A camera you can wear as a pendant to record every moment of your life will soon be launched by a UK-based firm.
Originally invented to help jog the memories of people with Alzheimer's disease, it might one day be used by consumers to create "lifelogs" that archive their entire lives.
Worn on a cord around the neck, the camera takes pictures automatically as often as once every 30 seconds. It also uses an accelerometer and light sensors to snap an image when a person enters a new environment, and an infrared sensor to take one when it detects the body heat of a person in front of the wearer. It can fit 30,000 images onto its 1-gigabyte memory.
The ViconRevue was originally developed as the SenseCam by Microsoft Research Cambridge, UK, for researchers studying Alzheimer's and other dementias. Studies showed that reviewing the events of the day using SenseCam photos could help some people improve long-term recall.
See some images taken using a SenseCam during trials in Cambridge, UK.
Can't get enough
Now Vicon, based in Oxford, UK, which specialises in motion-capture technology for the movie industry, has licensed the technology for the camera from Microsoft and intends to put it into large-scale production.
Imogen Moorhouse, Vicon's managing director, says that Microsoft has licensed the technology because it can't keep up with demand for the gadget. So far, only 500 have been made, most for use by researchers.
Vicon's version will retail for £500 (about $820) and will also be marketed to researchers at first; it will go on sale in the next few months. A consumer version should be released in 2010.
The gadget will be launched at the Society for Neuroscience meeting in Chicago this weekend, in conjunction with a conference on research using SenseCam so far.
A study published earlier this year described how SenseCam helped a person who had suffered encephalitis that permanently affected their ability to recall recent events. After reviewing SenseCam photos of a significant event every two days for three weeks, the person could remember it substantially better, even after months of not looking at the photos, compared with events that were not reviewed this way or were recorded only in a written diary.
Lifelogging
For consumers, the gadget will provide an easy way to become a "lifelogger" – someone who attempts to electronically record as much of their life as possible. Microsoft researcher Gordon Bell has made his life an experiment in lifelogging, recording everything from phone calls to TV viewing, and uses a SenseCam wherever he goes.
"What's great about these kinds of memory technologies is that they can be very usable for ordinary people," says Henry Kautz, a computer scientist at the University of Rochester, New York, who works on technology to assist cognition.
"Once you have that mass market, that brings the prices down." Eventually, he says, a SenseCam-like device could be part of an artificial memory used by ordinary people, just as they use notebooks and planners as memory aids today.
Journal reference: Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry, DOI: doi:10.1136/jnnp.2008.164251
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Have your say
But I haven't got a life. I just read NS all day and comment.
If I was really really important, I'd be one of those superstar NS reporters who make lots and lots of money, have the best women and drive Ferraris.
Your life is your filter of NS. Values by those with your interests. There is an app for that.
same here.... I spend more time reading NS than doing anything else...
same here.... I spend more time reading NS than doing anything else...
I Haven't Got A Life
Sat Oct 17 17:18:03 BST 2009 by wowaname
http://s6.zetaboards.com/wowaname
Seriously, don't double click.
Wow u guys are dicks and assholes who dnt kno what 2+2 is and read science shit all day u really need to get a life.
This comment breached our terms of use and has been removed.
They should add a microphone. Adding sound to a synchronized slideshow of photos would give a much more complete record of the day, and if recorded in mono at low quality it would not use much memory.
In the U.S., you need to provide notice if you are recording audio.
The other problem with this idea (of having photos taken throughout your day), is that they will need a method of shutting it down whenever you enter a bathroom or locker room.
And copyright owners would probably want it shut down whenever you enter a movie theater.
Aside from that, this would be great on vacations (especially if you could increase the frequency of the photos).
Some U.S. states require any participant in a telephonic conversation to disclose whether the conversation is being recorded. Some states have no such requirement.
U.S. federal law prohibits third-party interception of electronic communications except pursuant to court order or under post-9/11 antiterrorism practices that are controversial and in litigation.
I don't believe that there are any restrictions on surreptitious recording of face-to-face conversations unless one of the participants is in a protected class, such as some government officials.
Washington DC
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