DoCoMo Eye Controlled Earphones

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DoCoMo, a Japanese company that describes itself as “Japan’s premier provider of leading-edge mobile voice, data and multimedia services” on it’s website unveiled it’s most recent project at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2010.  They are creating a set of headphones that contain electrodes which sense electrical changes in your head when you move your eyes (I’m not exactly sure what that means either, just watch the video).

As you see in the video when the dude looks left the line moves left and when he looks right it goes right.  You’re probably thinking cool, but why would I want to buy an expensive Jedi powered earphone etch-a-sketch?  Good question, NTT DoCoMo is working on integrating the earphones to control your MP3 player.  That means the next time you’re at the gym in the middle of an intense workout and a Christmas song comes on because it’s set to shuffle, you don’t have to stop your workout to find a better song.  You can just look to the left and the song will automatically change.

Up, down, left and right will each control different functions for playback and volume.  If you look closely in the video you can actually see the play and pause symbols when he moves his eyes.  These aren’t going to be too safe to use while driving your car, but if you’ve got your MP3 player in your pocket or bag and you don’t want to dig it out to change the song then this could come in handy.  The only real drawback I can think of is that you may look a little crazy if you keep moving your eyes around looking for a specific song.  But I guess if you’re cool enough to own a set of these than you probably won’t let a few looks bother you.  You can’t look any crazier than the guy walking down the street talking to himself with his bluetooth earpiece, right?

Filed Under: Audio

3 Responses to “DoCoMo Eye Controlled Earphones”

  1. What happens when I’m at the gym and a good looking woman walks by? The next thing I know, I’ve skipped and entire album. Neat technology though, would be great for people with disabilities.

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    • I thought about that but wasn’t sure how to write about it without getting into trouble. I didn’t even think about people with disabilities, that’s a great point.

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  2. found your site on del.icio.us today and really liked it.. i bookmarked it and will be back to check it out some more later

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