I’ve talked about controlling your computer with your eyes and mind a couple of times already on this blog.

Well, Craig Rispin just helped blow my mind!  He handed me a scribbled URL on a scrap of paper at the office the other day and said, "I think you will like this…"

Tonight I eagerly entered the URL into my browser and discovered a recent video created by Cali of GeekBrief.tv describing new input devices for computers.  In particular a new technology from Emotiv, an Australian Company headquartered in San Fran, that reads brain waves to let you interact with a computer game with your thoughts, emotions and facial expressions. WTF?!

I have been doing some work with PSTNet who have actually put their reaction timing software into fMRIs and EEGs that can be used with eye trackers for research into brain function. However, making this gear small enough to put on your head, with a wireless connection to a usb dongle receiver in a laptop, is way cool! I didn’t think this kind of technlogy would be here so quick! And created on my Aussie doorstep with a COMET grant! 

There’s another video of it on CNET here and a 2SER radio podcast on their site here.

They claim that the new technology is a total form of communication that can allow us to comunicate with other people by using much more than our conscious thoughts and associated actions. Imagine what would happen if you coupled it with text based chat?  Goodbye emoticons

The hardware device is being released in the US, and available online, this year bundled with a game.  The headset will also be sold with a software that allows backwards compatibility with existing games you already own!  Oh, and there is a web platform coming too!

Even more exciting is that this technology could be used by people with disabilities such as quadraplegia in a similar way to how MyTobii currently works to allow Cerebral Palsy patients (for example) to control computers with their eyes. You can check that our on a previous post here too!

Exciting times!

Patrick Kennedy has launched a survey recently on LinkedIn and his blog to help us learn about how agencies view IA and usability.

I liked his approach, it was easily readable and written in a  way that agency creatives will understand. I’m glad he put it out there!  The questions certainly point to some answers about IA and usability acceptance that I have always intrigued me.

From his LinkedIn Answers post:

“Best practice design of websites, and other digital media, involves a set of skills known broadly as Information Architecture (IA) which generally means making designs user friendly. IA is also known to people doing this work, by such terms as User Experience (UX), User Centred Design (UCD), Interaction Design (IxD) or simply “usability”.

A significant amount of this sort of work is performed by agencies—whether they be advertising agencies, digital agencies or communication agencies. As a practitioner and educator in the field of IA, I am interested in learning how people go about practicing it, in particular how agencies “do IA”. This is to both confirm and challenge my own understanding of the way agencies work and how IA fits into their processes, who it gets done by and how it might be possible to give agencies the skills they need to perform better in this regard.”

Please help by completing the survey on his site here. It will run for the rest of the September 08.

Thanks Pat.