Bruce Sterling's Blog, page 743

ILoveSketch

*Okay, I don't exactly "love sketch," but I like it that they "keep the gesture vocabulary compact." What an amazing thing to say. When I'm a feeble old guy surrounded by augmented reality (instead of getting any actual food and medical care) I hope they "keep my gesture vocabulary compact."

*Now imagine this as an AR sketching application with fiducial graph paper. "Designing augmented reality with augmented reality."

Via Core77:

Augmented Reality: Metaio touch interaction

*Oh yeah. That's the stuff. You know what AR has been missing? Real-time haptic interactive phantom robots, that's what. Tell me that's not awesome!

*Need two of these! Printout robot wars. On the desktop. With your fingers. They're fighting for hockey pucks. Augmented sparks are flying, and stuff. Stand back, Nolan Bushnell!

*Via @Twitt_AR.

Texting the fish

*The one and only Natalie Jeremijenko, ladies and gentlemen.

http://www.sentientcity.net/exhibit/?p=5

Whuffie Bank opens

*I'd start giggling uncontrollably if this thing actually worked.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/09/15/tc50-meet-the-whuffie-a-new-currency-thats-based-on-your-online-reputation/

"It's a sad fact of life that many of the most insightful and helpful people on the web (and in real life, for that matter) aren't financially rewarded for their efforts — they may well be satisfied with the good they've done, but that doesn't help to pay the rent. The Whuffie Bank, a new non-profit organization...

Augmented Reality: an actual AR business announcement

*I'm not gonna run every one of these I get, but I still get all touched when I see today's AR pioneers talking in public like actual business people with a real industry. Here's some French guys who are signing a formal team-up to run some AR on Windows Mobile.

*Yes, I know — but come on, somebody has got to run something on Windows Mobile! It's Windows, they're a business, they have money. Come on.

"Total Immersion, the world leader in augmented reality, (((I wonder what PR guy decided t...

ReadWriteWeb's Top 5 Web Trends of 2009

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/top_5_web_trends_of_2009.php

*Feasting on buzzwords like there's no tomorrow! Yeah man!

*That's a pretty good summary, folks. If you're Joe Desktop or Jane Googlesurfer, and you wonder what's going on in the deeper waters of web development, you'd be up to speed in short order after a ponderous spin through the slides there.

SR Engine

*Okay, this isn't "augmented reality," because there's no three-dimensional registration in it. It doesn't register where it is, it has no GPS and it doesn't even have a server.

*But it is a real-time image-recognition system that pulls websites off wall posters. Also corporate logos, floor plans, whatever the camera recognizes. The user experience *looks like* augmented reality, because it's all overlays, pop-up bubbles and thumb clicks. So even if it's not "true AR," we're going to s...

Half Naked, Gun-Toting Female Libertarian Teenagers

*You gotta hand it to those Free Staters: when they want some cheesy media coverage, they know how to get it.

News & Views for Anarchists & Activists:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/smygo

http://sentinelsource.com/articles/20...

Charge dropped against teenager

Free Stater went topless in city

By PHILLIP BANTZ

Sentinel Staff

Wednesday, September 09, 2009

The armed teenager who was arrested while topless in downtown Keene did
not break the law, according to police p...

Augmented Reality Business Models

*If you're into AR, you may want a look at this, as "state-supported Marxist-Leninist augmented reality" is, sadly, no longer in style.

http://www.personalizemedia.com/16-top-augmented-reality-business-models/

Augmented Reality: PlayStation Eye

*There are critics who think that the cheap, gimmicky aspects of Augmented Reality are gonna lead to the early doom of the industry. That's a lot like complaining that gimmicky coin-op videogames are gonna ruin the brilliant field of Artificial Intelligence.

*Augmented Reality's comic-book lack of dignity is a big part of its charm. To paraphrase Marvin Minsky, if Augmented Reality was actually good, it would mean the end of everything we know.