Scientists Break Brain/Twitter Barrier
University of Wisconsin-Madison biomedical engineering doctoral student Adam Wilson has successfully tested a "brain wave monitor" to Twitter publishing interface, allowing him to compose a message merely by thinking and publish it to the arguably too-popular microblogging service.
Either the gates of Hell have begun to open or this is a grad student who really knows how to publicize his work by riding the bandwagon of popular culture. Both are probably true.
We get a fair number of press releases from Universities about graduate research and we usually don't write about them. This one was freakish enough that we decided to.
Technically, what Wilson did was come up with an interface combining an Electroencephalogram, or brain wave monitor, with an on screen keyboard for selecting letters. The system lights up each key on the keyboard but is able to notice a difference in brain activity when the desired letter for input is lit. Wilson compares it to clicking through multiple letters when texting on a mobile phone.
Once you've found a new way to input text - what are you going to do with it? Use it to Twitter, of course!
Clearly, there's some gimmickry going on in the news of Wilson's interface. Who knows if this is better or worse than saying that a technology is developed to assist physically disabled people when it's really going to be used by the military? Wilson does say that the technology will be helpful for people with active brains but immobile bodies. Now they'll be able to Twitter, among other things, he says. Fair enough.
Here at ReadWriteWeb we're proud to have the #1 Google search result for the phrase "Internet brain implant" for our post The Internet Brain Implant: Why We Should Say No. Today could be a good time to go re-read that post. New interfaces are cool, but the sanctity of free, independent thought is very important. Wilson's work is no brain implant, but it does seem like an important thing to check in with ourselves about.
To be fair, Twitter is clearly a revolutionary technology that we use throughout every day. Anyone who wants access to that tool ought to have it and Wilson's work may increase access.
We presume many more uses for his work will be found if proven commercially viable. For now, though, we can remember today as the day we learned about the man who Tweeted with his mind.
You can find ReadWriteWeb on Twitter, as well as the entire RWW Team: Marshall Kirkpatrick, Bernard Lunn, Alex Iskold, Sarah Perez, Frederic Lardinois, Rick Turoczy, Sean Ammirati, Lidija Davis and Phil Glockner. We hope you'll at least think about joining us there.
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The brain is a crazy powerful tool that we have only begun to tap. Sure, might be a bit on the lame side to use it to twitter, but hey - I'm starting to think that twitter at the end of the day will be remembered as a great launching point for the next era of the internet.
Rex
It was only a matter of time. Scientists had previously done this with optical interfaces that allowed paralyzed patients to write books and interact with nurses. Of course they were not linked to Twitter, and thus the news lacked the "sexiness" of the present story.
Total score for University of Wisconsin to get free press. This has to be the most interesting news on Twitter I've read all day, since everyone's going on and on about Tweetie for Mac and Pizza Hut's Twittern. But I wonder what percentage is correctly translated.
Thanks for this piece Richard!
Let's just get it over with and wire up already? Ok! Ok!
What are you holding out for, l-rd!
reminds of the early voice recognition software. ever run lotus 1-2-3 using your voice? if the last 20 yrs of development in this area are any sign, there's a long way to go before this is very useful for anything more than the novelty of it.
Our lawyers will be contacting Mr. Wilson soon. http://www.zobzee.com has the patent on mind to Twitter technologies and processes.
We've been live since 2008 and have invested billions in R&D. We will not allow our patent to be infringed upon. Thank you for bringing this to our attention.
Jim Kukral
CEO & Founder
http://www.zobzee.com
Hey, this is Adam Wilson. Thanks for picking this up. The only correction that I would make is that this really IS something that is designed to be used by people with severe motor disabilities who communicate with one word every 2 min, so I'm not sure what you mean by "gimmickery." These types of systems are being tested in small in-home trials, and we have been trying to think of ways to get them to be able to use the internet, via email or web browsers, etc. Twitter seemed like a good way to do this, since you don't need to select specific people to send your message to, but rather just do an update that anyone can read. It helped that the interface to do this over the internet was incredibly simple.
I just tweeted this using Apple's voice recognition. Much easier than wearing a helmet.
Will be that brains breaks scientifically 。。
Wow. This really makes me feel sick -and scared for society.
Well, more than I already do anyway.
Kind of spookie, makes you wonder, what else would people be able to do with computers.
I can only imagine what would happen if you strapped this on when you slept at night. Who needs an analyst when you can twitter your dreams and crowdsource the deeper meaning.
hmmm cool
I wonder how this compares to the way physicist Stephen Hawking communicates (a system based on eye movements, I think). He is able to give lectures and respond to questions amazingly quickly using that system.
I'm no expert in this field, but as far as i know, for this thing to realy work for someone it requires a fairly long process of tuning and adjusting.
It's not someyhing that you can buy off the shelf and start using. You first have to "teach" the computer to recognize your specific patterns of brain waves and tell it which one means "no" and which one means "yes".
Therfore, it DOES seem more effective as a tool for the handicapped, and less as a threat to free society :)
Nice research. Cool thing!
Wow.. great research. I hope they will come up with some applications for tinyURL and twitpic!.. :).. (eg. if brain likes the browsing website, picture or video, it will tweet the URL.. ).. :)..
To me the point of the story is where we can go or what we can do to get rid of keyboards. We can get rid of the mouse already, but the Keyboard remains king of the human input interface. This shows the way, maybe, to new solutions. We should be able to dial our mobile phones with this kind of stuff in a few years i guess?
This is interesting!
I came accross this blog today http://humanpopulationcatalog.blogspot.com/
Russian scientists are saying that humans are programed bioforms!!! What do you think? Could make a great press release too.
The Matrix taught us that there is no spoon. And now, there is no keyboard. Really amazing.
This holds great promise for people with different communication abilities and needs.
Great job Adam!
Invention and publicity really helps people with disabilities. If the Twitter solution works out, it might open the door for many other innovations.
Tom
Now, ain't that great :)
Now, ain't that great :)