[From BBC News, where the story includes a 3:00 minute video] When the home help is a robot By Mark Ward Technology correspondent, BBC News, Istanbul 3 July 2011 In the future, we will have robots in our homes. They will do all the dirty and boring jobs that we don’t want to do because we’ve got better things to do such as sip cocktails or play with our children. Or at least that’s what many films, novels and media articles have promised. Reality is taking some time to catch up. So far, the only domestic robots enjoying significant success…

[From Fast Company‘s Co.Design site, where the article includes more images and two videos] HyperReality Helmet Uses Kinect To Create An Out-Of-Body Experience Maxence Parache’s experimental augmented-reality system lets you detach your point of view from your body. July 28, 2011 We take our first-person visual perspective for granted every second of the day — we have to, because our eyeballs are attached to our heads. But what if you could detach your personal “camera angle” at any moment and float away from your own body while still inhabiting it, like an on-demand out-of-body experience? Designer Maxence Paranche has created…

[From MoMA (pdf)] MoMA EXHIBITION INVESTIGATES THE COMMUNICATION BETWEEN PEOPLE AND OBJECTS THROUGH DESIGN Installation Provides Visitors with Greater Access to Information by Incorporating the Use of Technology, Including QR Codes and Twitter Hashtags for Each Object Talk to Me: Design and the Communication between People and Objects July 24–November 7, 2011 Special Exhibitions Gallery, third floor NEW YORK, July 19, 2011—The Museum of Modern Art presents Talk to Me: Design and the Communication between People and Objects from July 24 to November 7, 2011. With nearly 200 projects ranging from the microscopic to the cosmic and all designed in…

[From redOrbit] [Image1: The Justin mobile robotic system, developed at the German Aerospace Center, DLR, with its compliant controlled lightweight arms and its two four-fingered hands, is an ideal experimental platform [for the use of teleoperation in space exploration]. The mobile platform allows the long-range autonomous operation of the system. The independent wheels respond to the requirements of Justin’s upper body during manipulation tasks. Sensors and cameras allow the 3D reconstruction of the robot’s environment, enabling Justin to perform his work autonomously. Credits: DLR] Driving A Robot From The Space Station Posted on: Thursday, 30 June 2011 Meet Justin, an…

[From Bob Enderle’s Unfiltered Opinion IT Business Edge blog] [Image: A scene from the film Demolition Man] Facebook and the Ugly Present, Wonderful Future of Video Communications Posted by Rob Enderle Jul 7, 2011 One-on-one videoconferencing has likely had the longest time coming to market of any tech product since it became viable as a technology. First showcased in the 1960s, I participated in the first large trials at Apple that started in the late 1980s. While desktop cameras proliferated on notebooks and as USB peripherals, for much of the last two decades, people have rarely performed video calls. WebEx…

[From The Australian] [Image: The interactive experience at UNSW’s iCinema Centre. Source: The Australian] Lost in cyberspace Ruth Ostrow From: The Australian July 23, 2011 You only have to be the parent of a child over the age of seven to know what I’m talking about: the vacant eyes so preoccupied by what’s on screen that they can’t focus on your face for more than a few seconds before being drawn back into the cyberworld. As you talk, your little darling types or toggles. “Are you listening to me?” you ask, only to be told in a precocious tone: “Yeahhhh.…

[From PSFK] Sonic Cradle Lets You Mix Soundscapes With Your Breathing By Stephen Fortune on July 13, 2011 One can rest easy about the fate of the remix, as artists are constantly seeking new ways to push remix culture into new territory. Oftentimes, they do so by reimagining the interface by which one can cut and mash up (like such novel projects as the VJacket and Karina Van Heck’s internal organ mixing desk), and the latest experiment in embodied remix interfaces is even more ambitious than previous forays. Jay Vidyarthi and Darwin Frost have designed the Sonic Cradle that enables…

[From Japan Times] [Image: Virtual venue: Takeshi Natsuno, managing director at Dwango, explains the features of Nico Nico Douga’s new Nicofarre venue. ALEXIS WUILLAUME PHOTO] Website Nico Nico Douga goes live … house By MARK JARNES Special to The Japan Times Thursday, July 14, 2011 Online video-sharing website Nico Nico Douga has become a popular place for young Japanese to check out new music. Now imagine stepping inside the site to experience those tunes live. That’s the feeling you get when you enter Tokyo’s newest live venue, Nicofarre. “We wanted to create an interactive musical experience where reality and virtual…

[From The Philadelphia Inquirer] War games, not debates, are what this race needs July 17, 2011 Jim Geraghty Brace yourself: Seven Republican presidential debates are scheduled in the next four months, and even more may be added. After two or three, the questions and answers are going to sound depressingly similar and predictable. Ah, yes, you’ll cut taxes and spending. You’ll respond decisively to foreign threats. Yawn. With primary debates including so little debate and so much rehearsed recitation of stale sound bites, it’s time to shake things up. What could give primary voters a clearer perspective of a candidate’s…

[From TechFlash] [Image: The avatar for Dr. Brian Ross welcomes participants to an online training session using Xbox chat technology (Stephen Brashear photos/PSBJ)] GAMING TECHNOLOGY How Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and Kinect help surgeons in the OR by Brad Broberg on Saturday, July 16, 2011 The sight of a surgeon playing “Grand Theft Auto” in the operating room might raise eyebrows, but it’s one example of how consumer technology is being repurposed to advance the practice of medicine. Rising medical costs — bloated by expensive, complicated machines — are wrecking the nation’s economic health, while off-the-shelf consumer gadgets keep getting cheaper…

[From The University of California, San Diego News Center] [Image: Brain response as measured by fMRI to videos of a robot, android and human] Your Brain on Androids July 14, 2011 By Inga Kiderra Ever get the heebie-jeebies at a wax museum? Feel uneasy with an anthropomorphic robot? What about playing a video game or watching an animated movie, where the human characters are pretty realistic but just not quite right and maybe a bit creepy? If yes, then you’ve probably been a visitor to what’s called the “uncanny valley.” The phenomenon has been described anecdotally for years, but how…

[From AFP via France 24; for more information see the museum’s Facebook page here] Pamplona museum offers virtual bull runs (AFP) – July 14, 2011 PAMPLONA, Spain — Revellers at Spain’s San Fermin festival lacking the nerve to run through the streets chased by a herd of thunderous bulls can now opt for a virtual bull-run. Visitors to Pamplona’s Museo del Encierro run on a treadmill while wearing virtual reality goggles that let them see computer-generated images of what it is like to race ahead of pounding hooves. “This is the only simulator in the world of a San Fermin…