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Friday, February 1, 2013

Future smart devices will extend our senses

Faiza Elmasry of voanews.com writes:

Imagine shopping for clothes online and being able to run your hand across the screen on your computer or smartphone to feel the fabrics. That kind of simulation technology could be available within the next five years.

“We’re talking about reinventing the way computers operate and you interact with them as humans,” says IBM Vice President Bernie Meyerson.

Extending our sense of touch is one of five innovations IBM believes will change the world in the next five years, according to the company's annual “Five in Five” list.

Smart machines will also soon be able to listen to the environment and highlight the sounds we care about most. For instance, an advanced speech recognition system will tell new parents why their baby is crying.

“Your child is hungry, versus ill, versus lonely,” Meyerson says. "This kind of thing is not possible today, but with a sophisticated enough system, it’s actually possible.”

In the near future, personal computers will be able to do more than recognize images and visual data. Their built-in cameras will be able to analyze features such as colors, and understand the meaning of visual media, such as knowing how to sort family photos.

Smart machines will also be able to smell. If you sneeze on your computer or cell phone, tiny sensors embedded in the machine will be able to analyze thousands of molecules in your breath.

“It can give you an alarm and say; ‘Hey, you may not feel sick yet, but you have an infection, you must go see your doctor immediately,’” Meyerson says.

IBM scientists are also developing a system which can experience flavors to be used by chefs to create recipes. It breaks down ingredients to their molecular level and blends them to create the most popular flavors and smells, even as it helps us mind our waistlines.

“It can recommend to you the food you love to taste, but it can also keep track of the caloric limits, whether you have limits on the fat or cholesterol you can eat,” Meyerson says. “So it strikes that ideal balance between the best possible taste and the best possible nutritional outcome.”

One of the most impressive things about the IBM list, says Georgetown University computer science professor Mark Maloof, is how powerful these tiny, smart devices are becoming:

“I think one of the surprises in that list is how a lot of very sophisticated computational methods for doing say for example, hearing and vision, have been implemented on these tiny small mobile devices.”

Maloof hopes the advances will encourage more students to study science, technology, engineering and math, preparing them to play a role in future innovations.

“It’s going to be exciting to see what young people do with the increased availability of mobile platforms and networking and computing power,” he says.

He believes there’s little doubt advances in computer technology over the next five years will make what now seems like science fiction a part of our everyday lives.

Originally published on voanews.com

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Opinion Articles

iPhone users are optimists while BlackBerry users are pessimists... apparently

Mark Bridge writes:

At the end of our weekly podcast covering the latest mobile industry news, we usually finish with an “And finally...” report. Something that’s lighter that the rest of the headlines. You know the kind of thing; kittens using mobile phones, puppy-powered mobile phone chargers...

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Indian mobile phone app aims to thwart sexual assaults

Kurt Achin of voanews.com writes:

In India's burgeoning economy, more and more women are going to work in offices - exposing them to what can sometimes be dangerous urban conditions. Now, a new technological initiative aims to protect women against sexual assault.

Author: The Fonecast
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Promote your business at Mobile World Congress with The Fonecast

Mark Bridge writes:

Another year, another Mobile World Congress!

It’s something of a cliché to talk about the months flying by, how it seems like yesterday when everyone in Barcelona had a Nokia handset and the dancers on the CBOSS stand were all wearing full-length evening dresses. Yet it’s also true. Except for that part about the dancers, anyway.

Here at TheFonecast.com we’ve had a busy 12 months that have seen us talking to more and more people, gaining a much larger audience and watching the mobile industry grow dramatically.

Author: The Fonecast
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Will the CES trend for larger screens lead to poorer mobile web sites?

James Rosewell writes:

This year’s CES event in Las Vegas promises to be the biggest yet. There’ll be mobile phones, there’ll be tablets, there’ll be gaming devices, there’ll be sat nav – and there’ll be many other products that now include their own mobile data connection.

When you’ve got mobile data, it’s usually an obvious step to add a browser... and before you know it, consumers are browsing the internet from a device that was never really intended to visit conventional web sites.

Author: The Fonecast
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Carnival of the Mobilists #256

Mark Bridge writes:

Happy New Year and welcome to the travelling circus better known as the Carnival of the Mobilists. If you’re looking for the best mobile-related blog posts from the past couple of weeks, you’ve come to the right place. (If you’re wondering about the name of Beyonce’s baby, you need to try somewhere else).

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