Are you building your own Jarvis? Voice computer? Home automation? Smart assistant? Or some other intelligent black-magic box?
If so, you might like to come to a gathering of people with like-minded interests. Exchange information, swap ideas, talk shop, help work on a project, whatever...
We are meeting up virtually on Wednesday, December 10th, 5pm Central Time.
Drop your email for details of this event and future ones. No spam, only Jarvis. Read FAQ.
Early consumer voice interaction for computers fell flat for two reasons. The intelligence and voice recognition quality of Siri, the most widely tried consumer experience, was embarassing. The Alexa & Google Home were a step up in quality, but they focused on voice in, voice out. I think the real power of voice interactions becomes evidence when it visually responds to what you say rather than verbally responding. The substance of this demo is simply ordering fast food, but apply this to daily productivity tasks and it can be very powerful.
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Know of a great demo that should be here? Email me at krschacht at gmail
In 1993 AT&T ran a series of commercials depicting future interactions with technology, many of which came true. These are two concepts depicting smart homes. Why isn't everyone's home this smart?
This is the holotable that Tony Stark used in the first Iron Man movie, released in 2008.
The movie Passengers had a fantastic array of new interactions. The android at the bar is one of the most compelling.
The power of the voice computer in Star Trek is most evidence when using voice as the input, while the computer both replies verbally to some commands and simply updates the display for other commands. Voice in, visual out.
In 1987 Alan Kay was working at Apple. He was inspired by many concepts being explored at the MIT Media Lab. This concept video kicked off the Dynabook, an internal Apple effort to work on this vision.
Know of another great sci-fi inspiration? Email me at krschacht at gmail
What's the story behind this club?
Growing up, I was inspired by sci-fi, particularly the explorations of what our relationship to computers could be like. One of the most complete and well known examples is Jarvis from Iron Man. For years, this was fiction, but the technology required to build many of these interactions is finally here. And it's out of research labs, it's available to any hacker. I am geeking out by what I've been able to put together with relatively little effort. And I'm starting to see a bunch of interesting experiments that others are doing online.
I don't expect the real breakthroughs and novel interactions to come out of the big tech companies. Instead, they'll deliver us an incremental upgrade to Alexa, Google Home, and Siri. The real explorations will happen by individuals, initially exploring what's possible just for the fun of it and eventually be notable startups.
I want to meet others who are interested in exploring this.
Why "Homebrew" name?
Back in 1975, Fred Moore, who worked at Fairchild Semiconductors organized a Homebrew Computer Club. He posted a note like this on a cork bulletin board at the Stanford AI Lab and reached out to friends. The group met monthly for many years and notable members included Steve Wozniak, 24 at the time, who showed off a computer he built and John Draper ("Captain Crunch").
History is filled with examples where small groups of people gathering regularly serves as the catalyst for interesting projects. Tipping my hat to the Homebrew Computer Club, I'm interested in meeting others who are excited about the frontier of human-computer interaction.
Do I need to have something to show in order to attend?
No, you don't need to have a high relevant Jarvis-like demo. But this is a group of people who make things: maybe that's with code, maybe with pixels or video. If you share an excitement for this space, you're thinking about building something in this space, and you've made lots of other random stuff in the past, then come! Personally, I love showing what I've built to anyone who appreciates what I'm going for and share insightful feedback.
