In my last post I wrote about several wearable devices I used while studying in Germany. With all the chatter about wearable displays at Consumer Electronics Show (CES) this year I decided it’s time for a post about wearable display devices that look promising. Several of the companies making the devices have been researching and developing this technology for several years now and appear to be on the verge of creating usable devices that consumers can afford. Keep in mind there are two main purposes for these displays: media consumption and augmented reality.

According to MITs Technology Review, most of the companies working on these wearable head mounted displays started out building systems for the military. My interest in wearable devices is centered around consumer products for recreation and leisure time, however it’s fascinating to see some of these companies building innovative communication products for industries like aviation and hospitality first, in order to generate enough revenue and research to get themselves into the consumer market. Read more…

It’s Friday, which means that it’s time for another Viral Video of the Week. Hooray!

This week, I’ve selected a commercial video which has gone gangbusters. It was released only a month ago, and has seen more than ten million hits–and those are only the views on the primary YouTube upload. Wowzer.

Obviously, someone at Sony is doing something right. Not only are people watching this video, but they’re talking about it–arguing about it, even  (read the comments).  All this spells advertising gold.

Well played, Sony.

Considering that Seattle Seahawks fans are still on a high after watching Marshawn Lynch’s epic run at the end of this weekend’s playoff game against the New Orleans Saints, this post comes at the right time. By now, plenty of people have seen the numerous YouTube clips of Lynch’s electrifying 67 yard run in which he throws arguably one of the best stiff arms in NFL playoff history. The numerous uploaded clips on YouTube are nearing the 1 million viewer mark if they haven’t surpassed them already in just three days and that says as much about “The Run” as it does on how quickly sports fans take ownership of plays that they love and share them with the online community.

Here are two videos I watched today that particularly standout because they infuse sounds from older 1980s video games such as Tecmo Bowl and Super Mario Bros.

And here’s Marshawn Lynch in “star” mode from the video game, Super Mario Bros.

(via Kottke)

I’ve often wondered what kind of technology my 5-year-old daughter will be using when she grows up. The following is proof that I have a feeble imagination. But the folks at MIT Media Lab make up for what I lack.

What if you no longer needed a cellphone, computer, computer mouse, iPad, digital camera or any number of other devices. What if you replaced a whole stable of hardware with a small wearable gizmo around your neck that interacted with your hand gestures.

Read more…

Yesterday Microsoft released Windows Phone 7, the company’s latest attempt to gain a foothold in the mobile space. With the smartphone market already dominated by Apple, Google, and RIM, some people are saying it might be too late for Microsoft. But could mobile gaming be its ticket?

Read more…

Last month, Wolfire Games, an independent game developer and distributor, unleashed a pay-what-you-want campaign for a bundle of indie games that seemed to take a play from the famous Radiohead pay-what-you-want experiment. The Humble Indie Bundle, as it was called, was offered from May 4 through May 11, and generated over $1.2 million in revenue for the game developers who participated, as well as two charities.

The bundle initially consisted of five indie games: World of Goo (2D Boy), Aquaria (Bit Blot), Gish (Edmund McMillen), Lugaru (Wolfire Games), and Penumbra: Overture (Frictional Games ). Later, Amanita Design kicked in a sixth game, Samorost 2. All the  games run on PC, Mac, and Linux platforms.

People could literally pay anything they wanted for the Humble Indie Bundle, starting at $.01. The largest single donation rang in at $3,333.33. I personally paid $10.01. You could choose to allot part or all of the price to the two charities, Child’s Play and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). While you could have bought the games or donated to the charities separately, the combination of the two made the bundle appealing. You can’t deny the power of one -stop shopping.

John Graham, Chief Operating Officer of Wolfire Games, was kind enough to answer some of my questions about the Humble Indie Bundle campaign in a post-promotion debriefing.

How did the idea for the pay-what-you-want Humble Indie Bundle come about?
Ever since the success of 2DBoy’s pay-what-you-want experiment and our Organic Indie Preorder Pack [a game bundle of Wolfire’s Overgrowth and the Unknown Worlds’ Natural Selection 2], we had this feeling that independent developers could really do a lot to promote themselves.
How did you decide what games to put in the bundle?

Our main requirement for this bundle was that we needed awesome indie games available for Mac, Linux, and Windows.  We didn’t have a fancy rubric, and weren’t maximizing any kind of bundle hotness equation, but I think it’s fair to say that we ended up with a group of games that are all different but very awesome.
Have you ever tried anything like this before? Did you learn anything from the Radiohead pay-what-you-want experiment?

Well, our theory was that a pay-what-you-want bundle would maximize participation and also allow people to feel like they were getting their money’s worth, and I think this proved true.  With pirated copies already easily available for all the games, we figured our biggest risk was not piracy but rather that we would spend a lot of time on this promotion, and then no one would hear about it. Read more…

Comparison of video size, iPad and iPod Touch

As far as tech toys go, I’m a late adopter.  I like playing with free betas, but when it comes down to handing over money, I become very conservative.  I like at least one Service Pack on my new OS, a critical mass of my friends on social apps, a solid couple of months post-release on a massively multiplayer online game, and a stalwart recommendation from my IT friends for new hardware.  I delayed my purchase of my Xbox 360 for almost two years; then shortly after I bought it, they announced the big price drop with the addition of the Elite model (shoulda waited longer!)

But this time, I threw the dice and pre-ordered a 32 GB Wifi-only iPad.  I even threw in a Mac Bluetooth keyboard, the dock, and a case.  There’s no super feature that made this the penultimate gadget for me; my desires were based around a great experience with my iPod Touch, a slowly growing interest in e-books (much to the dismay of my library card) and the ability to have a “one-stop-shop lite” computing device.  I game some, I email a fair amount, I watch videos while I travel or work out (no more tiny iPod on the treadmill – huzzah!) and I’ve been using the iPod Kindle app when I fly. Read more…

It’s hard not to notice social games. Every time I log into Facebook, I am flooded with requests to play games with friends. Given that I’ve had an aquarium on and off since I was three, the allure of a virtual Facebook fish tank finally became too much: FishVille was going to be my game of choice. (Apparently, I’m not alone, as the game has more than 23 million monthly players.)

Like other social games, FishVille, developed by Zynga, leverages your social network for gameplay. Your friends help you obtain items and take care of your fish, and you help them in return. In that way, social games are more collaborative than other game genres. Social games are also built around the idea of playing regularly. Just like you feel compelled to check Facebook, you feel compelled to check on your fish tank or your farm. I decided to play FishVille for 17 days to see if it could keep my interest for the duration.

Read more…