July 13, 2006
The shirt that checks your heart, the hat that checks your brain
The wearable computer, a concept as old as the wrist-watch, has found new life, reports the FT.
"The latest electroconductive materials can be woven into garments. A sweater, for example, can generate a feeling of warmth when the wearer takes a phone call from a loved one. The sleeve of a firefighter’s tunic can flash a warning of toxic materials.
Robin Mannings, a BT futurologist at the telecoms operator’s Adastral Park research centre, thinks commercialisation is not far off. “We will see electronic displays on clothing worn by the emergency services very soon. And within five years, somebody, somewhere will come up with displays on high street clothing.”
Professor Sandy Pentland of MIT’s prestigious Media Lab, one of the world’s leading experts on the topic, says that for “wearable computer” read “mobile phone”.
He argues: “The mobile phone is the first truly pervasive computing platform. The question is not: ‘is the wearable computer a gimmick?’ but whether it will be people’s primary computing platform and push all others decisively aside.”
[via pasta&vinegar]
Picture left from Wearable Computer Fashion Show at MIT photographed by Sam Ogden
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