Thursday, October 30, 2008

Reading List: Wired, November 2008

Here is an overview regarding two interesting articles from this month's wired magazine. I've provided a link for only one of the articles as I could not find the other one online. Enjoy.

Mainstream Physical Computing Interfaces
In the Gadgets column, Steve Levy talks about three products that have succeeded in integrating the digital and physical world in a compelling and easy to use manner - the Wii, the iPhone and Guitar Hero. Though all of these gadgets were launched before 2008, it was only this year that they reached maturity, achieved more widespread adoption and "dominated the zeitgeist." I have to agree with Steve's assessment since these are three of my favorite gadgets. Link to column, The Melding of Physical and Digital Realms.

Open-Source Hardware
Clive Thompson's article titled "Build it. Share it. Profit. Can Open Source Hardware Work." about open-source hardware was very interesting. Now that production cost for hardware technology is now sufficiently cheap new companies with open-source hardware business models have begun to appear and flourish. Improvements in technology design have also made it easier for DYI gadget builders to create cool prototypes without a PhD in advanced robotics. I have been tinkering with the idea of building some home brewed gadgets for a while - this will be one of a step of my self-imposed curriculum.

No comments: