TED: Augmented Reality, its all I ever wanted

The device that embodies everything I have ever wanted is on its way to being realized, at MIT of course. 

The presentation was given by Pattie Maes from MIT media labs, and its the work of Pranav Mistry. Basicaly its a projector, camera, a cellphone for processing and internet connectivity and some marker caps stuck on the end of the guy’s fingers. 

Basically what it could deliver is nearly instantaneous information on anything and everything. If you throw enough horsepower, you can know everything. Right now its hooked to a projecter and mirror hung around your neck.

In the future its an OLED film on my glasses (that also doubles as sunglasses) that allows me to see into things. I can look down at the road and tell it to show me the underground utilities. It will access the databases and show me all the underground utilites – sewer, water, electric, etc. The glasses have a tiny magnetic compass and accelerometer to know which way I’m looking and what I’m looking at. It knows how to overlay the image onto my glasses so that I’m seeing the underground utilities as they are, with other information like depth and age. 

Man I want it so bad. I think we will eventually get to the Matrix – we plug ourselves in and live in a virtual world. We wont be forced, we’ll do it willingly.