|
Bladerunner got it wrong - especially that bit about the Replicants turning into nasty critturs. Our view of the future is unbendingly, unashamedly, evangelically positive. We have seen the light: computers will do all our office work for us, networks will read our newspapers for us, and friendly and very sexy robot slaves will serve our every need from dawn till dusk. The power of shared information will erode inequalities between the haves and have-nots, between races and nations, between young and old, between the first and third worlds. BRILLIANT!
If anything can be certain about the future, it is that it will also involve a lot of sponsors, a lot of entrepreneurs, and a lot of technology, especially digital technologies (and Lego bricks of course). The state-of-the-art Meejalab will redefine the interaction of people, electronic 'bits', and everyday 'things' in a digital world. Our laboratory in downtown medieval Dublin includes custom-built "playpen" learning environments.
Key achievements
The following are among the major breakthroughs and wonderful inventions of our sister lab in the US over the past 24 years:
- computers you wear
- computers you can flush down the toilet
- "Counter Intelligence" (a scheme whereby chip manufacturers get to sell more chips to home users)
- "novel interfaces" (including electronic books)
- the "News in the Future" machine, now used by 500 of America's leading newspapers, TV and radio stations to produce automated news stories
- interactive 3-D digital media and synthetic characters (now very popular in various adult entertainment industries)
- interactive animated characters (for use in immersive story-telling systems and various adult entertainment industries)
- interactive cinemas (10 have been built so far)
- musical instruments that "understand" the artistic intentions of the performer, so they no longer have to "play" them any more in order to play them, if you know what we mean
- A PC with the ability to see when a user is frustrated with its messy operating system
- "smart spaces" and responsive environments including football stadia
- "smart materials" that turn invisible when the user feels sexually stimulated
- The "Real Nasal" Web plug-in
- "stuff that sings"
The Dublin Meejalab will craft a uniquely open information environment in which all research results are made available to sponsors and student authors/inventors, via our Technology Licensing Office. The payoff for us is that copyrights and patents on all work are retained by our institute (except anything sponsored by Microsoft).
Within its first ten years of operation, the Lab is projected to grow to approximately 10,000 people, including faculty members, research staff, gardeners, caterers and students: 20 full-time faculty members from Ireland and abroad; 15 full-time research staff; 20 part-time faculty members; more than 100 post-graduate students (around half from abroad); and 100 undergraduate students.
|
'If anything can be certain about the future, it is that it will be brilliant.' |
