Multi-thousand Dollar Interactive Whiteboards for 45 Euros at UM

Sorry for not posting new stories lately, but I had been busy reading phone books. Uuups, I should not do that (Point 3). Well, I thought; and I have been thinking about the future of using more technology at the University of Maastricht. I know that not all faculties have - unfortunately - equally many beamers (not this beamer, although it would certainly be nice for every faculty to have one), yet did you know that we could get interactive whiteboards for just about 45 Euro a piece?

All we need, is the following:

- Wii Remote = 40 Euros

- Infrared LED <= 1 Euro

- Push Button Switch = 2 Euro

- Pen (case) and some easy soldering work = 2 Euros

See the Multi-thousand Dollar Interactive Whiteboard for 45 Euros in action here.

Johnny Chung Lee, a student at Carnegie Mellon University, has also some other interesting uses for the Wii remote. Check it out at his website. He also shows you how you can easily turn your screen into a Virtual Reality Display by using a Wii remote. I am surely going to try this out - and if successful post the results here, of course.

So, what else are we (not) going to see in the future?

The Future

- Aptera - the car of the future.

- The disappearing car door - This concept has been developed in the 80s, yet had been discarded. This is not fake; it is real.

- CyberWalk - one step closer to Virtual Reality Environments.

- Self-reassembling robots - if that were only possible with cars.

- The Search Engine that understands you - so far you can only search Wikipedia articles, though.

- Dmitri Gaskin - explaining jQuery.

- An Electric Car beating a Porsche and a Ferrari

- Finnish Polka 1: Loituma. People really sing that. And there are is a techno version by BassHunter and someone else available as well.

- Finnish Polka 2: Eläkeläiset - they cover almost everything, from Smells like Teen Spirit to Barbie Girl.

Not the Future

- ICat - please get a real pet.

- Flying Cars - The Moller SkyCar is a waste of energy. But hey, it's only 324,000 GBP. If you had that kind of money you would merely have to figure out how to get a license for it and where to take off and land.

- Skateboard Car

- Chessboxing

- Funky but still useless car features

In Between

- Super Icat - I have no idea what this guy is talking about, but it certainly looks interesting.

- Tresling


So, will you assemble the Interactive Whiteboards if UM agrees to buy the components?