Wii Fit making your defibrillator flutter? Balance Board taking your back out?
Some researchers suspect the video games industry, which touts the health benefits of so-called exergames, is paying little attention to the risks those games pose to players.
And the FDA is taking notice…
via Healthy games offer risks, too – The Boston Globe.
In my Boston Globe personal technology column this week, I take a look at casual games for the iPad.
And one commenter accuses me of snobbery, for including this bit in my column:
“Asteroids, Space Invaders, Ms. Pac-Man: Back in the 1980s, on Long Island, my friends and I played these games compulsively at home and at the local tennis club, while players sat around, sipping Perrier water.”
But that’s how we rolled, up on the North Shore of Long Island…
via A classic pops up quickly on the iPad – The Boston Globe.
Too good to be true (Happy April 1), but oh, what a great idea:
“When the iPad was announced, we all crammed into a conference room to watch live and drool over every shiny corner and reflecty icon. After the glow of the initial announcement wore off, many of us came to the conclusion that the iPad was actually pretty useless. ‘It’s a giant iPhone!” some said. Others exclaimed, ‘WTF, no Flash!?’. Still, we knew that most Apple fanbots (us included) would have to have one anyway.”
via ThinkGeek :: iCade – iPad Arcade Cabinet.
Here’s a live view from the “Complete Game-Completion Marathon 2010″ (all proceeds to Partners in Health/Haitian relief):
Live Video streaming by UstreamMore about the event:
“We are marathoning for earthquake relief in Haiti. We have teams of players ready to grind it out for charity, but we need your help! Tune in to the webcam feed on the weekend of February 26th-28th to check it out, and please donate to the cause. Every little bit helps.”
via Complete Game-Completion Marathon 2010.
Image: LOTR: Mines of Moria, from Westwood, Mass.-based Turbine
In my Boston Globe column today, I embrace the latest Roomba robot vacuum cleaner, and note the growth of a Middle Earth MMO. Both products are from Massachusetts-based companies.
Please take a moment to read the column, and comment at Boston.com!
Just in time for Great Depression 2.0:
Westwood-based Turbine (it’s at www.turbine.com) last week launched a game that will keep you busy for as long as you can keep the lights on.
The Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria is the first expansion pack for Turbine’s massively multiplayer online game about hobbits, wizards, and whatnot.
LOTRO: Mines of Moria shows there is even more to Middle Earth than MMO players could have imagined.
First good frackin’ thing I have seen for the iPhone. This application, like several I have seen for the Nintendo DS, responds to the force of your breath against the device’s mic.
Smule’s new iPhone app, Ocarina turns your iPhone into a fully-functional musical wind instrument. This amazing little application works very much like the real deal, combining touch, tilt, gestures and human breath to create ethereal sounds which bring out your inner Zelda.
via iphone ocarina: go blow (into your iphone) on [technabob]
Photo: Courtesy of Devin Connors
Originally uploaded by markbaard.
I just received this pic from Devin Connors, a former journo student of mine at Emmanuel College. You can check out a recent bit by Devin, about the future of gaming, here.
The more you play, the more they pry
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A warning to all you social networking, or “Web 2.0″, junkies out there: This kid (Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg) and his coding pals are not your friends. Photo: “Scott Beale / Laughing Squid,” at laughingsquid.com. – mb
Practically all of the stupid games, quizzes, widgets and apps used by Facebook social networkers scoop-up more personal data than they need, and keep that data longer than they should, without notifying users.
A University of Virginia study found recently that 90 percent of the most popular apps (UVa looked at 150 of them) rip-off Facebookers’ personal data.
Here’s a link and excerpt to some recent coverage of the case study’s release:
Privacy Lives » Blog Archive » Social Networking Sites’ Applications Gather Users’ Personal Data
“Facebook fanatics who have covered their profiles on the popular social networking site with silly games and quirky trivia quizzes may be unknowingly giving a host of strangers an intimate peek at their lives,” reports the Washington Post. A couple of weeks ago, the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (“CIPPIC”) filed a complaint (pdf) against Facebook alleging 22 violations of Canadian law (which I blogged about here). The Privacy Commissioner of Canada has launched an investigation. The BBC discusses security vulnerabilities in these applications here. CNet News and others have reported on the problems surrounding this kind of data-gathering from social networking sites and third-party application creators.
Some teens are having troubling distinguishing between real and virtual realities, making them more likely to turn on the public with real guns blazing.
That’s what Oregon Health and Sciences University psychiatrist Jerald Block was scheduled to tell a conference in Washington earlier today. He cites the Columbine shooting case as an example of what is yet to come.
The Columbine shooters, Harris and Klebold, Block say, were addicted to first person shooters (video games). The two took their aggressions into RL (real life) after having the plug pulled on their digital worlds.
OHSU psychiatrist to highlight warning signs for school shootings
“Virtual realities, like the ones that Harris and Klebold experienced, are a double-edged sword,” explained Block, a clinical faculty member in the OHSU Department of Psychiatry. “On one hand, virtual worlds allow people to feel connected and empowered. They also allow participants to escape stress and have an outlet for aggression. On the other hand, when a heavy user must eliminate or cut back on the virtual, as was the case with these two killers at times, the user can feel lonely, anxious, or angry.
Linden Lab chairman Mitch Kapor and developer Philippe Bossut today demonstrated a camera-based motion recog system that controls your avatar’s movements in Second Life. Looks good on the video, below…
With a 3D viewing headset (such as the augmented reality headset imagined here), you would have your own at-home 3DVR “cave” for exploring the metaverse.
Incredibly, we are just years, perhaps only months, away from very discreet (i.e., they won’t take over your livingroom), immersive experiences, at home.
And it will cost a fraction of what 3DVR caves, such as the one at Brown University (an elaborate mix of multiple projectors, hand and head tracking devices, and a stack of Linux servers).
Of course, the more seamless metaversal interfaces become, the more likely people will start forgetting where they really are.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2t52gkAwJq8&eurl=http://secondlife.reuters.com/stories/2008/04/11/mitch-kapor-unveils-sl-navigation-via-3d-camera/]
[digg=http://digg.com/hardware/SL_3D_hardware_near_complete_immersion]