SixthSense is a wearable gestural interface device that augments the physical world with digital information and lets people use natural hand gestures to interact with that information. It was developed by Pranav Mistry, a PhD student in the Fluid Interfaces Group at the MIT Media Lab. It is similar to a neckworn projector+camera system developed by Media Lab student Steve Mann which Mann originally referred to as "Synthetic Synesthesia of the Sixth Sense".



Basically, Sixth Sense is a mini-projector coupled with a camera and a cellphone—which acts as the computer and your connection to the Cloud, all the information stored on the web. Sixth Sense can also obey hand gestures, like in the infamous Minority Report.

However, instead of requiring you to be in front of a big screen like Tom Cruise, Sixth Sense can do its magic—and a lot more—everywhere.

The camera recognizes objects around you instantly, with the micro-projector overlaying the information on any surface, including the object itself or your hand. Then, you can access or manipulate the information using your fingers. Need to make a call? Extend your hand on front of the projector and numbers will appear for you to click. Need to know the time? Draw a circle on your wrist and a watch will appear. Want to take a photo? Just make a square with your fingers, highlighting what you want to frame, and the system will make the photo—which you can later organize with the others using your own hands over the air.

But those are just novelty applications. The true power of Sixth Sense lies on its potential to connect the real world with the Internet, and overlaying the information on the world itself. Imagine you are at the supermarket, thinking about what brand of soap is better. Or maybe what wine you should get for tonight's dinner. Just look at objects, hold them on your hands, and Sixth Sense will show you if it's good or bad, or if it fits your preferences or not.

Now take this to every aspect of your everyday life. You can be in a taxi going to the airport, and just by taking out your boarding pass, Sixth Sense will grab real time information about your flight and display it over the ticket. You won't need to do any action. Just hold it in front of your and it will work.

The key here is that Sixth Sense recognizes the objects around you, displaying information automatically and letting you access it in any way you want, in the simplest way possible.

Clearly, this has the potential of becoming the ultimate "transparent" user interface for accessing information about everything around us. If they can get rid of the colored finger caps and it ever goes beyond the initial development phase, that is. But as it is now, it may change the way we interact with the real world and truly give everyone complete awareness of the environment around us.

Or just make a few people look like dorks. It can go either way, really. Whatever it is, I want to try it.

The first Facebook benefits that I have found is that I am able to find some of my old friends from all my previous schools that I have fallen out of contact with. I know that if you're like me, some of your close friends stay in contact with you, but others just fall away and see you only on rare occasions.

The second Facebook benefit that I know of is that Facebook has many groups on the site that you can join. So if you are interested in America's Next Top Model (ANTM) you can research ANTM in the groups section and you will be able to find friends on there that like the programme just as much as you do. Now that is just one example that I can say right away, but I know that you can join groups for being a fan of your favorite football team, television show, or whatever you want for the most part. Another Facebook benefits is that even if you are unable to find the group that you are looking for, but think that an interest would exist you will be able to start your own group!



The third Facebook benefit that I have found is that you are able to chat with your friends just like you were able to on some of the original Internet programs. I know that some people do not like talking online to others, but if you do not have free long distance or are unsure of peoples phone numbers that are your old friends you can talk to them on Facebook and manage to save yourself a long distance phone call. However, at times you will still want to get that personal connection and call someone up.


With such wonderful benefits from using Facebook, it is no wonder nearly everyone I know, including my aunties, parents and little cousins, all have and use Facebook. Now if only they come up with a software which can limit our time on Facebook so that youths like me will not be able to be distracted by it and be able to complete our homework in no time. (instead of a few hours because someone just changed their status and you had to read and comment on it, or because somebody just uploaded a bunch of new photos)

Our teacher showed us this blog in class and after looking through quite a few other videos, I still find this to be the most comprehensive (and cute) video explaining what blogs are. So here it is. ((:



I also found another video! But this is on trends in online journalism.

So is journalism on the internet here to stay? Well the majority thinks so.

"Citizen journalism and social media also have important roles to play, and in one form or another they are here to stay. The power of social media to spot and report news in real time is well illustrated by the Austin airplane incident. Beyond news, social media and blogs provide a deep reservoir of information and a wide range of opinion that we could not have imagined even 10 years ago. Citizen journalists and commentators enhance the richness and diversity of expression and keep professional journalists on their toes. Tools like Twitter promote free expression and make it available to people who would otherwise be heard. Finally, social media have demonstrated an amazing ability to engage and motivate large numbers of people, as we saw during the recent Haitian relief effort."

"It was citizen journalists using new media who directed mainstream news organizations to [the plane's pilot] Joe Stack’s anti-government note, which turned the story from a local tragedy to one of national and international importance. Our news policy prevents us from spreading information we haven’t confirmed, so we sat on the note until we confirmed Stack owned the [website on which the note was found]. And even then, we talked about how to report on the note’s contents. With everything we tweeted, we stayed committed to being respectful, factual, and sensitive."

"Aggregating and curating content with attribution should become part of a BBC journalist’s assignment; and BBC’s journalists have to integrate and listen to feedback for a better understanding of how the audience is relating to the BBC brand."

The fact that I am now blogging for my school assignment should also be indicative that blogging news or twittering it, will be here to stay in future.

The 2008 U.S. presidential campaign drew the attention of the world. In the aftermath, the Obama campaign's use of Facebook, YouTube and Twitter were widely credited with helping secure the historic victory of President Barack Obama.








Mr. Obama used the Internet to organize his supporters in a way that would have in the past required an army of volunteers and paid organizers on the ground. Mr. Obama’s campaign took advantage of YouTube for free advertising. And those videos were more effective than television ads because viewers chose to watch them or received them from a friend instead of having their television shows interrupted.

I then read from the New York times that:

“The campaign’s official stuff they created for YouTube was watched for 14.5 million hours,” Mr. Trippi said. “To buy 14.5 million hours on broadcast TV is $47 million.”

There has also been a sea change in fact-checking, with citizens using the Internet to find past speeches that prove a politician wrong and then using the Web to alert their fellow citizens.

The John McCain campaign, for example, originally said that Governor Sarah Palin opposed the so-called bridge to nowhere in Alaska, Ms. Huffington said. “Online there was an absolutely obsessive campaign to prove that wrong,” she said, and eventually the campaign stopped repeating it.

“In 2004, trust me, they would have gone on repeating it, because the echo chamber would not have been as facile,” Ms. Huffington said.

The Internet also let people repeatedly listen to the candidates’ own words in the face of attacks, Mr. Huffington said. As Reverend Jeremiah Wright’s incendiary words kept surfacing, people could re-watch Mr. Obama’s speech on race. To date, 6.7 million people have watched the 37-minute speech on YouTube.

So since the internet has been changing the way politics works in America, perhaps one day soon, Singapore would be in the same position. Political candidates will upload their campaign videos on youtube, set up facebook and twitter accounts, instead of a few "meet the MP" sessions where they shake some people's hands (preferably some old couple and then some little kids), and ask them (and thank them in advance) for voting for them.

Using the internet has been proven effective in aiding ones political campaign so I sincerely hope that the Singapore government might start to allow a little more freedom in this area to allow the various political views to be aired, shared and commented on.