a tool to remove.  Mike and Honey (the villeins) use them to control and help mind-wash John and Suki.

By the time they got me talked into writing a story I got the idea of using contacts instead of glasses, or goggles, for the display.  I really did not address input when I had Suki using them, they were more for pre-set information display.

In the new series, John takes it up to another level.  He has the displays in the contacts, and other things, controlled by eye movements or by finger movements in the air.  He extends the earbud concept a bit more too.

Sorry, was looking for a picture of a model with her fingers in the air for an illustration and had to settle for the one trying to sell costumes :)

Update:  It seems Vernor Vinge used a similar concept in 2001 in work he won a Hugo Award for.  Thanks for the tip  maxume!


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Key technology for gogs: Transparent LCD screen

Samsung shows off transparent laptop screen.

We have already seen some of the most interesting transparent gadgets in the past, but the latest laptop concept by Samsung, showcased at the CES 2010, will definitely take you by surprise with its immaculate transparency. Featuring 14-inch OLED display, which when turned off becomes up to 40 percent transparent, the laptop concept is claimed to be the world’s first and largest transparent OLED laptop. This is the only info available at the moment, though you may go through the video for a closer look after the jump.

In the future that I write about, most everybody wears some form of glasses, or gogs, with data displayed on transparent lenses.  Was thinking however they are doing this is about right, if brought down to glasses size.

Edit/correction:  Did not realize blogger buddy Suki got this from a Slashdot post she responded to in the firehose.  Another article here.

H/t: Dyne09

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Neil Stephenson's "Turn On, Tune In, Veg Out"

An interesting comment in an email pointed me to this Slashdot story, which was good but I have no strong opinion either way on it.  It did have an interesting link to a Neil Stephenson article from 2005, Turn On, Tune In, Veg Out.

It is a critique of a Star Wars movie that was just released.  His criticism was more toward the movie itself not having much "geek" in it, all veg.  Maybe a little more of a critique of the method.

Post Origional 3 SW movies all sorts of TV shows, books and other products were produced that developed a rich background for the movies to be based on.  Neal describes an early scene in one of the newer movies where the Jedi board a ship and fight a lot, then take the ship over.  The problem he notices is that noplace in the movie is it revealed who owns the ship!  I caught the theme of Socialism vs. Free Market from Neal'sdescription, but that is a different issue.

Full disclosure, I am a fan of Mr. Stephenson, Snowcrash is one of my favorite books ever.  I am not a Star Wars follower, but I have seen the first two movies.  I was unaware that the movie franchise had done what Neal describes so extensively.

Something I did with the Suki Series was put the background to the story online, but I was trying to avoid what Neal describes in his article.  In the books I think I have enough descriptions of gadgets, cars, clothes and the general environment to have complete stories.  I also began this blog and got Suki to help (she helped with everything and is too modest about it) to get into the super geeky details.  She even started her own blog for ultra geek things related to the books.

For example, I think I describe "gogs" well and I never bothered to Google the term.  It just seemed like an appropriate term for glasses with a view screen, but I didn't want to take up pages of book space for it, so the details are here and at SukiSite.com.  I wanted the story to be focused on the characters and their relationship.  Very little of it is affected by world events, in the beginning, so that stuff is here and on the website too.  When world events invade their lives that is in the books and not much mention of it here.

Anyway, go check Neal's article.  It is very good, just like everything else he writes.  I am hoping that the method I used is beneficial to the readers.  The bits of feedback I have gotten so far are mostly positive and yes, I know the SukiSite.com page is "plain and ugly," it is supposed to be that way ;)  Fast loading, clean, etc.

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Suki and John's Cavalcade of Porn!

Okay everybody.  Suki and I are going to hook you up with some of our favorite erotica.

My first choices:  The Perfect Trap and The Perfect Trap 2 by Jim Weathers.  I was thinking about this while I was writing Suki I for the erotica that Suki had John watch through blindfold style gogs while she was in control and away at work.  Liquid Motion was a thought too.

Stay tuned for Suki's picks!

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Gogs

John's "gog" idea from his books is now patented by Apple (hat tip to Gawker):

STEVE JOBS

Apple Granted Patent on iGlasses

By Ryan Tate, 2:44 PM on Tue Sep 29 2009, 2,898 views

Apple today received a patent on a head-mounted laser video display. Now that the three-year old application has finally been approved, Steve Jobs can put these babies through his grueling design process and hopefully pretty them up a bit.

Apple's innovation over previous head mounted displays is, in part, to separate the laser engine from the headgear, stowing the engine in a separate unit connected to the frames via fiber optic cable. Such an "iGlasses" setup, as our tipster calls it, would allow a more immersive television, gaming or conferencing experience when using, say, an iPhone. Or you could just walk around pretending to be a commando from the future, with frickin' laser breams attached to your head.

It's not clear whether Jobs will ever turn this officially-designated innovation into a product; his company boasts an impressive cash hoard with which it funds more research than it can use. Many of the patents from Apple's seemingly endless stream are never heard from again. The obsessive CEO remains, by all accounts, infatuated with his forthcoming tablet product at the moment, so we're not counting on being able to buy iGlasses anytime soon. But simply by putting the patent into the trophy case, Apple adds a little something to its mystique among its growing base of fans, the press included.

The first page of the patent is below, along with one drawing; we've archived the full filing here. AppleInsider summarized the application back in April.

Suki's Store is running

Suki's Store

Gogs

I extended the concept of Bluetooth ear buds to adding visual along with data input and manipulation and called the system "gogs", short for goggles.

After having the book almost finished I found The Sixth Sense Project, while researching language & culture technology at my regular job.

'SixthSense' is a wearable gestural interface that augments the physical world around us with digital information and lets us use natural hand gestures to interact with that information.

Same idea, just more advanced and compact two decades from now.  Users do tend to get immersed in their own little world of sight and sound, paying even less attention to what is going on around them than they do now.

The devices have a high processing and storage capacity.

Live video chat is not used much, since most people under the age of 35 are wearing their main communication device on their face.  People a bit older still tend to use "ancient" or "fossil" wireless phones and they tend to use video chat and text.

All of the devices can be "anonymous", but information collected as the device is in proximity of other devices quickly sets up targeted advertising unless the user takes the trouble to block ads.

The US government is prohibited from analyzing user data unless it is paid for on a government issued credit card, i.e., "stimulus card".