UXbyDesign.org » Gadget

Mind Altering Candy: Is this legit?

Bradley Hebdon — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 21:32:19 +0000

Eye Candy is a revolutionary new gadget that uses Sensory Substitution Technology. When a user places the candy gadget in their mouth, it transmits vivid emotive images into their mind’s eye. This evokes a specific feeling, depending on the flavor.

How this works
Each of your senses (touch, smell, sight, taste, hearing) sends information to the brain at a different frequency. The brain determines where the sensory information it receives comes from by the frequency at which it resonates, it can then process it in the appropriate way (e.g. turn sight information from the eyes into pictures in the mind).

An array of resonators positioned on the surface of an Eye Candy transmit information from the tongue to the brain at the frequency that the eyes usually send visual information to the brain. A pleasant sensation of soda bubbles can be felt on the tongue as the mind decodes this sensory information as vivid pictures.

What are the available flavors?

RELAX – Tranquil fish swimming through the streams of your consciousness will help you to unwind.
SOCIALISE - The shooting stars will encourage sociability.
ASSERT – A big thumbs is guaranteed to reassure and motivate you.
MEDITATE – The the slowly shrinking circle helps you to meditate.
OVERCOME – Images of spiders will enable you to overcome your fears.
FOCUS – Direction giving arrows help to improve focus and attention.

Head on over to EyeCandy.com and order yours, just make sure not to mix flavors! Is this a step in the path of replacing chemically induced “highs” with electronically induced “highs”?

Is this legit?
I’ll admit, it’s hard to believe this is legit. But before you make your mind up, watch the Wired Science video below, which shows a very similar device used by a blind person to read numbers on playing cards as if he was looking right at them, and even follow a path drawn on the ground.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Update: Well it turns out the Eye Candy product is actually a spoof, but the technology is very real.

Twittering from the Womb

Bradley Hebdon — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 03:20:58 +0000

Corey Menscher, a father-to-be, has constructed a device called the Kickbee that notifies him when his unborn baby kicks inside the womb.

The Kickbee is a stretchable band with attached sensors, and is worn by a pregnant mother over her stomach. A microcontroller in the band then captures the movement of the baby kicking, and transmits the signals wirelessly to an application on a nearby computer. The computer in turn broadcasts short messages of “I kicked Mommy!” on Twitter, which can be shared with family and friends.

The device is not yet available for purchase, but you can follow the Kickbee on Twitter.

'Wearable Agrirobot' Power Suit Helps Aging Farm Workers

Bradley Hebdon — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 22:41:38 +0000

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology has developed an agriculture robot suit tailored to the 40% of Japan’s farm workers who are over the age of 65. Shigeki Toyama, a professor in robotics who developed the robotic harvesting and pruning suit, sought to make it industry and task-specific in order to generate cost savings in producing the suit.

With Japan’s aging population, this solution seems to present a transition between human workers and what will ultimately become fully robotic ones.