I thought this was an interesting article. Still a little
perplexed on how you would dial and what you would
do if you got a lot of crank calls -- and I don't even
want to think about an upgrade (ouch!).
Besides the market segments mentioned, seems like this
would be popular with wives that want to keep tabs on
their wayward hubbies.
James
Put your mobile where your mouth is
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_2055000/2055654.stm
Soon you could be swapping your mobile phone for a molar phone.
Royal College of Art students in London have developed a phone that fits
inside a tooth.
The concept device picks up signals with a radio receiver and uses a tiny
vibrating plate to convey them as sound along the jawbone to a person's ear.
The designers said the mini-molar phone could be implanted in a tooth
during routine dental surgery.
The prototype phone is the work of graduates James Auger and Jimmy Loizeau
and forms part of the Royal College of Art's annual summer exhibition.
Known as The Show, this exhibition shows off the best ideas of the current
crop of RCA designers and students.
Bits and bites
Currently, the tooth phone is only a mock-up and lacks the communications
chip to actually turn it into a functioning device.
Mr Auger said the technology to turn it into a working device already
existed and it would be a simple matter to build the relevant chips into
the gadget.
The designers speculate that, if the tooth phone becomes a working device,
it could be used by stock traders to receive up-to-the-moment information
about share prices or to help football managers communicate quickly with
players during key matches.
However, the existing design is only supposed to help stimulate debate
about future wearable computing devices and to help explore the social and
cultural ramifications of in-body technology.
The tooth phone is on show at the Science Museum in London from the 21 June
to November.
Development of the device was funded by the National Endowment for Science,
Technology & the Arts as part of a collaboration between the Science Museum
and the Royal College of Art.
James Santagata
AudienceTrax
Audience Management Systems
http://www.audiencetrax.com
Received on Fri Jun 21 03:01:22 2002