Apple is a bit of a one-hit wonder, like a lot of companies.
Apple is good at taking something we use and putting a chip and OS in it. They basically only make different computers in different form factors.]
We should see some amazing refinements down the road. Lighter, roll up or fold up phones, better cameras, etc.
You aren't aware are you that Microsoft is a one hit wonder do you? Obviously not, you just laid yourself open to a parody of yourself, thanks for the laugh. What has ms done since it designed windows? Except build all kinds of bloat around it and rip people off? Which is btw coming to an end . Ms has gone from 95% market share of the personal computing market to about 18% in about 6 years and is now irrelevant who would have foreseen that in 2009?
Apple is a bit of a one-hit wonder, like a lot of companies.
Apple is good at taking something we use and putting a chip and OS in it. They basically only make different computers in different form factors.]
We should see some amazing refinements down the road. Lighter, roll up or fold up phones, better cameras, etc.
You aren't aware are you that Microsoft is a one hit wonder do you? Obviously not, you just laid yourself open to a parody of yourself, thanks for the laugh. What has ms done since it designed windows? Except build all kinds of bloat around it and rip people off? Which is btw coming to an end . Ms has gone from 95% market share of the personal computing market to about 18% in about 6 years and is now irrelevant who would have foreseen that in 2009?
When the product you are demonstrating uses, nay depends on CGI -- how do you propose making videos of the product without using CGI?
Well that's obviously a Catch-22. Maybe MS will produce something that delivers what it promises and that people will actually find uses for it. At the moment they seem to be dragging a list of feature incomplete (compared to the promotional videos) products around behind them so the prognosis is not good, but maybe with Ballmer gone things may have radically improved. Let's see how the land lies at the end of 2015 after the (possible?) release of the "HoloLens".
This will be quite a good way to do X-Ray type apps where you can superimpose nude bodies onto real people as they walk by because Kinect-type tracking will capture all the body accurately. The transparency still needs to be sorted though. The Kinect can do this kind of thing already:
[VIDEO]
All of this technology is at a very experimental stage and while I think some form of augmented reality is the future of computing, none of these are it.
The last video is unrealistic -- the girl never turns around to see how her butt looks in the dresses ...
That doesn't mean "they're moving units", it just means that they're out of stock. For some reason or other.
Well, you're right. They might have evaporated or been stolen by elves, but my money is on Christmas sales.
Let's put it another way. If they sold 1M in the Oct quarter (as calculated earlier in another response), and Apple sold 5M Macs, but Apple has MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, iMac 21.5", iMac 27", and Mac Mini, Surface Pro 3 has to be selling at least as well as one of those models. So which Mac are we calling an abject failure?
[QUOTE] [B][SIZE=5]The Reason To Be Cheerful About HoloLens[/SIZE][/B]
So it’s with that in mind that I want to go out on a limb and say I think Microsoft is onto something with the HoloLens. I’m referring to a technology that the company showed at its Windows 10 event earlier this week. It seems to be an augmented reality system capable of projecting faux-holograms to an eyepiece you wear. The net effect is the wearer “sees” a hologram in space all around him, and to back this up Microsoft’s presentation showed high concept uses like a designer working on an application on a monitor, but with a projected 3D model appearing to the side. That kind of thing. [/QUOTE]
The author then describes a typical game display where much of the display's screen area is used for necessary, but distracting HUD display of feedback of status and progress numbers, time remaining, etc.
Then he describes how the HUD components can be moved off the [B][I] real [/I][/B] display area and placed on [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] displays projected to the sides:
He suggests that this would free up about 30 percent of the [B][I] real [/I][/B] display for actual game content ...
And that gamers will buy this.
Mmm ...
That got me thinking ... What other disciplines could take advantage of this basic capability of additional [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] screen space?
The first thing that came to mind was doctors examining X-rays or videos of scans.
Then I got to thinking of how I might use it -- enough to buy and wear expensive goggles.
The author mentions that in the above quote: [B][I]Microsoft’s presentation showed high concept uses like [COLOR=blue]a designer working on an application on a monitor[/COLOR], but with a [COLOR=blue]projected 3D model appearing to the side.[/COLOR][/I][/B]
I remembered that, so I captured the following image from the video:
The designer is using the [B][I] real [/I][/B] computer display to display various 2D views of the design he is creating --- and a [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] display of the 3D design to the side.
I don't [think I] need an additional 3D display. I use Photoshop and FCPX -- both tend to divide the [B][I] real [/I][/B] display into sub-windows to display ancillary information and controls to what you are focused upon. You can reconfigure/eliminate these windows to gain additional space when needed -- but, it's kind of a pain. Now, if you could move these off screen to a [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] display that is [B][I]accessible with the cursor/mouse/kb ...[/I][/B] that'd be something. Photoshop, especially, has a plethora of floating Windoids -- that always seem to be in the wrong place ... Not to mention the floating-on-top [I] help [/I] screen for any Mac app ...
I would pay for that and wear the goggles!
Let's take it a step further. When using FCPX I prefer to use 2 monitors to put aside some of the ancillary content.
I use an iMac 27 5K (starts at $2,500) and an older iMac 27. I plan to buy a Apple 27" 5K external display when it becomes available ... Dell sells one now for $2,500.
With HoloLens (if I could get it on the Mac) I could just use a [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] display.
I would pay for that and wear the goggles!
Yet another step further:
I use an inexpensive small table to hold my iMac 5K mouse and KB. The table can be raised/lowered between desk height and standing hight in a few seconds (less sedentary to work while standing, but harder on he legs and back). Having a larger table to hold both the Mac and an Mac-sized external display is a major undertaking -- expensive and space hogging.
With HoloLens (if I could get it on the Mac) the [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] display would move wherever I choose, with no special desk/space requirements or additional expense.
I would pay for that and wear the goggles!
So, I think there's a lot more to Ho;oLens than first meets the eye.
I hope that Apple uses some of its tech to provide some of the virtual 2D capabilities imagined above.
That doesn't mean "they're moving units", it just means that they're out of stock. For some reason or other.
Well, you're right. They might have evaporated or been stolen by elves, but my money is on Christmas sales.
Let's put it another way. If they sold 1M in the Oct quarter (as calculated earlier in another response), and Apple sold 5M Macs, but Apple has MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, iMac 21.5", iMac 27", and Mac Mini, Surface Pro 3 has to be selling at least as well as one of those models. So which Mac are we calling an abject failure?
First, the Surface is actively being marketed against the iPad.
Second, since we're dealing in hypotheticals about out-of-stock -- let me add mine.
Computer manufacturers frequently offer special deals to merchants (especially large merchants) for holiday sales.
It goes something like this: If the mfgr has a lot of inventory, it will offer to ship extra stock to the merchants -- above the merchants' normal order -- so they can satisfy expected/desired holiday demand.
As incentive, the merchant might be offered:
extended payment terms, say net 45 instead of net 30 days
lower unit cost
lower or eliminated shipping fees
waived return restocking fees
waived return shipping charges
As a result, the merchant can stock up for holiday sales with little cost or risk if those sales do not materialize.
I suspect there's some of that going on.
Most mfgrs book sales when the product is in transit to the merchant. Returns can be booked any time (within limits) at whim.
In the case of the Christmas holidays it is very convenient that the quarter and/or FY ends around December 31. That way both the merchants and the mfgrs can post the good news (sales) today -- and defer any bad news (returns) until next quarter or FY.
So my entire life is apple dominated, lets start with that. Let's start with Windows 10 - while seemingly mundane, One Windows is a damn good idea for everyone - developers included, I remain curious.
With regards to Hololens, what they have done is incredible. Whether or not it takes off in the consumer market, combining depth with AR is a huge deal - one that Google attempted to pull off in glass prototypes but couldn't nail. It's important to note that Glass, Oculus rift and the Hololens are completely different products with different intentions.
Im all for market trends and so on but lets take a quick look at why the iPhone was so magical to us all. Technological Innovation, Timing and Design. Apple announced a product that ticked all the boxes and left us floored - it didn't matter what you said about it because in the end it was magical (innovation with multitouch), came at the perfect time (we all hated out hard to use phones) and had an incredible Design (its apple, come on). With the iWatch I figure they nailed timing and design - but innovation? Let's be frank - theres nothing to magical about it and we all know it, its not checking all our boxes because we have seen it all before.
From what I have seen - and believe me I have seen more than most - the Hololens ticks Innovation (its magical damn it), ticks timing (look at the way everyone is fussing about it) - the only thing that remains is how it works in the real world (design). I can't speak to the UI of the Hololens and again, I remain curious how it is to be implemented in real life situations outside of a controlled environment. That being said, let's compare it anyway. Glass: On the consumer side, no one wants to wear it, it's designed to wear all the time and does little more than show you notifications. Oculus rift: great for developers - we can mess around and build cool demos, assuming the person doesn't get sick after 15 minutes of using it. Hololens: for consumers, Im not sure it will "take off" but its the closest thing we have to something consumers could actually use. It isn't intended for constant use like glass, and unlike oculus it can work in reality - which is a huge thing. This brings me to developers and researchers - we are going to have a field day with this. Kinect didn't take off huge in the public domain but all of those fancy demos and advancements in research, the things you will eventually one day see in your lives - powered by kinect.
I for one can't wait for Hololens and whether or not it works for consumers and becomes something we all use is irrelevant - its an incredible advancement in physical computation and I for one can't wait to use it, along side my mac.
Apologies for the rant but speaking for someone who has worked at a number of these companies and in research, do your best to look at things without fandom and feature comparison. I will say this - none of these companies invented any of this - it's all been around for years. What these companies do is make it WORK.
So my entire life is apple dominated, lets start with that. Let's start with Windows 10 - while seemingly mundane, One Windows is a damn good idea for everyone - developers included, I remain curious.
With regards to Hololens, what they have done is incredible. Whether or not it takes off in the consumer market, combining depth with AR is a huge deal - one that Google attempted to pull off in glass prototypes but couldn't nail. It's important to note that Glass, Oculus rift and the Hololens are completely different products with different intentions.
Im all for market trends and so on but lets take a quick look at why the iPhone was so magical to us all. Technological Innovation, Timing and Design. Apple announced a product that ticked all the boxes and left us floored - it didn't matter what you said about it because in the end it was magical (innovation with multitouch), came at the perfect time (we all hated out hard to use phones) and had an incredible Design (its apple, come on). With the iWatch I figure they nailed timing and design - but innovation? Let's be frank - theres nothing to magical about it and we all know it, its not checking all our boxes because we have seen it all before.
From what I have seen - and believe me I have seen more than most - the Hololens ticks Innovation (its magical damn it), ticks timing (look at the way everyone is fussing about it) - the only thing that remains is how it works in the real world (design). I can't speak to the UI of the Hololens and again, I remain curious how it is to be implemented in real life situations outside of a controlled environment. That being said, let's compare it anyway. Glass: On the consumer side, no one wants to wear it, it's designed to wear all the time and does little more than show you notifications. Oculus rift: great for developers - we can mess around and build cool demos, assuming the person doesn't get sick after 15 minutes of using it. Hololens: for consumers, Im not sure it will "take off" but its the closest thing we have to something consumers could actually use. It isn't intended for constant use like glass, and unlike oculus it can work in reality - which is a huge thing. This brings me to developers and researchers - we are going to have a field day with this. Kinect didn't take off huge in the public domain but all of those fancy demos and advancements in research, the things you will eventually one day see in your lives - powered by kinect.
I for one can't wait for Hololens and whether or not it works for consumers and becomes something we all use is irrelevant - its an incredible advancement in physical computation and I for one can't wait to use it, along side my mac.
Apologies for the rant but speaking for someone who has worked at a number of these companies and in research, do your best to look at things without fandom and feature comparison. I will say this - none of these companies invented any of this - it's all been around for years. What these companies do is make it WORK.
Which Microsoft PR firm do you work for? I'll give everyone here a hint: Any time someone starts off by saying "I own every Apple product", or "I work in IT", or this guy's latest twist, "So my entire life is apple dominated, lets start with that... I for one can't wait to use [Hololens], along side my mac.", you know it's a PR guy working for a marketing firm hired by the company he's championing. No normal person would claim Hololens is "an incredible advancement in physical computation".
Which Microsoft PR firm do you work for? I'll give everyone here a hint: Any time someone starts off by saying "I own every Apple product", or "I work in IT", or this guy's latest twist, "So my entire life is apple dominated, lets start with that... I for one can't wait to use [Hololens], along side my mac.", you know it's a PR guy working for a marketing firm hired by the company he's championing. No normal person would claim Hololens is "an incredible advancement in physical computation".
Cute, I work at the MIT Media Lab under the Tangible Media Group. I did a short term in Microsoft research, among other companies there after and to be transparent my self designated job at MSR was to argue their approach to design (3 years ago) was terrible. You won't see me running windows for anything other than the CAD apps I have to use it for.
How about yourself? (you know, just so I can discredit your perspective too)
Hologram is not exactly the right word, but Microsoft is using it because it's catchy and to the user the objects appear to be holograms. Also, these images are made by bouncing light around to create the illusion of a 3-dimensional object, instead of the standard light-projected-from-behind-a-screen-and-into-your-eyes. Or something like that. I'm not properly qualified to explain exactly how the technology works, but there are several articles you can read on it
And I'm not sure what you mean about buttons? Nobody said anything about buttons...
Who would blame you for not understanding, when such a massive media campaign has been launched to re-educate us? I know, we have such an intelligent, investigative technology news media, they can't all be wrong. But take a gander at the wikipedia page describing holography. Take a close-up look at a hologram. Note the speckling and whorls in the stored, static 3d image. That "noise" is the stored interference pattern of light. That noise then diffracts light to re-produce an image of the originally recorded scene. Do you see any of that happening in the HoloLens? Do you see imagery like that in any of the HoloLens demos? If HoloLens uses holography, why doesn't Microsoft at least show a diagram of the light path(s)? All that anyone has ever seen in the media is a bunch of demos.
If HoloLens produced imagery using holography, the user would not need to have their head mounted in the device but would be able to move their head around relative to the device. That's why I suggest the HoloLens at best uses static holograms just to guide light. So, yeah, it's not false advertising to say the HoloLens uses holography, if you consider using holography to produce a static hologram that's then mass produced to be holography.
Yes, somebody said something about buttons. Wired or NYT or TheVerge reported the HoloLens has buttons on the right side for controlling brightness, etc. So where are the buttons? And what about those "terabytes of data per second" that the HoloLens is processing [re: Wired.com]?
Ms has gone from 95% market share of the personal computing market to about 18% in about 6 years and is now irrelevant who would have foreseen that in 2009?
This is a lie. According to the WSJ (1/22/15) via the IDC, 89.5% of personal computers run some version of Windows. Please do your research
Who would blame you for not understanding, when such a massive media campaign has been launched to re-educate us? I know, we have such an intelligent, investigative technology news media, they can't all be wrong. But take a gander at the wikipedia page describing holography. Take a close-up look at a hologram. Note the speckling and whorls in the stored, static 3d image. That "noise" is the stored interference pattern of light. That noise then diffracts light to re-produce an image of the originally recorded scene. Do you see any of that happening in the HoloLens? Do you see imagery like that in any of the HoloLens demos? If HoloLens uses holography, why doesn't Microsoft at least show a diagram of the light path(s)? All that anyone has ever seen in the media is a bunch of demos.
If HoloLens produced imagery using holography, the user would not need to have their head mounted in the device but would be able to move their head around relative to the device. That's why I suggest the HoloLens at best uses static holograms just to guide light. So, yeah, it's not false advertising to say the HoloLens uses holography, if you consider using holography to produce a static hologram that's then mass produced to be holography.
Yeah, this is all true, but like I admitted before, "hologram" is not really the right word. It's mostly a marketing thing
Quote:
Yes, somebody said something about buttons. Wired or NYT or TheVerge reported the HoloLens has buttons on the right side for controlling brightness, etc. So where are the buttons? And what about those "terabytes of data per second" that the HoloLens is processing [re: Wired.com]?
If you go onto the Hololens website you can see that there are clearly no buttons, and frankly I'm more inclined to believe Microsoft than foreign reporting, which as you said sarcastically above is "intelligent" and "investigative".
Yeah, this is all true, but like I admitted before, "hologram" is not really the right word. It's mostly a marketing thing
It is certainly a marketing gimmick. And "hologram" might be the right word, but not for the reasons Microsoft is so overbearingly suggesting. Any hologram involved would be static (fixed at the time of manufacture), perhaps used to beam separate images into the eyes, not a dynamic hologram of computer-generated, 3d imagery.
Comments
I will give MS kudos for coming up with ironic names though they seem too be great at that
Surface- yeah very skin deep and superficial
Hololens - yeah very "Hollow"
Zune - it was brown (i.e. excrement)
Vista - Viruses, Intruders,Spyware,Trojans, Adware
XP extra Problems
need I go on
?Perhaps Windows 10 is really a retread of Windows 1.0?
I have suggestion for their next product - "dodo" as in dead as a ....
You aren't aware are you that Microsoft is a one hit wonder do you? Obviously not, you just laid yourself open to a parody of yourself, thanks for the laugh. What has ms done since it designed windows? Except build all kinds of bloat around it and rip people off? Which is btw coming to an end . Ms has gone from 95% market share of the personal computing market to about 18% in about 6 years and is now irrelevant who would have foreseen that in 2009?
That doesn't mean "they're moving units", it just means that they're out of stock. For some reason or other.
When the product you are demonstrating uses, nay depends on CGI -- how do you propose making videos of the product without using CGI?
Well that's obviously a Catch-22. Maybe MS will produce something that delivers what it promises and that people will actually find uses for it. At the moment they seem to be dragging a list of feature incomplete (compared to the promotional videos) products around behind them so the prognosis is not good, but maybe with Ballmer gone things may have radically improved. Let's see how the land lies at the end of 2015 after the (possible?) release of the "HoloLens".
The last video is unrealistic -- the girl never turns around to see how her butt looks in the dresses ...
Well, you're right. They might have evaporated or been stolen by elves, but my money is on Christmas sales.
Let's put it another way. If they sold 1M in the Oct quarter (as calculated earlier in another response), and Apple sold 5M Macs, but Apple has MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, iMac 21.5", iMac 27", and Mac Mini, Surface Pro 3 has to be selling at least as well as one of those models. So which Mac are we calling an abject failure?
Read this:
[QUOTE]
[B][SIZE=5]The Reason To Be Cheerful About HoloLens[/SIZE][/B]
So it’s with that in mind that I want to go out on a limb and say I think Microsoft is onto something with the HoloLens. I’m referring to a technology that the company showed at its Windows 10 event earlier this week. It seems to be an augmented reality system capable of projecting faux-holograms to an eyepiece you wear. The net effect is the wearer “sees” a hologram in space all around him, and to back this up Microsoft’s presentation showed high concept uses like a designer working on an application on a monitor, but with a projected 3D model appearing to the side. That kind of thing.
[/QUOTE]
http://techcrunch.com/2015/01/25/hololens/
The author then describes a typical game display where much of the display's screen area is used for necessary, but distracting HUD display of feedback of status and progress numbers, time remaining, etc.
[IMG ALT=""]http://forums.appleinsider.com/content/type/61/id/54737/width/500/height/1000[/IMG]
Then he describes how the HUD components can be moved off the [B][I] real [/I][/B] display area and placed on [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] displays projected to the sides:
[IMG ALT=""]http://forums.appleinsider.com/content/type/61/id/54738/width/500/height/1000[/IMG]
He suggests that this would free up about 30 percent of the [B][I] real [/I][/B] display for actual game content ...
And that gamers will buy this.
Mmm ...
That got me thinking ... What other disciplines could take advantage of this basic capability of additional [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] screen space?
The first thing that came to mind was doctors examining X-rays or videos of scans.
Then I got to thinking of how I might use it -- enough to buy and wear expensive goggles.
The author mentions that in the above quote: [B][I]Microsoft’s presentation showed high concept uses like [COLOR=blue]a designer working on an application on a monitor[/COLOR], but with a [COLOR=blue]projected 3D model appearing to the side.[/COLOR][/I][/B]
I remembered that, so I captured the following image from the video:
[IMG ALT=""]http://forums.appleinsider.com/content/type/61/id/54739/width/500/height/1000[/IMG]
The designer is using the [B][I] real [/I][/B] computer display to display various 2D views of the design he is creating --- and a [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] display of the 3D design to the side.
I don't [think I] need an additional 3D display. I use Photoshop and FCPX -- both tend to divide the [B][I] real [/I][/B] display into sub-windows to display ancillary information and controls to what you are focused upon. You can reconfigure/eliminate these windows to gain additional space when needed -- but, it's kind of a pain. Now, if you could move these off screen to a [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] display that is [B][I]accessible with the cursor/mouse/kb ...[/I][/B] that'd be something. Photoshop, especially, has a plethora of floating Windoids -- that always seem to be in the wrong place ... Not to mention the floating-on-top [I] help [/I] screen for any Mac app ...
I would pay for that and wear the goggles!
Let's take it a step further. When using FCPX I prefer to use 2 monitors to put aside some of the ancillary content.
I use an iMac 27 5K (starts at $2,500) and an older iMac 27. I plan to buy a Apple 27" 5K external display when it becomes available ... Dell sells one now for $2,500.
With HoloLens (if I could get it on the Mac) I could just use a [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] display.
I would pay for that and wear the goggles!
Yet another step further:
I use an inexpensive small table to hold my iMac 5K mouse and KB. The table can be raised/lowered between desk height and standing hight in a few seconds (less sedentary to work while standing, but harder on he legs and back). Having a larger table to hold both the Mac and an Mac-sized external display is a major undertaking -- expensive and space hogging.
With HoloLens (if I could get it on the Mac) the [B][I] virtual [/I][/B] display would move wherever I choose, with no special desk/space requirements or additional expense.
I would pay for that and wear the goggles!
So, I think there's a lot more to Ho;oLens than first meets the eye.
I hope that Apple uses some of its tech to provide some of the virtual 2D capabilities imagined above.
First, the Surface is actively being marketed against the iPad.
Second, since we're dealing in hypotheticals about out-of-stock -- let me add mine.
Computer manufacturers frequently offer special deals to merchants (especially large merchants) for holiday sales.
It goes something like this: If the mfgr has a lot of inventory, it will offer to ship extra stock to the merchants -- above the merchants' normal order -- so they can satisfy expected/desired holiday demand.
As incentive, the merchant might be offered:
As a result, the merchant can stock up for holiday sales with little cost or risk if those sales do not materialize.
I suspect there's some of that going on.
Most mfgrs book sales when the product is in transit to the merchant. Returns can be booked any time (within limits) at whim.
In the case of the Christmas holidays it is very convenient that the quarter and/or FY ends around December 31. That way both the merchants and the mfgrs can post the good news (sales) today -- and defer any bad news (returns) until next quarter or FY.
So my entire life is apple dominated, lets start with that. Let's start with Windows 10 - while seemingly mundane, One Windows is a damn good idea for everyone - developers included, I remain curious.
With regards to Hololens, what they have done is incredible. Whether or not it takes off in the consumer market, combining depth with AR is a huge deal - one that Google attempted to pull off in glass prototypes but couldn't nail. It's important to note that Glass, Oculus rift and the Hololens are completely different products with different intentions.
Im all for market trends and so on but lets take a quick look at why the iPhone was so magical to us all. Technological Innovation, Timing and Design. Apple announced a product that ticked all the boxes and left us floored - it didn't matter what you said about it because in the end it was magical (innovation with multitouch), came at the perfect time (we all hated out hard to use phones) and had an incredible Design (its apple, come on). With the iWatch I figure they nailed timing and design - but innovation? Let's be frank - theres nothing to magical about it and we all know it, its not checking all our boxes because we have seen it all before.
From what I have seen - and believe me I have seen more than most - the Hololens ticks Innovation (its magical damn it), ticks timing (look at the way everyone is fussing about it) - the only thing that remains is how it works in the real world (design). I can't speak to the UI of the Hololens and again, I remain curious how it is to be implemented in real life situations outside of a controlled environment. That being said, let's compare it anyway. Glass: On the consumer side, no one wants to wear it, it's designed to wear all the time and does little more than show you notifications. Oculus rift: great for developers - we can mess around and build cool demos, assuming the person doesn't get sick after 15 minutes of using it. Hololens: for consumers, Im not sure it will "take off" but its the closest thing we have to something consumers could actually use. It isn't intended for constant use like glass, and unlike oculus it can work in reality - which is a huge thing. This brings me to developers and researchers - we are going to have a field day with this. Kinect didn't take off huge in the public domain but all of those fancy demos and advancements in research, the things you will eventually one day see in your lives - powered by kinect.
I for one can't wait for Hololens and whether or not it works for consumers and becomes something we all use is irrelevant - its an incredible advancement in physical computation and I for one can't wait to use it, along side my mac.
Apologies for the rant but speaking for someone who has worked at a number of these companies and in research, do your best to look at things without fandom and feature comparison. I will say this - none of these companies invented any of this - it's all been around for years. What these companies do is make it WORK.
So my entire life is apple dominated, lets start with that. Let's start with Windows 10 - while seemingly mundane, One Windows is a damn good idea for everyone - developers included, I remain curious.
With regards to Hololens, what they have done is incredible. Whether or not it takes off in the consumer market, combining depth with AR is a huge deal - one that Google attempted to pull off in glass prototypes but couldn't nail. It's important to note that Glass, Oculus rift and the Hololens are completely different products with different intentions.
Im all for market trends and so on but lets take a quick look at why the iPhone was so magical to us all. Technological Innovation, Timing and Design. Apple announced a product that ticked all the boxes and left us floored - it didn't matter what you said about it because in the end it was magical (innovation with multitouch), came at the perfect time (we all hated out hard to use phones) and had an incredible Design (its apple, come on). With the iWatch I figure they nailed timing and design - but innovation? Let's be frank - theres nothing to magical about it and we all know it, its not checking all our boxes because we have seen it all before.
From what I have seen - and believe me I have seen more than most - the Hololens ticks Innovation (its magical damn it), ticks timing (look at the way everyone is fussing about it) - the only thing that remains is how it works in the real world (design). I can't speak to the UI of the Hololens and again, I remain curious how it is to be implemented in real life situations outside of a controlled environment. That being said, let's compare it anyway. Glass: On the consumer side, no one wants to wear it, it's designed to wear all the time and does little more than show you notifications. Oculus rift: great for developers - we can mess around and build cool demos, assuming the person doesn't get sick after 15 minutes of using it. Hololens: for consumers, Im not sure it will "take off" but its the closest thing we have to something consumers could actually use. It isn't intended for constant use like glass, and unlike oculus it can work in reality - which is a huge thing. This brings me to developers and researchers - we are going to have a field day with this. Kinect didn't take off huge in the public domain but all of those fancy demos and advancements in research, the things you will eventually one day see in your lives - powered by kinect.
I for one can't wait for Hololens and whether or not it works for consumers and becomes something we all use is irrelevant - its an incredible advancement in physical computation and I for one can't wait to use it, along side my mac.
Apologies for the rant but speaking for someone who has worked at a number of these companies and in research, do your best to look at things without fandom and feature comparison. I will say this - none of these companies invented any of this - it's all been around for years. What these companies do is make it WORK.
Which Microsoft PR firm do you work for? I'll give everyone here a hint: Any time someone starts off by saying "I own every Apple product", or "I work in IT", or this guy's latest twist, "So my entire life is apple dominated, lets start with that... I for one can't wait to use [Hololens], along side my mac.", you know it's a PR guy working for a marketing firm hired by the company he's championing. No normal person would claim Hololens is "an incredible advancement in physical computation".
Cute, I work at the MIT Media Lab under the Tangible Media Group. I did a short term in Microsoft research, among other companies there after and to be transparent my self designated job at MSR was to argue their approach to design (3 years ago) was terrible. You won't see me running windows for anything other than the CAD apps I have to use it for.
How about yourself? (you know, just so I can discredit your perspective too)
I don't understand...
Hologram is not exactly the right word, but Microsoft is using it because it's catchy and to the user the objects appear to be holograms. Also, these images are made by bouncing light around to create the illusion of a 3-dimensional object, instead of the standard light-projected-from-behind-a-screen-and-into-your-eyes. Or something like that. I'm not properly qualified to explain exactly how the technology works, but there are several articles you can read on it
And I'm not sure what you mean about buttons? Nobody said anything about buttons...
Who would blame you for not understanding, when such a massive media campaign has been launched to re-educate us? I know, we have such an intelligent, investigative technology news media, they can't all be wrong. But take a gander at the wikipedia page describing holography. Take a close-up look at a hologram. Note the speckling and whorls in the stored, static 3d image. That "noise" is the stored interference pattern of light. That noise then diffracts light to re-produce an image of the originally recorded scene. Do you see any of that happening in the HoloLens? Do you see imagery like that in any of the HoloLens demos? If HoloLens uses holography, why doesn't Microsoft at least show a diagram of the light path(s)? All that anyone has ever seen in the media is a bunch of demos.
If HoloLens produced imagery using holography, the user would not need to have their head mounted in the device but would be able to move their head around relative to the device. That's why I suggest the HoloLens at best uses static holograms just to guide light. So, yeah, it's not false advertising to say the HoloLens uses holography, if you consider using holography to produce a static hologram that's then mass produced to be holography.
Yes, somebody said something about buttons. Wired or NYT or TheVerge reported the HoloLens has buttons on the right side for controlling brightness, etc. So where are the buttons? And what about those "terabytes of data per second" that the HoloLens is processing [re: Wired.com]?
Ms has gone from 95% market share of the personal computing market to about 18% in about 6 years and is now irrelevant who would have foreseen that in 2009?
This is a lie. According to the WSJ (1/22/15) via the IDC, 89.5% of personal computers run some version of Windows. Please do your research
First, the Surface is actively being marketed against the iPad.
No, i'm pretty sure it's not
(all of the above are Surface advertisements that clearly pit it against the MacBook Air)
Who would blame you for not understanding, when such a massive media campaign has been launched to re-educate us? I know, we have such an intelligent, investigative technology news media, they can't all be wrong. But take a gander at the wikipedia page describing holography. Take a close-up look at a hologram. Note the speckling and whorls in the stored, static 3d image. That "noise" is the stored interference pattern of light. That noise then diffracts light to re-produce an image of the originally recorded scene. Do you see any of that happening in the HoloLens? Do you see imagery like that in any of the HoloLens demos? If HoloLens uses holography, why doesn't Microsoft at least show a diagram of the light path(s)? All that anyone has ever seen in the media is a bunch of demos.
If HoloLens produced imagery using holography, the user would not need to have their head mounted in the device but would be able to move their head around relative to the device. That's why I suggest the HoloLens at best uses static holograms just to guide light. So, yeah, it's not false advertising to say the HoloLens uses holography, if you consider using holography to produce a static hologram that's then mass produced to be holography.
Yeah, this is all true, but like I admitted before, "hologram" is not really the right word. It's mostly a marketing thing
If you go onto the Hololens website you can see that there are clearly no buttons, and frankly I'm more inclined to believe Microsoft than foreign reporting, which as you said sarcastically above is "intelligent" and "investigative".
Yeah, this is all true, but like I admitted before, "hologram" is not really the right word. It's mostly a marketing thing
It is certainly a marketing gimmick. And "hologram" might be the right word, but not for the reasons Microsoft is so overbearingly suggesting. Any hologram involved would be static (fixed at the time of manufacture), perhaps used to beam separate images into the eyes, not a dynamic hologram of computer-generated, 3d imagery.