hmm
prior art , i.e. nike+?
Clothes that track your every move could fill Apple fanbois' wardrobes after the fruity tech titan patented new wearable technology. The designs, approved yesterday, describe "smart garments" with embedded sensors and a two-way communications link to an external database. Based on the existing Nike+ iPod trainers, the new …
...but they remind you when you "need" to buy new ones? The need according to whom? And how often is the message repeated?
I wear old trainers while gardening or working on the car. I really don't want them texting me every five minutes to tell me that I should replace them.
No, I think this is one innovation I'll pass up.
...was to assume you are the norm.
A user in my office had some weather widget on her desktop that told her if it started to rain. You guessed it, she sits by a window. And has an iPhone. Whether or not something is actually useful is no longer buying criteria for "normal" people as I see it.
Just as it is funny when a Bad Guy gets nabbed because he was wearing flashing shoes whilst committing crimes at night, it will be funny to see people with this stuff going anywhere at the next Vegas-based trade show or conference, when the Eye In The Sky (all the various surveillance systems the casinos have) spots them having electronics in their clothes. The casinos take a dim view of that, especially since the Eudemonic Pie folks tried to beat roulette.
Let alone all the facilities that now ban anything that could remotely be construed as "recording devices".
"In Cupertino style, users would be prevented from putting their sensors on unauthorised clothing. The patent application complained that people were in the habit of removing spy circuits from authorised trainers and putting them in unofficial items. Apple doesn't like that."
I propose a system of sensors that can freely be relocated to whichever brand or style of clothing you desire. Since this represents new and novel functionality that Apple does not claim, my patent trumps theirs.
This wearable computing is of course just a prelude to the inevitable cyber-clothing rebellion! Imagine self-wedgying underwear! Shirts that stimulate your sweat glands while you are out on a date or making a key business presentation!! Pants that heat up male gonads, thereby rendering mankind sterile!! The time to prepare for clothing-optional resistance is now!!!
I could have gone with the rise of the machines icon, but instead I'll get my coat--but can I do that before my coat gets me???
"In Cupertino style, users would be prevented from putting their sensors on unauthorised clothing. The patent application complained that people were in the habit of removing spy circuits from authorised trainers and putting them in unofficial items. Apple doesn't like that."
Obviously this is preparing us for the next logical step:- Apple, Microsoft et al are going to start licensing us clothing. Anyone caught wearing unauthorised clothing will be stripped immediately and denied access to all clothing stores. Forget hand-me-downs. Hand-me-downs is piracy: you are not permitted to transfer ownership of our licensed clothes.
Also, if you want to buy a t-shirt from Microsoft then you can't wear jeans from Apple as they're incompatible, and definitely not make a pair of your own to wear - the t-shirt will fall apart on when you try to put on your home-made jeans. You can buy a t-shirt from Apple, but it's called a straight-jacket, when you put it on they effectively achieve lock-in as you are then unable to free your hands to put on anything else.