Report on Wearable Computing

The upcoming IMMERSION 2015 has a history of successful previous 9 years of Immersive Education, iED, conferences. While Paris has been selected as the official site for IMMERSION 2015, the summit will address the individual and cultural influence of immersive technologies such as Virtual Reality, augmented reality, wearable computing, cybernetics, and etc. For more information on new forms and technologies at summit, this website http://summit.ImmersiveEducation.org should be helpful and accurate.

Wearable computers, also known as wearables are miniature electronic devices that are worn by the users. This type of wearable computer technologies is developed for special purpose and media development. Wearable computers enable the users to constantly interact with computer. Multi-tasking is one major advantage using these types of device since it features mobile computing, ambient intelligence, and ubiquitous computing with hands free access. 

Google Glass is another wearable technology with an optical head-mounted display. Obviously, Google Glass is developed by Google and the whole purpose of the device is to display information in a smartphone format but hands free. The users communicate with the Glass with natural language voice commands. On January 15, 2015, Google stated that they would stop producing the Google Glass prototype but remained committed to develop the product furthermore. 

Samsung Gear VR is a similar wearable technology kit developed by Samsung Electronics in collaboration with Oculus VR. Similarly to Google Cardboard, Samsung Gear VR does not have its own display. However, the Gear has Oculus Rift’s head tracking module inside that will be more accurate and lower-latency tracking than normal standard mobile sensor based headsets. 

Other than headset based wearable gears, Apple Watch is a smartwatch created by Apple on September 9, 2014. Following device has features like fitness tracking and health-oriented capabilities as well as integration with iOS and other apple applications. The Apple Watch will also work with Apple Pay, a mobile payment method. It is capable of receiving phone calls and messages paired up with iPhone. 

WIMM One is a developer device for the WIMM. This is another wearable computing device similar to iWatch. The major difference between WIMM and iWatch is that they use different operating systems. WIMM uses Android, while iWatch uses iOS. The WIMM One has transflective bi-modal screen that produces color images with an 18-bit color depth, while OS is limited to 16.

Pebble is another wearable computing devices made by Pebble Technology Corporation. This watch features a black and white e-paper display, memory, Bluetooth, a vibrating monitor, ambient light sensor, and etc. As of February 2014, Pebble app store had over 1,000 applications and raised $10.3 million through a Kickstarter campaign.