Sesame Street pioneers interactive TV — from skynews.com.au
Excerpt:
Sesame Street hit TV screens more than 40 years ago and now the children’s television program is leading the way in interactive programming. The next generation of Sesame Street watchers will be able to interact with the characters and educational games when viewed on Xbox Kinect. A whole new season of Sesame Street is being created specifically for Xbox Kinect, pioneering a new form of programming called ‘Playful Learning’.
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From DSC:
Below are some items concerning the continued convergence of the telephone, the television, and the computer — it involves the smart/connected TV as well as human-computer-interaction (HCI)-related items. But this time, I’m focusing on a recent announcement from Microsoft.
However, I have to disagree that, given this announcement, Microsoft will now rule the living room — or at least I surely hope not. Why do I say this? For several reasons.
1) How long has Microsoft Office been around? Years and years, right? If you think that Microsoft should control your living room, I ask you to show me how I can quickly and easily insert some audio-based feedback with one easy click of a record button within Microsoft Word. Go ahead and check…such a quick and easy method is not there….still…and it’s almost 2012. (BTW, here are some resources on this if you’re interested in seeing how this could be done, but you will quickly notice that this is not a streamlined process — and it should have been so years ago.)
2) Performance/not doing what it’s supposed to do. My Dell PC running Windows 7 still can’t even shut itself down half the time. It just sits there with wheels-a-spinnin’ at some point…but not powering down. I’m not sure why this is the case, but I never have had trouble with this simple task on my Macs.
3) Regarding troubleshooting Microsoft’s solutions, an entire support industry has been built on supporting Microsoft’s software — go to a local bookstore and see how to get MS certified on some particular package/application/service — none of the books are thin.
4) Security has never been Microsoft’s strong point.
Bottom line:
I think you get my point. Microsoft has a loooooonnnnngggg way to go in my mind before I want their products and services controlling my living room.
With that said, I do congratulate Microsoft on being more innovative and forward thinking with the Xbox announcements mentioned below. I just hope that items such as usability, user experience, security, and streamlined interfaces are high on the list of their priorities/deliverables.
Disclosure/note:
I do use PCs with Windows a significant amount of the time and they do a nice job with many items. But if I were to assign grades to Microsoft, usability, performance, and security are not items that I would give A’s to Microsoft on.
Upgrade: The Xbox 360 Slim game console.
Also:
Skype announces Facebook-to-Facebook calling — from wired.co.uk by Beth Carter
HTML5 program promises to be game changer — from mediapost.com by Diane Mermigas
Also see:
- #1: “Next” web architecture = Hypernet + Hyperweb
- #2: The decline & fall of Windows unlocks revenue
- #3: Index search is peaking
- #4: Apple’s model threatens web
- #5: HTML5 is game changer for publishers
HTML5 is not just a programming language; enables new models of web experience
– Developers will embed audio and video directly in web pages, replacing Adobe’s Flash plug-in; enables much greater differentiation in sites, advertising, etc.
– Content publishers will redesign their sites to reduce power of Google, ad networks
HTML5 will be disruptive in ways we cannot imagine today: pendulum swinging to favor content creators and publishers. Imagine Amazon or eBay storefront as an ad.
– Everything can be an app . . . every piece of content . . . every tweet . . . every ad
– Ads: create demand and fulfill it at the same time . . . without leaving publisher’s page
– Other tech (e.g., Wordnik) enables publishers to protect and monetize text onsite and off- #6: Tablets are hugely disruptive
- #7: First wave of “social web” is over
- #8: Smartphones in US: Apple + 7 Dwarfs
- #9: Wireless infrastructure is a competitive threat to US
- #10: Integration of TV & Internet could be disruptive
From DSC:
Breathe new life into your PowerPoint slides with dozens of exciting free tools & resources — from EmergingEdTech.com by K. Walsh
From DSC:
This posting evolved after having read $500 billion TV market new battlefield for Internet companies (from forbes.com and the Trefis Team therein) as well as the posting at Future TV disruption – Forbes says it’s worth half a trillion dollars for Internet companies (from appmarket.tv).
As the convergence — and the movement of data/apps/content/services towards the cloud — continues, I wanted to jot down some thoughts re: the current field:
Having said this, one can see that it is getting harder to practice the KISS principle in the IT departments out there. But where we can do so, it makes sense to do so — as there is less finger pointing and more accountability. It’s easier to support a fewer amount of tools and, often times, it seems that things simply work better with a reduced amount of vendors/technologies involved.
Also see:
Who will win the cloud war? Apple vs. Google vs. Microsoft — from TechNewsDaily.com by Dan Howley, LAPTOP Staff Writer
Excerpt:
Defining the Cloud
Although the cloud and the various services it supports have been around for quite some time, tech companies have done a fairly poor job of explaining exactly what the cloud is. “When you say cloud services, it’s pretty broad,” explained Michael Gartenberg, research director with the technology research firm Gartner. “Are you talking about digital lockers? Are you talking about cloud-based applications? Streaming music services? Cloud sort of becomes one of those catch-all phrases that becomes hard to define.”
In truth, the cloud is a nebulous term to describe the Internet and the various ways it can be leveraged by users.
For example, cloud storage allows users to upload and access their data via the web, much like an Internet-connected hard drive. When you upload a document or photo to Dropbox, you are storing it on the company’s servers, which allows you to access your files from any computer. Playing a game on Facebook? That also uses the cloud as a backbone.
Cloud-based applications, such as Google’s Docs productivity suite and online music services such as Grooveshark and Pandora, give users access to programs that they previously would have had to install on their PC. Such services save precious resources on users’ computers. However, most of these cloud apps require an active Internet connection. If you’re offline, for the most part you’re out of luck.
Also see:
Also see:
Above items originally/ultimately from:
Microsoft advances natural UI with Kinect SDK — from cnet.com by Jay Greene
Oregon State University student Alex Wiggins gestures to Kinect, which in turn makes a remote-control
toy helicopter take off while teammates Ruma Paul (left) and Fabio Matsui (right) look on. (Credit: Microsoft)
