Bringing touch to virtual worlds
Prototype
Virtual worlds such as Second Life offer bored and lonely romantics a shot at parallel existences that are more stimulating than their workaday lives. They also present the unlucky a chance to fall in love with their perfect mate.
One thing you can't do in Second Life, however, is feel the cashmere on your date's sweater, or the smack across the face that tells you the gesture was unwelcome. It's called haptics, and it's the next frontier in virtual reality and immersive computing: adding the sense of touch to online interactions.
Visitors to SIGGRAPH this week in Boston got to check out a prototype haptic device, the Fingertip Digitizer from the University at Buffalo, which has a thimble-like metal tip through which you can sense and control virtual objects.
``They said it was the most intuitive interface they had seen for art and design work," said Thenkurussi Kesavadas, director of UB's Virtual Reality Lab, who created the Fingertip Digitizer with UB mechanical engineer Young-Seok Kim.
The Fingertip Digitizer has a force sensor, an accelerometer, and a motion tracker, so you can feel ``resistance" from objects that you ``touch" on the screen, and manipulate them with your hand and finger movements (all without actually touching the screen).
Kesavadas sees applications for the Fingertip Digitizer as a medical diagnostics device and video-gaming controller, and as an interface for people with motor control problems that prevent them from using a keyboard and mouse effectively. He said commercial versions of the Fingertip Digitizer may be available in two years, as the costs of its components come down.
Mobil Phones
Phone is a rich blend of music and calling
It's tempting when a phone promises to replace your iPod, so you can hit the streets with an all-in-one device and a lighter load.
So imagine my father-in-law's disappointment when he learned it would cost him two bucks apiece to download Frank Sinatra from his wireless service's music store. So much for taking the Chairman on his daily strolls around his neighborhood on the Cape.
Wireless service providers are only now beginning to make it easier to rip your existing CDs and MP3s onto your phone, even as they continue to steer you toward their online stores, which compete with the Apple iTunes Music Store.
The new LG Chocolate from Verizon Wireless provides more than one way to manage your music. Impulsive types can still pay $1.99 to download songs directly to the phone from the V Cast Music Store. But you can also download songs from V Cast to your Windows XP PC for 99 cents each and then upload them to your phone with Windows Media Player 10. You can also upload your MP3s to the Chocolate phone from a Windows XP PC.
Mac users will have to stick to their iPods and iTunes for now.
The Chocolate also will not play iTunes-formatted files.
The Chocolate also has a 1.3 megapixel camera, Bluetooth (naturally), and a microSD memory expansion for up to 2 gigabytes of additional data storage.
Ipodding
Boombox for the court or the beach
The iThunder from MTX Audio (www.mtx.com) is not quite as bad as the boombox Radio Rahim carries in Spike Lee's ``Do the Right Thing," but it should turn a few heads on the street, especially if you carry it on your shoulder.
The iThunder is one of the latest stereos to be built around the iPod. This particular model will add 5 1/2 pounds and 15 1/2 inches to the weight and length of your mobile music experience. And don't forget all of those C batteries you'll need for trips to the beach, eight of them.
Available in black, white, or pink, the iThunder (about $180 at the MTX website) has two 4-inch speakers and a wireless remote control. It supports all iPod models except the Shuffle.
