Browse content similar to 21/04/2012. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
Line | From | To | |
---|---|---|---|
Did you think you were in charge of the machines? Not any more. Now, | :00:13. | :00:23. | |
:00:23. | :00:38. | ||
This week, Click is in Liverpool at the art exhibition designed to test | :00:38. | :00:42. | |
our relationship with robots and each other. But are you ready to | :00:42. | :00:48. | |
become a digital been? As a rapper Tupac is resurrected for one final | :00:48. | :00:54. | |
peak, we show you how this holographic effect was achieved. -- | :00:54. | :01:04. | |
:01:04. | :01:05. | ||
gig. And a side that has control of your online mutterings in Webscape. | :01:05. | :01:10. | |
Welcome. It is pretty certain that in the future, we will all be | :01:10. | :01:14. | |
talking to each other more and more using technology. Communicating | :01:14. | :01:19. | |
with people who are a fair distance away, as if they were in the same | :01:19. | :01:23. | |
room. Now, I am not just talking about video calling your mother. | :01:23. | :01:29. | |
There are many more ways in which you can make your presence felt and | :01:29. | :01:35. | |
feel that of somebody else's from afar. That is why we have come to | :01:35. | :01:40. | |
this exhibition which explores some of those ideas. It is called Robots | :01:40. | :01:49. | |
and Avatars. Part art, part technology, this is | :01:49. | :01:53. | |
a collection of works exploring ways in which we made few others | :01:53. | :01:59. | |
and ourselves as digital beings. -- view. The artists have pondered | :01:59. | :02:03. | |
questions like how do we feel about seeing ourselves on screen? How | :02:04. | :02:07. | |
would it feel to look more of our lives in virtual bodies? And how | :02:07. | :02:15. | |
would it feel to let machines take more control over our real bodies? | :02:15. | :02:20. | |
This work, for example, called Base 8 invited to transform your hand | :02:20. | :02:24. | |
into a virtual one to experience the feeling of handling non- | :02:24. | :02:28. | |
existent particles. As more and more devices become controlled | :02:28. | :02:32. | |
using gestures, we may have to get used to moving things around which | :02:32. | :02:36. | |
we cannot actually feel. Maybe manipulating particles in a virtual | :02:37. | :02:40. | |
chemistry lab or remotely controlling that will hand from | :02:40. | :02:45. | |
thousands of miles away. You may instead want to use your phone to | :02:45. | :02:51. | |
control a bop -- A Bott, bot's voicebox. This is a daunting figure | :02:51. | :02:57. | |
designed to give a voice to others who may otherwise be lost in the | :02:57. | :03:03. | |
crowd. He certainly is hard to ignore. Some of robotic | :03:03. | :03:08. | |
interpretations are far more tenuous. Take a leader - a giant | :03:08. | :03:13. | |
globe covered with pieces of coal and filled with a mixture of you in | :03:13. | :03:21. | |
bed to make it floaty. Aida has been described as an analogue robot. | :03:21. | :03:25. | |
Something that is remote controlled by quite a few people at one time. | :03:25. | :03:29. | |
But in no way did Italy. The point, does it say something about what | :03:29. | :03:36. | |
happens when people try to be cholate -- created at once? Maybe. | :03:36. | :03:41. | |
And from the physical to the emotional. Some of the works are | :03:41. | :03:45. | |
designed to capture our feelings. The electronic man is a website | :03:45. | :03:50. | |
which sources emotions from users around the world. If the project | :03:50. | :03:56. | |
gains momentum, it could provide a guide to the happiest places on | :03:56. | :04:01. | |
earth and the most stressful. If crossing continents is not your | :04:01. | :04:05. | |
thing, you now have many ways to talk to people on the other side of | :04:05. | :04:11. | |
the world. If you years ago, Second Life was briefly all the rage. A 3D | :04:11. | :04:15. | |
space in which your avatar could build a home, the business and | :04:15. | :04:19. | |
relationships with others, no matter where their flesh and blood | :04:19. | :04:26. | |
fissions decided. Although the buzz around it has died down, its ideas | :04:26. | :04:30. | |
live on. This project, Visions of our Communal Dreams, attempts to | :04:30. | :04:35. | |
show how a virtual world may blend with the real one. Not only can you | :04:35. | :04:39. | |
fly your avatar around this island, meeting and interacting with others | :04:39. | :04:44. | |
virtually, but it can also see and talk to real people as well. Fly to | :04:44. | :04:48. | |
one of several portals of the island and you will find a window | :04:48. | :04:53. | |
to a particular place in the real world. Cameras and projectors allow | :04:53. | :04:58. | |
real and virtual people to converse across the physical and virtual | :04:58. | :05:06. | |
divide. More of this later. And finally, something much more | :05:06. | :05:10. | |
unnerving. It is designed to test out trust in technology. Will we | :05:10. | :05:16. | |
ever reach a point where we let the robot drive us about? How easy | :05:16. | :05:22. | |
would it be to give over physical control to a machine? I am about to | :05:22. | :05:32. | |
:05:32. | :05:34. | ||
find out. World! -- I do not have much choice | :05:34. | :05:40. | |
about which way it wants me to go. This frightening looking beast is | :05:40. | :05:44. | |
called Compass and has the ability to spin you around. It has its own | :05:44. | :05:48. | |
ideas about the route you should walk and, specifically, it will not | :05:48. | :05:53. | |
let you walk into the rectangles of light. It is guided by a small | :05:53. | :05:57. | |
magnetic field under the carpet and gets its talk by spinning | :05:57. | :06:02. | |
heavyweights in the opposite direction. | :06:02. | :06:07. | |
This is kind of awesome but it is not very nice. The Compass is | :06:07. | :06:11. | |
really insisted on where it wants me to go and where it does not want | :06:11. | :06:15. | |
me to go. It is really strong. It is very difficult to resist when it | :06:15. | :06:25. | |
:06:25. | :06:30. | ||
turns you. I guess this is what it We are back with Ede, the giant | :06:30. | :06:37. | |
inflatable robot/avatar. And our guest, Professor Noel Sharkey. -- | :06:38. | :06:46. | |
aider. Welcome to Click. Is there anything you and your profession | :06:46. | :06:51. | |
can learn from this? Quite a lot. I love working with artists and | :06:51. | :06:54. | |
designers because they explore domains we do not look at. We are | :06:54. | :06:58. | |
good at Engineering. But if you want real beauty and an exploration | :06:58. | :07:03. | |
of new ideas, this is the way to go. I would recommend we do this kind | :07:03. | :07:08. | |
of arts in our schools. And we are teaching robotics. There has been a | :07:08. | :07:12. | |
lot of talk about how a i is getting better. What Aires is it | :07:12. | :07:19. | |
particularly good at? And for what parts of simulating real life? -- | :07:19. | :07:25. | |
areas. There has been a lot of talk since the 50s. In the 70s, we would | :07:25. | :07:30. | |
have all household Tours does. One thing we are good at is making | :07:30. | :07:35. | |
false predictions. -- tours. The areas we are good at his robotics. | :07:35. | :07:40. | |
There is a lot of work in robotics in things like farming, picking | :07:40. | :07:44. | |
fruit, cleaning floors, a lot of cleaning tasks. The reason for this | :07:45. | :07:49. | |
is until the 1980s, the big ambitions were to make a big | :07:49. | :07:54. | |
thinking robot machine. That was almost impossible. Machines were | :07:54. | :07:59. | |
moving so slowly. You could hardly see them moving. So we moved from a | :07:59. | :08:03. | |
fast sensor type operation, stop trying to make multi-purpose | :08:03. | :08:07. | |
machines. Now, there is one robot that will clean and sweep the floor, | :08:07. | :08:11. | |
one that will market, and one that will clean the windows. That is the | :08:11. | :08:16. | |
area where we are making progress. Single purpose robots. Also the | :08:16. | :08:21. | |
area of telly robotics. That is becoming major. It has become | :08:21. | :08:28. | |
really begin surgery, particularly in the US. It is robotic assistance | :08:28. | :08:32. | |
for a surgeon. The surgeon moves the hand but the robot takes out | :08:33. | :08:37. | |
tremors and so it is good progress. I have been told in the past that | :08:37. | :08:42. | |
it is the sensors on any were bought or system that is still | :08:42. | :08:46. | |
letting us down, the ability to in per -- interpret the world and act | :08:46. | :08:51. | |
on it. Is that still the case? is but it is not the sensors | :08:51. | :08:54. | |
themselves. They are becoming remarkable with nanotechnology. We | :08:54. | :09:04. | |
:09:04. | :09:05. | ||
are making incredible infrared sensors. Sonar sensors take out | :09:05. | :09:14. | |
certain problems. But with vision, for example, back in the 1950s, we | :09:14. | :09:18. | |
thought we would saw fit in ten years but we have seen little | :09:18. | :09:22. | |
progress. We can classify a telephone or a cup, put the two | :09:22. | :09:26. | |
together and you have a cup of a phone or something but it is poor. | :09:26. | :09:32. | |
Thank you. There is a lot here and a sure it will fire your | :09:32. | :09:41. | |
imagination. Get in touch. Next - this week's Tech News. | :09:41. | :09:46. | |
Scientists at the University of Glasgow have pioneered a way to use | :09:46. | :09:49. | |
3D printers to create drugs and other chemicals. The process | :09:49. | :09:53. | |
involves a robotic we controlled syringe, building the drugs out of | :09:53. | :09:57. | |
the gel based ink into which chemicals and catalysts are mixed. | :09:57. | :10:01. | |
It is thought manufacturers, doctors and even the public could | :10:01. | :10:06. | |
use the technique to download, pre- set recipes and Taylor medicines to | :10:06. | :10:11. | |
individual's means. Greenpeace warns of the environmental impact | :10:11. | :10:15. | |
towards the trend towards cloud computing. A new report breaks some | :10:15. | :10:19. | |
of the biggest firms on how efficient they are data farms are. | :10:19. | :10:23. | |
Google performed well while Apple and amazon were rated poorly. The | :10:23. | :10:28. | |
canteen group says if the cloud was a country, it would be the fifth | :10:28. | :10:31. | |
biggest polluter on the planet. Apple, which do not provide | :10:31. | :10:34. | |
information for the report, disputed the figures and says it is | :10:34. | :10:38. | |
currently building greener power supplies. Microsoft says its next | :10:38. | :10:42. | |
operating system, Windows eight, will come in four flavours, | :10:42. | :10:47. | |
including one designed for tablet. The Enterprise and professional | :10:47. | :10:55. | |
versions are aimed at business -- businesses. This covert system | :10:55. | :10:59. | |
would also work on Pat strain laptops and includes versions of | :11:00. | :11:04. | |
Excel, PowerPoint and other operations. A US firm that asked | :11:04. | :11:10. | |
the public for $100,000 to create a new type of what has raised more | :11:10. | :11:14. | |
than $3 million in just one month. The what, which has a seven-day | :11:14. | :11:19. | |
back to life, has an efficient display, links to the user's Apple | :11:19. | :11:24. | |
or android phone, allowing them to -- alerting and e-mails or messages. | :11:24. | :11:30. | |
It also runs cycling apps. It may even dispense cash at this rate! | :11:30. | :11:39. | |
Of -- a window to a virtual world. At the moment, it does not look | :11:39. | :11:43. | |
like anybody his home. But the ideas and technology behind this | :11:43. | :11:51. | |
are now starting to bring more people together. | :11:51. | :11:57. | |
Most of us associate avatars with gaming. A fantasy character we | :11:57. | :12:02. | |
control in words -- worlds where we fight battles and without fantasies, | :12:02. | :12:05. | |
even own Allam Ireland. Increasingly, the characters are | :12:05. | :12:10. | |
not carrying swords. -- our own island. They wear normal clothes | :12:10. | :12:15. | |
and look like us because the virtual world they are in a not | :12:15. | :12:23. | |
fantasy but designed to mimic the real one. The most popular | :12:23. | :12:27. | |
applications are virtual meetings with the number of five-10 persons | :12:27. | :12:31. | |
for in 18. We have a virtual conferences where we have something | :12:31. | :12:36. | |
like 20-30 people up to hundreds of participants in a conference room. | :12:36. | :12:40. | |
And virtual trade shows where thousands of people visit a booth | :12:40. | :12:44. | |
and so on. Instead of getting crushed in the hustle and bustle of | :12:44. | :12:50. | |
trade shows, you can dig in and out from your desk or laptop. -- dip. | :12:50. | :12:55. | |
And then there is the virtual classroom where student avatars | :12:55. | :12:58. | |
respond to the real person's movements, picked up by the camera | :12:59. | :13:03. | |
on their computer. Teachers can see who is paying attention by seeing | :13:03. | :13:07. | |
which way they are looking for posing questions and asking | :13:07. | :13:13. | |
students to raise their hands. Over the past few years, these spaces | :13:13. | :13:18. | |
have become more simple to create. Now, you can even design want using | :13:18. | :13:23. | |
a Facebook app. The use of avatars has several advantages over video. | :13:23. | :13:28. | |
It tends to use less bandwidth, allow more people to get involved, | :13:28. | :13:38. | |
:13:38. | :13:42. | ||
with a little less personal There is nothing quite like seeing | :13:42. | :13:51. | |
someone's face. Their ears. I think he has a bit more hair now. While | :13:51. | :13:55. | |
many of us have become familiar with using services like Skype, | :13:55. | :14:01. | |
tech giant Cisco is taking it to a new level that is high-definition | :14:01. | :14:08. | |
with no light time. It is called telepresence. Because as humans, we | :14:08. | :14:15. | |
understand much more than is being said. We have visual beans. 64% of | :14:15. | :14:19. | |
communication is non-verbal. It is body language, the look in my eye, | :14:19. | :14:24. | |
the tone of my voice. Eyeballing someone across the table is | :14:24. | :14:29. | |
important. So rather than placing the camera that catches your image | :14:29. | :14:34. | |
above or below the screen you're looking at, US firm DVE have | :14:34. | :14:40. | |
managed to put it in the middle, behind the image of the person. The | :14:40. | :14:43. | |
screen is semi-transparent plastic with a special metallic coating | :14:44. | :14:50. | |
that reflects a projected image of those being beamed in. A Monday | :14:50. | :14:56. | |
morning meeting at our offices. Not everyone has turned up but many | :14:56. | :14:58. | |
existing the new conferencing systems would struggle to bring | :14:58. | :15:03. | |
this many people together. That is no longer a problem. We may no | :15:03. | :15:11. | |
longer have an excuse to miss it at all. Here, we had 60 people brought | :15:11. | :15:16. | |
together using 19 different video feeds. Polycom says this system can | :15:16. | :15:22. | |
support more than 1,000 individual video streams. They do not all need | :15:22. | :15:29. | |
specialist kit. Chris is using an iPad here but he | :15:29. | :15:34. | |
could be used in any one of a variety of smartphones or tablets. | :15:34. | :15:39. | |
-- using. Does that mean employees could be | :15:39. | :15:42. | |
forced into conferences at any time of the day like some are expected | :15:42. | :15:48. | |
to respond to e-mail now. There is the ability now to work from | :15:48. | :15:55. | |
anywhere. Bosses might transfer -- translate that in to an ability to | :15:55. | :16:00. | |
work any time. Of course, the work- life balance is something that | :16:00. | :16:06. | |
might be a challenge for everybody but there are other mechanisms | :16:07. | :16:14. | |
available. As telepresence becomes more realistic so our systems that | :16:14. | :16:21. | |
show more of the body and at a more useful visual tools. One of the | :16:21. | :16:23. | |
useful things is being able to gesture and use your hands as well | :16:24. | :16:29. | |
as your face and the whole body to communicate. We get to the point | :16:29. | :16:35. | |
now where through the connection of telepresence with other | :16:35. | :16:38. | |
technologies like software that allows you to move virtual objects | :16:38. | :16:45. | |
around, this enables a haptic interface to happen. Virtual 3D | :16:45. | :16:48. | |
technology is already being used to create effects like holograms on | :16:48. | :16:54. | |
stage. Most notably used last weekend at this performance between | :16:54. | :17:00. | |
a pre-recorded Tupac and Snoop Dogg who performed live next to him. One | :17:00. | :17:03. | |
of the companies behind the performance showed us how it was | :17:03. | :17:08. | |
done based on an old Victorian Peter Aleutian called Pepper's | :17:08. | :17:18. | |
:17:18. | :17:19. | ||
Ghost. -- Theatre allusion -- illusion. You have a projector here | :17:19. | :17:24. | |
and you move the screen here and across that space at a 45 degree | :17:24. | :17:31. | |
angle we have our patented foil which reflects the image up into | :17:31. | :17:37. | |
the consumer's face. There is a lot of backstage tinkering to get the | :17:37. | :17:41. | |
realistic effect. The performer and the image on the right can see and | :17:41. | :17:45. | |
hear each other, allowing the onstage artist to interact with the | :17:45. | :17:50. | |
projected one. That project is shooting imagery up that way and | :17:50. | :17:57. | |
going to the boil that way. I can see where I am and where Lucinda is | :17:57. | :18:05. | |
and I can interact. Musion makes its money from the Ming | :18:05. | :18:09. | |
performances live to theatres or stadiums globally. Another small | :18:09. | :18:13. | |
company thinks this is the way telepresence will be done in the | :18:13. | :18:18. | |
future. This system does not rely on a complicated stage set-up. | :18:18. | :18:24. | |
Using projection, you can go right up to this image and a holographic | :18:24. | :18:33. | |
all volumetric effect is maintained. -- or volumetric effect. To get | :18:33. | :18:39. | |
right up close, you might need to ditch the avatar and take the form | :18:39. | :18:44. | |
of a robot instead. A French firm but to inside of one, giving you a | :18:44. | :18:51. | |
physical presence in the room. Other things apart from your image | :18:51. | :18:55. | |
might be communicated. In the future, we will start to get | :18:55. | :19:00. | |
interfaces which deal with our breath, heartbeat, and touch | :19:00. | :19:10. | |
sensations. At the moment, telepresence is focused on the | :19:10. | :19:14. | |
visuals but as other things are added, one day we could literally | :19:14. | :19:24. | |
:19:24. | :19:25. | ||
make our presence felt. In this increasingly virtual world, | :19:25. | :19:31. | |
it is not uncommon to have close friends you have never actually met. | :19:31. | :19:35. | |
Our very own Kate Russell is one of those friends. She never leaves the | :19:35. | :19:40. | |
studio and I only ever see her on wine. So, for one week only, we | :19:40. | :19:48. | |
brought her with us. She actually exists! Virtual pokes only if you | :19:48. | :19:54. | |
don't mind. I have a managed to escape my studio to cut here and | :19:54. | :19:59. | |
look at a few websites and apps related to this exhibition and | :19:59. | :20:04. | |
Liverpool itself. Replicants is the first of the | :20:05. | :20:09. | |
exhibition site I want to show you. This project lets you create a | :20:09. | :20:16. | |
posting but for Facebook or Twitter which will simulate your online | :20:16. | :20:21. | |
activity. By linking with your other social streams and adding key | :20:21. | :20:24. | |
words are vital interests, the bottom will analyse the kinds of | :20:24. | :20:28. | |
content you like in oddities and the size and online persona or that | :20:28. | :20:38. | |
:20:38. | :20:38. | ||
is an extension of who you are. Once it is installed, you are | :20:39. | :20:43. | |
encouraged to activate the Klout app to track any increase in your | :20:43. | :20:49. | |
popularity. I have been running this for about a week and it has | :20:49. | :20:53. | |
been very pro active posting music suggestions. The first video it | :20:53. | :20:59. | |
posted on my behalf was this. I have to say it is probably the best | :20:59. | :21:09. | |
:21:09. | :21:10. | ||
thing I have ever posted on That said, my Replicants soon went | :21:10. | :21:14. | |
a bit mutant, posting all sorts of random things from my Twitter feet. | :21:14. | :21:24. | |
:21:24. | :21:26. | ||
So I eliminated it. -- Twitter feed. Next up from reports and avatars, a | :21:26. | :21:28. | |
Naked on Pluto. You click on the reports and linked to your social | :21:28. | :21:33. | |
streams to turn them into a virtual world populated with people and | :21:33. | :21:43. | |
places you know. It is like a text- based adventure game. It creates a | :21:43. | :21:53. | |
:21:53. | :21:55. | ||
simulation of your friends based on what it has learnt about you. This | :21:55. | :22:00. | |
gain is taxed based and I have a feeling it will have limited appeal. | :22:00. | :22:06. | |
An interesting passing curiosity nonetheless. Here is at an unusual | :22:06. | :22:14. | |
search tall. The results are not extensive but they are compiled | :22:14. | :22:19. | |
into a media with a robotic voice narrating. Here is what it told me | :22:19. | :22:25. | |
about this exhibition. Robots and Avatars is a programme of events | :22:25. | :22:28. | |
and educational activities which explores how young people will work | :22:28. | :22:34. | |
and play with your representations of physical form. Since we are on | :22:34. | :22:39. | |
location, it was a great excuse to turn out -- try out some location | :22:39. | :22:46. | |
based apps. Most cities have an events listings site like Liverpool | :22:46. | :22:51. | |
Live, where you can Plan A night out and buy tickets. A growing | :22:51. | :22:55. | |
number of these sites offer a free smartphone app so you can organise | :22:55. | :23:04. | |
things on the move. Many places have Birchall to work out that will | :23:04. | :23:12. | |
shake you are a sight to the city might not otherwise have found. | :23:12. | :23:16. | |
LiveTour Liverpool maps out a five mile road starting at a train | :23:16. | :23:19. | |
station and leading the past historic buildings and other | :23:19. | :23:25. | |
interesting landmarks, including legendary live music venue the | :23:25. | :23:32. | |
cavern where the Beatles first made their name. It sucks the life out | :23:32. | :23:42. | |
:23:42. | :23:48. | ||
of your battery at an alarming rate. That's all we have time for. | :23:48. | :23:58. | |
:23:58. | :24:02. |