Michael and Michael welcome to this episode occasional host Andy Piper and special guest Mark Moxon for an amazing trip down memory lane replete with assembly language references for a conversation about Mark’s lockdown project documenting the source code for Elite on the BBC Micro. A fascinating look at the amazing creativity and user experience innovation rendered into 32K code running on a BBC Micro with many lessons for current developers. Don’t miss this episode!
Michael and Michael have something special brewing for this week’s episode, starting off with an IoT thought experiment to determine how vulnerable consumer devices could be, and whether a device could be hacked without owning the network or the router. The appliance of choice in this case the humble (internet connected) coffee machine, which researcher Martin Hron set to deliver a ransomware message, grind beans, turn on the water and beep until you decide to unplug it. Not quite what you would want to have happen in the morning when you need that first cup of coffee.
Turning next to the robotic world, the co-hosts discuss an intriguing robot dreamed up by the team at the Toyota Research Institute that hangs from the ceiling to navigate around the kitchen. Then, a disinfecting drone from Lucid. Remember this North Carolina company from last year, that created a drone to wash windows? This new one is designed to sanitize stadium seats.
Software stories for this week include a cool SwiftUI piece of code created to share information on the COVID-19 statistics for the UK which developer An Trinh has made open source. And, in our continuing set of Microsoft Flight Simulator stories, we have a new interesting bug, this time a hole you can fly into.
Segueing to the world of fashion, Moschino partners up with Jim Henson’s Creature Shop to put on a special COVID-19 socially distant runway show for the Milan Fashion Week – with puppets, complete with models and spectators alike, with the newest fashions scaled to marionette sizes.
Wrapping things up this week, we have the Rolling Stone article on their top 500 greatest albums of all time. See how many of these that you have in your collection and whether you agree with the rock critics choices for #1 or #500!
The team would love to know what IoT devices you’re intrigued by or what your favorite album of all time is. Drop a line over on Twitter at @gamesatwork_biz and your topic may be on the agenda for next week’s episode!
Michael and Michael are glad to have Andy Piper join in for this first fall episode of Games At Work, and start things off right with some AR and VR stories, an AR one from Fukushima Daiichi workers using smart glasses to conduct their work faster, and a VR one showcasing passthrough camera capabilities and Infinite Office integration.
Then, games. The new No Man’s Sky video is really impressive given the infinite number of worlds, which sparked a conversation on Spore. The celebratory Microsoft Flight Simulator video going back to the original original version, also provided a short trip down memory lane with a reminder about the Battlezone arcade game. My how far gaming has come in these last few years. Almost so far that someone might make a podcast focused on the technologies used for gaming, and how they are applicable to business. Hmm…
Turning to AI, the Toonify app gets the conversation going on how this AI model takes an ordinary headshot and makes it look like a cartoon character. See the show notes for the details and a link to try it out for yourself!
After a discussion about the new Ring indoor camera drone named Always Home Cam, which seems just such an apt description of everyone’s 2020, so not sure why one might need such drone, Michael R shares a very cool open source project called MeetingBar which allows you to easily launch the next virtual video meeting you are in directly from the top of your screen. And you know, you’re in at least a couple of such meetings every day!
Rounding off this episode with a futuristic bicycle helmet, replete with lights, and messaging capabilities, an awesome lightsaber design and the requisite LEGO builds (new wall mountable Batwing, and baby Yoda!), Andy, Michael and Michael wrap up this week’s conversation.
The team would love to know what you’re finding intriguing around the house, or around the web. Drop a line over on Twitter at @gamesatwork_biz and your topic may be on the agenda for next week’s episode!
A huge update to the universe. Billions of new worlds to discover. Rich in variety with new flora & fauna. More detailed, vast and diverse than ever possible before.
Starting things off right with an augmented reality automotive repair use case, Michael and Michael remember similar examples discussed years ago. What is interesting now is that these stories are not limited to technology websites and magazines, but is showing up more and more mainstream press. Moving right along to VR, we have a story to share about Myst, returning in a virtual reality format with the Oculus Quest 2 headset.
Michael and Michael share their thoughts about generative adversarial networks and fake data (aka synthetic data) being used to train machine learning algorithms in a way that surprisingly removes bias. Staying on the development front, the co-hosts talk through the challenges associated with having one day between announcement and deployment of a new operating system. Michael R points out that his app, Wasted Time, was ready to go on announce day for iOS 14. The Ford-developed pickup truck emoji for iOS 14 also get’s some time in the sun – check out the fun video from the Ford team on what went into the development of this “iconic” F-150 emoji.
Closing things off for this week’s episode, Michael and Michael discuss the importance of vacation time, which is not wasted time at all, even if you’re not traveling. Michael R shares a game that he is playing on Apple Arcade, and Michael M shares a Netflix show that has surfaced three times in the past three days, so it must be a sign that he needs to watch it.
Share with the Games At Work team what you’re watching, whether in AR, VR or TV, and your topic may be part of next week’s episode, right here on Games At Work… dot… bizzzzzz.
