Your Palm as Remote Controller (Video and Links)

Traditional remote controls for televisions and home media centers are particularly frustrating to use, in my opinion.  There are too many buttons, the buttons are too small, and it is easy to mess it all up.  (I've touched on this topic in a number of blog posts, such as UX of ITV: The User Experience and Interactive TV (or Let's Stamp Out Bad Remote Controls) and others, linked at the end of this post.)


There is hope for the future!  I'm happy to share a video about a method of remote control that might make interacting with my TV less annoying...and possibly pleasant! 


Researchers at the Technical University of Darmstadt have been working on a way for people to control their TV without a remote or hand-held device.  I think they are on the right path. The video shows how UI elements, mapped to the hand, can be touched, with accuracy, to interact eyes-free with a large-screen TV.  This work won the Best Paper award at EuroITV'12.


For more details, see Leveraging the Hand Surface as and Eyes-free TV Remote Control and the references below:
Niloofar Dezfuli, Mohammadreza Khalilbeigi, Jochen Huber, Florian Müller, and Max Mühlhäuser. 2012. PalmRC: Imaginary Palm-based Remote Control for Eyes-free Television Interaction. In Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Interactive Television (EuroITV '12). ACM, New York, NY, USA, to appear. 


Niloofar Dezfuli, Mohammadreza Khalilbeigi, Jochen Huber, Florian Müller, and Max Mühlhäuser. 2012. Leveraging the palm surface as an eyes-free tv remote control. In Proceedings of the 2012 ACM annual conference extended abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems Extended Abstracts (CHI EA '12). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 2483-2488. http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/2223656.2223823

SOMEWHAT RELATED
Oh! No! Sony's "Mother of Remote Controls" for Google TV
Interactive Multimedia Across Platforms and Screens: Adobe's Open Screen Project; MEX Mobile User Experience Manifesto... (Please don't annoy the user!)
Usability of a Remote Control
Quick Link:  The Remote - Death by Voice Control?

Quick Link: The Remote- Death by Voice Control?

Voice Control, the End of the TV Remote? Samsung, LG, and others are racing to bring voice control to the TV Set 
Peter Burrows and Cliff Edwards, Bloomberg Businessweek, 12/7/11


"Most consumers’ first opportunity to talk to their TVs—and have them listen—will be through voice-enabled apps for their smartphone or tablet."

I look forward to seeing if/how Apple TV uses Siri as a remote control!

Picture from Amazon.com

RELATED

Remote Control Anarchy

Jakob Nielsen, Alertbox, 6/7/04  

(A great read, still holds true in 2011!)

Oh! No! Sony's "Mother of Remote Controls" for Google TV

Lynn Marentette, Interactive Multimedia Technology, 10/12/10

Sony, Sony, what have you done?

Harry Brignull, 90 percent of everything, 10/6/10

Bad hospital TV remote control:

Instructions for my last remote control:

Another close encounter with in-store digital display marketing at Best Buy, bad internet TV controllers, bowling with the Kinect, and more...

Not long ago I visited a Best Buy. While I was there, I wanted to play around with the Kinect, but the demo system hadn't arrived.  As I wandered around the store, I encountered quite a few digital displays, part of  Best Buy's recent in-store digital media marketing effort.  I later shared my experience in a blog post,  Close Encounter with "Best Buy On": Example of a multi-channel marketing approach using in-store digital media that includes an on-line magazine.  


During today's visit to Best Buy,  I noticed that there were more display centers in various departments in the store, and many of the displays had useful and informative content. The Kinect demo was up and running, too.


Within the store,  I noticed a strong emphasis on HDTVs with internet capabilities. I  was hoping that the new Internet HDTVs would come with user-friendly touch-screen controllers, or at least an app for use on touch-screen smartphones, iPads, or other touch-screen tablets. 

What I found was disappointing.  On display were traditional-looking multi-button remote controllers, controllers that looked like PC keyboards,  and of course, Sony's confusing multi-featured contribution to the Internet TV scene.


None of the controllers seemed to be easy-to-use, or capable of supporting web-navigation and other web interactions on HDTVs from a distance, especially when the goal is to watch movies and video from a recliner in a darkened family room.  


What sort of user-centered design or usability studies were in place during the hatching of Sony's Internet TV controller?!  (For more about bad remote controls, one of my pet peeves,  see  "Oh! No! Sony's "Mother of Remote Controls" for Google TV, 74 Buttons and Counting")


Below is a partially annotated slideshow of pictures I took of some of the displays and other things I encountered at Best Buy.  Enjoy!



Close Encounter with Kinect Bowling
It wasn't easy trying to bowl and take video with a phone at the same time! 
(Please excuse the shaky video effects and the view of my fingers.)

Oh! No! Sony's "Mother of Remote Controls" for Google TV. 74 Buttons and Counting.

Today we switched from DISH to Time Warner Cable, and tonight I had to battle with a new remote control, the UR5U-8780L.  The experience with this remote led me to search for something better. What a coincidence!  In this day and age of touch-screens,  I was hoping for something better than....

Sony's Mother of Remote Controls!

-From the SonyStyle website: Television, meet internet., 

I first learned of this complex addition to the world of TV/Internet surfing from an article and a video in a recent article in Engadget:  Sony's Google TV controller outed on ABC's Nightline (video) Ross Miller,10/5/10.  Harry Brignull also posted about the new controller- Sony, Sony, what have you done?
(Harry is a UX Consultant at Madgex, and author of the 90percent of everything blog.)


ABC Video, via engadget

It is 2010, and with TVs connected to the internet, we'll be interacting with content in ways we could only dream of in the recent past.  Interactive TV is here.  Do I really have to push a lot of buttons in order to have the best "interactive" experience?  




OTHER OPTIONS
Xfinity Remote Prototype for the iPad


Turn Your iPhone into a TV Remote Samuel Axon, Mashable/Apple
L5 Remote: Turn your iPhone or iPod touch into a universal remote control:

Not Yet Available:  Vizio's XRT100 touchscreen remote

My Fancy New Remote, Instructions Included:

RELATED
Sony, Sony, what have you done? (Harry Brignull, 90percent of everything)
Usability of a Remote Control (my post)
Interactive TV Game Controllers- A variety of permutation for the present and future (iPhone, iPod Touch Wii-mote, XBox 360 Controller, Gesture ....
Usability Review of a Remote Control (Chris McEvoy)

Video and Links about Google TV : Another Flavor of Android - "Google TV brings everything you love about the web to your television"

"Google TV brings everything you love about the web to your television"

INTRODUCING GOOGLE TV



Transcript of the Google TV video:


"Back when there were only a few networks, watching TV was pretty simple.  You turned on the TV, and if you didn't like what was playing, you changed the channel. But these days, TV can be pretty complicated. Figuring out what you want to watch is hard enough, and that's only the beginning. Once you've chosen a program, you have to figure out when it's playing, and which of hundreds of channels it's on.  It's like you have to change your schedule to fit your TV's schedule.  In fact, many of us end up watching videos on the web, because it is easier to find things that you want.  I mean think about it, more and more of our favorite shows and videos are showing up online these days, and you can get to them really easily, whenever you want, just by typing in what you're looking for."


"The problem is, these smaller screens don't really compare to our home entertainment systems.  Which leads us to a pretty big question:   If the web is so smart, and our TVs are so fun to watch, why do we have to choose?  Why can't they work together?   


"Well, now they can.  Introducing Google TV.  Google TV brings everything you love about the web to your television. Some new TVs will come with it built-in, or you can get a separate box for the TV you already own. Either way, the way it works is very simple. Right on your TV screen, you simply type in what you're looking for...anything you're looking for, and Google TV will find it."


"It's basically an entertainment hub that searches all of your channels, recorded shows, YouTube, and other web sites. If you find something you like, you can add it to your home screen where you will always see your favorite channels, shows, websites, even music playlists and photo albums. That way, you can get to things really quick.  And with a full web browser, you get unlimited access to the entire Internet, so you can do stuff like browse photos or update your status.  And that's just scratching the surface."


"By opening up your TV to all of the improvements and innovation that the web has to offer, Google TV will make your TV smarter and easier to use.  So you'll be able to spend a lot less time finding what you want, and a lot more time watching what you want."

Here is some information from the Google TV website:

Watch

Google TV is coming to a living room near you.

Watch the Google TV announcement.

Learn

Learn about the partners we're working with.

Visit Sony, Logitech and Intel.

Develop

Optimize your web apps for Google TV.

Android SDK coming soon. Learn more.

Google TV is a new experience made for television that combines the TV you know and love with the freedom and power of the Internet. Watch an overview video below, sign up for updates, and learn more about how to develop for Google TV.

More Information about Google TV from Google

Announcing Google TV:  TV meets web.  Web meets TV

"Google TV is a new experience for television that combines the TV that you already know with the freedom and power of the Internet. With Google Chrome built in, you can access all of your favorite websites and easily move between television and the web. This opens up your TV from a few hundred channels to millions of channels of entertainment across TV and the web. Your television is also no longer confined to showing just video. With the entire Internet in your living room, your TV becomes more than a TV — it can be a photo slideshow viewer, a gaming console, a music player and much more."

Google TV Developer Page

Designing Websites for Google TV

Related Google TV News and Links

Google: A new consumer electronics power broker

Tom Krazit, CNET News  5/20/2010

Google I/0 Keynote Day 2: Android Day (Live Blog)

Tom Krazit, CNET News  5/20/2010

Google tries where others failed: shaking up TV biz
Yinka Adegoke and Jennifer Saba, Reuters  5/21/10
Google Introduces Google TV, New Android OS
Priya Ganapati, Gadget Lab, Wired 5/20/10
Sony Internet TV
Logitec and Google TV
Logitec Google TV Box Will Have Special Powers
Matt Buchanan, Gizmodo, 5/20/10
Google Combines TV, Android, and All of the Internet
Jason Chen, Gizmodo, 5/20/10

Picture of Google TV Box, from Gizmodo:




SOMEWHAT RELATED
I wonder what the user interface will be for navigating around Google TV.   This just might be the opportunity for a next-gen universal remote control to emerge.   I hope so, because I've had usability issues with the current state of my remote controls and my DVR +  HDTV viewing experiences.


FYI:   A few of my previous posts related to remote controls, web-browsing on HD TV's, and so on:

Usability of a Remote Control
The UX of ITV:  The User Experience and Interactive TV (or Let's STamp Out Bad Remote Controls)
WebTaps HDTV and Touch-Screen Web Browser:  Share the view of the web on your couch!
Silverpac's Multi-touch website, by Ciplex features Evolution 5500, a user-freindly universal remote control, using Wiindows 7 SlideShow
Jonathan Kessler's Hand Eye Technologies:  Coordinating your cell phone with Interactive TV
An Example of Convergence:  Interactive TV:  uxTV 2008

UPDATE:

Maybe a something like the iPad app below will be created for a slate-application for Google TV?

Remote Control News:  Comcast Shows Off Sweet iPad Remote Control Prototype


This application supports socializing remotely via your remote....watch the video to see how it works:

Xfinity Remote Powered by Comcast (on an iPad)