Episode 246 — Ninja Stealth Robots

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robotic helmet
Photo by Conor Luddy on Unsplash

A pair of Boston Dynamics robots catch Michael & Michael’s attention this week — Atlas, with it’s amazing (and quiet!) ninja parkour capabilities, and Spot, now being made available to the market.  

Several cool applications are part of this week’s program, from High Fidelity’s app to create VR avatars, to celebrity voices for Alexa & TomTom navigation, to improving your surfing skills via Surfline, to making better consumer choices in the grocery store with Yuka and Seafood Watch, and tracking the value of the time spent in meetings with our very own cohost Michael Rowe’s WastedTime app.

An interesting account of a couple’s backstory and costume construction for their vacation to Disney’s recently opened Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge sparks a conversation on how entertainment is evolving to become more and more immersive.

Surf on over, dive right in, and give this episode a listen!

Selected Links

Tech Crunch article: Atlas the humanoid robot shows off a new and improved gymnastics routine — https://techcrunch.com/2019/09/24/atlas-the-humanoid-robot-shows-off-a-new-and-improved-gymnastics-routine/ 

Wired article: Spot, the 4-Legged Robot, Is Ready to Go for a Walk — https://www.wired.com/story/gadget-lab-podcast-424/ 

Parkour — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkour 

Venture Beat article: High Fidelity’s new mobile app turns your selfies in to VR avatars — https://venturebeat.com/2019/09/22/high-fidelitys-new-mobile-app-turns-your-selfies-into-vr-avatars/ 

High Fidelity — https://www.highfidelity.com 

High Fidelity movie — https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0146882/ 

USA today article: Amazon to offer Samuel L. Jackson voice for Alexa.  He’ll curse, if you want — https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2019/09/25/samuel-l-jackson-first-celebrity-voice-amazon-alexa/2447992001/ 

Samuel L. Jackson – celebrity voice for Alexa — https://www.amazon.com/Samuel-L-Jackson-celebrity-voice/dp/B07WS3HN5Q 

TomTom Mr. T voice — https://www.tomtom.com/en_us/drive/maps-services/shop/navigation-voices/mr-t/ 

Kotaku article: Three Months of Prep Made Our Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge Trip Amazing — https://kotaku.com/three-months-of-prep-made-our-star-wars-galaxys-edge-t-1838364921 

CNet article: Star Wars meets ‘Sgt. Pepper’s’ in epic geeky parody — https://www.cnet.com/news/star-wars-meets-beatles-sgt-peppers-lonely-hearts-club-band-geeky-musical-parody/ 

Man of Many article: Surfline Sessions and an Apple Watch Can Record You Surfing — https://manofmany.com/outdoors/surf/surfline-sessions-and-an-apple-watch-can-record-you-surfing 

Yuka — https://yuka.io/en/ 

Science Friday September 27, 2019 The Latest IPCC Report: A Global Warning On Ice and Oceans — https://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/september-2019-ipcc-report-ice-oceans/ 

Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch app — https://www.seafoodwatch.org/seafood-recommendations/our-app 

Drive article: New South Wales drivers using phones behind the wheel are in the firing line, with the state to permanently roll out its phone-detection cameras — https://m.drive.com.au/news/nsw-phone-monitoring-cameras-going-live-this-year-122500.html 

Nintendo LABO Builders tweet

Nintendo LABO — https://labo.nintendo.com 

WastedTime Watch! app — https://apps.apple.com/us/app/wastedtime-watch/id1478660347 

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Episode 245 — Ayes & Ears

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glasses and earbuds
Photo by Pixabay from Pexels

Augmentation abounds in this edition of Games At Work!  Starting off with a wearable that you wear as a suit, Michael and Michael talk about the amazing Teslasuit, with its haptic feedback system and muscle-memory developing capabilities for learning, and teaching how to move your body.  The next augmentation is from Bose, with the AR Frames, and have the augmented positional audio is used via these glasses to give an even more immersive experience to gameplay.  Michael and Michael “spec”ulate on how the combination of Bose audio technology could be combined with Magic Leap, Hololens or other AR glasses.  Michael R introduces another wearable – the MN8 earbuds from Emotiv which allow the collection of brain data without looking like a cyborg.  Michael M is reminded then of the biometric possibilities of the ear canal, which actually has been a promising way for unique identification for a number of years.

Switching from wearables to software, the co-hosts marvel at the AI and machine learning powered Relonch AI app which puts the power of a Hollywood lighting crew in your phone to make amazing effects effortless.  While not currently available in the US App Store, Michael and Michael hope that it will be available soon.  And for those that want a hard copy of their digital pictures, have a look at the Polaroid Lab, which creates a hard copy picture of your cell phone picture just like the Polaroid camera did.

Selected Links

International Talk Like a Pirate Day — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Talk_Like_a_Pirate_Day 

Teslasuit — https://teslasuit.io 

VentureBeat article: Bose’s AR Frames get a narrative gaming boost — https://venturebeat.com/2019/09/15/boses-ar-frames-get-a-narrative-gaming-boost-from-the-team-behind-that-dragon-cancer/

Bose AR Frames — https://www.bose.com/en_us/products/frames.html 

The Dragon, Cancer — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That_Dragon,_Cancer 

Episode 219 — Do You Hear What I Hear — https://gamesatwork.biz/2018/12/10/episode-218-do-you-hear-what-i-hear/ 

Emotiv blog: The Real Future of Work — https://www.emotiv.com/blog/the-real-future-of-work/ 

Gizmodo article: Researchers Think It’s a Good Idea to Secure Your Phone Using the One Thing You Perpetually Lose — https://gizmodo.com/researchers-think-its-a-good-idea-to-secure-your-phone-1838248232 

Wired article: Ears Could Make Better Unique IDs Than Fingerprints — https://www.wired.com/2010/11/ears-biometric-identification/ 

Relonch AI — https://relonch.com 

TechCrunch article: The Polaroid Lab uses the light from your phone’s screen to turn digital photos into Polaroids — https://techcrunch.com/2019/09/10/the-polaroid-lab-uses-the-light-from-your-phones-screen-to-turn-digital-photos-into-polaroids/ 

Scienmag article: UNC-Chapel Hill To Lead $20 Million Project To Test A Reimagined Internet — https://scienmag.com/unc-chapel-hill-to-lead-20-million-project-to-test-a-reimagined-internet/ 

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Episode 244 — Who’s your secret crush?

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neon sign reading "I have a crush on you"
Photo by Leonardo Sanches on Unsplash

This episode starts off with a virtual tour of 17th century London, courtesy of the Pudding Lane team’s entry to a British Library Digital Scholarship a couple of years ago.  The experience created with Crytek’s CRYENGINE holds up over the years, and the detail included in this entry is phenomenal, from the rope at the docks to the textures of the window glass, and the rooms they gently obscure behind them.

Secret crushes feature prominently in the new Facebook Dating capabilities, which have just now been deployed to the US Facebook app.  It will be very interesting to see how the user population begins to take advantage of the new functionality.

Star Wars makes a musical appearance courtesy of the British musician Sam Battle, where Lego droids form an entire orchestra to play the John Williams theme.  Also included in the VOTD link is a longer making-of video that is well worth checking out.  Continuing with A New Hope, Lego debuts the Ultimate Collector Series Imperial Star Destroyer battleship from the opening of the the movie, and the 4,784 piece set, along with a couple of minifigs and a to-scale model of the Tantive IV, which is pretty tiny, can be yours for a cool $699.

The cohosts round out this episode with an announcement story from the House House team about a new game called Untitled Goose Game, and some anticipation of the Apple event coming up next week.

Selected Links

Open Culture article: Prize-Winning Animation Lets You Fly Through 17th Century London — http://www.openculture.com/2013/11/fly-through-17th-century-london.html 

British Library Digital Scholarship blog: Off The Map Winners Announced — https://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/digital-scholarship/2013/10/off-the-map-winners-announced.html 

Pudding Lane blog — http://puddinglanedmuga.blogspot.com 

Crytek’s CRYENGINE — https://www.crytek.com/cryengine 

9To5Mac article: Facebook Dating available now, with Secret Crush feature, but concerns raised — https://9to5mac.com/2019/09/06/facebook-dating/ 

Daily Tech News Show episode: You’re in My Facebook Top 9 – DTNS 3610 — http://www.dailytechnewsshow.com/youre-in-my-facebook-top-9-dtns-3610/ 

Marsbot — https://marsbotapp.com 

SlashFilm article: VOTD: Watch the ‘Star Wars’ Theme Played by a LEGO Droid Orchestra with Real Instruments — https://www.slashfilm.com/lego-droids-play-the-star-wars-theme/

Ars Technica article:  This $700 Lego Star Destroyer is as close as you’ll get to the real thing — https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/09/this-700-lego-star-destroyer-is-as-close-as-youll-get-to-the-real-thing/ 

CNN article: A gaming company is releasing something called “Untitled Goose Game” and people are losing their honking minds — https://edition.cnn.com/2019/08/30/entertainment/honking-goose-game-trnd/index.html 

Untitled Goose Game — https://goose.game 

House House tweet

Apple tweet

NC State Author Event: Felicia Day, Embrace Your Weird — https://www.lib.ncsu.edu/events/author-event-felicia-day 

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Episode 243 — Droning on about Robots

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photo of drone flying overhead in a forest
Photo by KAL VISUALS on Unsplash

Bots, drones, and immersive experiences abound in this episode of Games At Work.  Michael and Michael start things off with some new insight about the Minecraft Earth closed beta limited availability — which explains why they have not yet had the chance to try it out!  On the other hand, Nintendo’s newest contribution is about to hit the app store in the form of Mario Kart tour for iOS.

The North Carolina company Lucid Drone Tech has a solution for pressure washing homes and buildings in a drone-powered way.  This leads to the suggestion that similarly equipped drones could be used to specifically target lawn watering.  Michael R mentions the Mavic Pro as the drone on his wish list.  And how about that video of the Robosen T9?  More than meets the eye, for sure! 

The Disney Imagineering team has majorly outdone themselves with the announcement of the newest hotel property – the Halcyon, a galactic starship where are you are immersively experienced in the Star Wars universe, interacting with characters and living out your story.  Michael R shares how he’s been reminiscing in the World of Warcraft immersive virtual world of Azeroth with WoW Classic.  

A veritable trifecta – containing Lego, Star Wars and drones, this episode has it all!  

Selected Links

TechCrunch article: Minecraft Earth closed beta goes live on Android in five cities — https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/30/minecraft-earth-closed-beta-goes-live-on-android-in-five-cities/ 

TechCrunch article: Mario Kart Tour arrives on iOS and Android on September 25 — https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/27/mario-kart-tour-arrives-on-ios-and-android-on-september-25/ 

Mario Kart Tour Pre-Order on App Store — https://apps.apple.com/us/app/mario-kart-tour/id1293634699 

Super Luigi Bros article: The Evolution of Mario — http://www.superluigibros.com/evolution-of-mario 

Inverse article: 5 Best Coding Games for Kids — https://www.inverse.com/article/58713-best-coding-games-for-kids 

The Verge article:  Microsoft’s HoloLens 2 headset may go on sale in September — https://www.theverge.com/2019/8/29/20838085/microsofts-hololens-2-headset-release-date-september 

xinhua.net article: Shanghai hosts 2019 World Artificial Intelligence Conference to boost innovation — http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-08/29/c_138347768_2.htm 

TechCrunch article: Lucid’s drone is built to clean the outside of your house or office — https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/27/lucids-drone-is-built-to-clean-the-outside-of-your-house-or-office/ 

Lucid Drone Tech — https://www.luciddronetech.com 

DJI Mavic Pro — https://www.dji.com/mavic 

Ian Hughes tweet on Robosen T9

Robosen T9 Kickstarter page — https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/890011357/the-worlds-first-intelligent-auto-transforming-rob 

Mashable article: Disney unveils new details about Galactic Starcruiser, the Star Wars hotel — https://mashable.com/article/star-wars-galactic-starcruiser-hotel-resort-details/ 

starwars.com article: D23 Expo 2019: Step Aboard The Halcyon, The New Star Wars Vacation Experience — https://www.starwars.com/news/d23-expo-2019-star-wars-galactic-starcruiser 

Mashable article: ‘World of Warcraft Classic’ developers reminisce about old Azeroth — https://mashable.com/article/world-of-warcraft-classic-interview/ 

PeakVisor — https://apps.apple.com/us/app/peakvisor/id1187259191 

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