Kodu: A visual programming language made for children to create games, running on the Xbox, using a game controller for input.

"The core of the Kodu project is the programming user interface. The language is simple and entirely icon-based. Programs are composed of pages, which are broken down into rules, which are further divided into conditions and actions. Conditions are evaluated simultaneously.

The Kodu language is designed specifically for game development and provides specialized primitives derived from gaming scenarios. Programs are expressed in physical terms, using concepts like vision, hearing, and time to control character behavior. While not as general-purpose as classical programming languages, Kodu can express advanced game design concepts in a simple, direct, and intuitive manner." -Microsoft

Video from MSR Techfest (low quality, but provides an example of Kodu in action)

Interview about Kodu (link to video)

Kodu Blog

Article: New program allows everyone to program videogames (USA Today 1/7/09)

The Kodu Technology Club at Explorer Elementary School

Screenshots from the Kodu website:

Update from the Microsoft Research UK's Innovation Day 2009 -SecondLight, Collaborative Slate, and More!

Demonstration of SecondLight, Microsoft's plans for the next-gen Surface:

More from the Microsoft Research UK website:

Family Archive (links to video)


Links to videos can be found on the Enabling Innovation Through Research2009 website

For your convenience, you can link to the videos from here:

Keynote

Andrew Herbert

Digital Lifestyle

HomeBook
HomeWatcher
Kitchen Postcard
SecondLight
TimeCard
Wayve
Family Archive

Converging Sciences

Doing Real Computer Mathematics
Modelling & Simulating Biochemical Systems

Education

NodeXL

Environment

Somniloquy
Understanding and
Simulating Forests

Gaming

Computer Go
Core Tools for Augmented Reality
TrueSkill in Halo 3

Health

Programming the
Immune System
SenseCam

Parrallel Programming

Using Transactional Memory in Practice

Security
Cryptographic
Verification Kit
SybilInfer

Systems & Networking
Everest

RELATED:
Microsoft Research Fast Facts

MeeTTable: Kevin O'Mahoney's Multi-Touch Meeting Table Project

Kevin O' Mahoney is a multimedia developer who is working on his Masters in Media Design at Cork University in Ireland. The MeeTTable, pictured above, supports collaboration among 2 or more people who are developing 3D design projects. (Kevin is a member of the NUI-Group.)

More information about Kevin's project, include a video, can be found on his blog.

IEEE International Symposium on Multimedia Dec. 14-16, San Diego, CA

The IEEE International Symposium on Multimedia will be held in San Diego, CA. December 14-16, 2009. A variety of workshops will be held in conjunction with this symposium - links are provided below.

The information below is from the ISM 2009 website:

The IEEE International Symposium on Multimedia (ISM2009) is an international forum for researchers to exchange information regarding advances in the state of the art and practice of multimedia computing, as well as to identify the emerging research topics and define the future of multimedia computing. The technical program of ISM2009 will consist of invited talks, paper presentations, and panel discussions.

Submissions of high quality papers describing mature results or on-going work are invited. Topics for submission include but are not limited to:

Multimedia systems, architecture, and applications
Multimedia networking and QoS
Peer-to-peer multimedia systems and streaming
Pervasive and interactive multimedia systems including mobile systems, pervasive gaming, and digital TV
Multimedia meta-modeling techniques and operating systems
Architecture specification languages
Software development using multimedia techniques
Multimedia signal processing including audio, video, image processing, and coding
Visualization
Virtual Reality
Multimedia file systems, databases, and retrieval
Multimedia collaboration
Rich media enabled E-commerce
Computational intelligence including neural networks, fuzzy logic, and genetic algorithms
Intelligent agents for multimedia content creation, distribution, and analysis
Internet telephony and hypermedia technologies and systems
Multimedia security including digital watermark and encryption
Mobile Multimedia Systems and Services
Multimodal Interaction, including Human Factors
Multimodal User Interfaces: Design, Engineering, Modality-Abstractions, etc.
Multimedia tools including authoring, analyzing, editing, and browsing

Conference Organizing Committee

The conference will offer a variety of workshops:

The ISM2009 Workshop Call for Proposals can be found here.

Papers submitted to each workshop will be reviewed by the program committee and external reviewers of the workshop.

The following workshop proposals have now been accepted:

DSMSA
Data Semantics for Multimedia Systems and Applications

MTEL
Multimedia Technologies for e-Learning
http://www.math.tu-berlin.de/~knipping/ieee/ism09-mtel/

MIPR
The Fifth IEEE International Workshop on Multimedia Information Processing and Retrieval
http://www.cis.fiu.edu/conferences/mipr09/

MASP
Multimedia Audio and Speech Processing: advancing the state-of-the-art
http://speechlab.ifsc.usp.br/ism2009/

CBTV
Content-based audio/video analysis for novel TV services
http://ism2009.eecs.uci.edu/cbtv09/

MS
Third International Workshop on the Many Faces of Multimedia Semantics

AdMIRe
International Workshop on Advances in Music Information Research
http://www.cp.jku.at/conferences/admire2009/

Any general questions regarding ISM2009 Workshops and workshop proposals should be directed to the ISM2009 Workshop Co-Chairs:

Shu-Ching Chen, Florida International University, USA
Chengcui Zhang, University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA
Atsuo Yoshitaka, Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Japan
Ilja Radusch, Technische Universitaet Berlin, Germany

at: ismwork@eecs.uci.edu

Check the website for updates.

iPod Touch Apps, WiiMote Whiteboards, 3D multi-user environments in education, and a teacher's video of the SMARTTable in action.

I thought I'd share the last two posts from my TechPsych blog here, since they focus on newer technologies that involve multi-touch or multi-user interaction.

A teacher explores the multi-touch, multi-user SMARTtable in his classroom
From what I can see, multi-touch, multi-user applications are ideal for students to learn collaborative, cooperative social skills at the same time they learn academic skills. Smart Technologies, well-known in the education world for interactive whiteboards, has unleashed a few tables, known as SMARTTables, in classrooms. One teacher, Tom Barret, is sharing his journey with technology, including the SMARTtable, on-line via his blog, SPACE FOR ME TO EXPLORE

The following is a video of young children doing math on a multi-touch SMARTTable. In order to solve the finger- arithmetic problems, the students must work cooperatively

Addition App - Set to multi-touch finger counts from Tom Barrett on Vimeo.

(In the video, you will see some shapes that Tom mistakenly added, so disregard them as you view the video.)

Here is a quote from Tom's blog about his experience with the addition application:

"I was most pleased with the level of engagement from the children and although on the surface this seems to be a simple application, it definitely requires a level of teamwork that you often do not get.

It is intriguing watching the children’s first attempts and how they realise they need to work together. As the challenge is small scale, once they have been successful they begin to refine their approach, communicate better and so get to later answers quicker."


Educational iPod Touch Apps for Students and Teachers: Eric Sailers' blog
Eric Sailers is a speech and language pathologist and assisted technology specialist who explores new technologies that he's found useful in the schools. Below is Eric's demonstration of applications such as "I Write Words", Wikipanion, Preschool Adventure, Twitterific, Google Mobile, and the calendar.

To demonstrate the iPod Touch,Eric uses the Elmo document camera that projects onto a screen. Note that as Eric demonstrates the Twitterific application, , he navigates to a link to a blog of one of his colleagues, which highlights the way one school is using the Wii as an augmentive communication tool and also an assessment tool for occupational therapy.



Take some time to explore Eric's Speech-Language Pathology Sharing blog. It is full of great information!

Update: Here are two video clips Eric created to prepare for an interview as a finalist for the Cox Communication Innovation in Special Education award. In one of the videos, Eric discusses the EduSim application, a 3D multi-user virtual world platform and authoring toolkit intended for classroom interactive whiteboards.

Interactive Applications for Special Education: Wiimote Whiteboards and iPod Touch in Special Education, Part I


Wiimote Whiteboards and iPod Touch in Special Education, Part II

For a smile - T-Mobile & Flash Mobs: Dancing and Singing in the UK

T-Mobile: Dancing at the Liverpool Street Station

This viral ad from T-Mobile gives a glimpse of how music in a public space, a small crowd of dancers, and YouTube, can bring a smile to over 11,771,896 viewers. (My guess is that many of video's views were repeat views, because I immediately pressed "replay" after the first go-round.)

Apparently a real flash mob congregated at the Liverpool Station a month after the T-Mobile ad was filmed:


I guess this concept has been spreading in the UK. The following video was taken in Trafalgar Square, with 13,000 people singing karaoke:

 

The flash-mob dancing and singing in public places brought back a memory of a video clip I came across a few years ago of a "faux" dance happening at a mall during the late 1990's. The video was set to Fat Boy Slim's "Praise You".
It turns out that Spike Jonze, the man behind the upcoming film of Maurice Sendak's story Where the Wild Things Are, was involve in the creation of the video.
 
Enjoy!

RELATED:
Spike Jonze Unmasked

Arizona State University's ArtsWork Arts Education Center Website: 
Interactive Gateway: Dance, an 8-unit curriculum for high school students that explore the art and culture of the 1960's.

"Students will improvise and choreograph dances structured by chance methods, sports, games, political issues, surroundings, everyday gestures and the manipulation of objects. Through these investigations students realize that in the 1960’s, dance was redefined to include everyday people, everyday movement, indeterminacy, and alternative spaces"

Lesson 7. Anytime, Anywhere, Anything
Unit of Study: Interactive Gateway
Theme: Redefining Dance As Happening Anytime, Anywhere, Including Any Movement
Sub theme: Happenings
Grades: 9-12th grade