
Ctrl-labs’ armband lets you control computer cursors with your mind - sahin-boydas
https://venturebeat.com/2018/06/16/ctrl-labs-armband-lets-you-control-computer-cursors-with-your-mind/
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escapologybb
Hello, if anyone from this team is reading this and needs a quadriplegic geek
with experience beta testing would massively benefit from this technology. Let
me know.

This could make my life 3.7 million percent easier. Seriously.

~~~
rory096
Would it work at all (assuming your quadriplegia is spinal cord related)? It
functions by measuring signals sent from the brain at the forearm:

>How does it do that? By measuring changes in electrical potential, which are
caused by impulses that travel from the brain to hand muscles through lower
motor neurons. This information-rich pathway in the nervous system comprises
two parts: upper motor neurons connected directly to the brain’s motor center,
and lower axons that map to muscle and muscle fibers.

Perhaps it could be configured to work with neck muscles instead?

~~~
escapologybb
Hello,

Fortunately, like most Quads I have some movement below the level of injury.
If you're that way inclined, here's a YouTube video of the amount of positive
control I have over my body below the neck (My Range of Movement [1]). It's
using that and my voice that I can post here, work, bother Sam Harris on
Twitter etc etc.

So ideally it would go on my finger, or somewhere on my lower forearm such
that I could use both my finger and the muscles in my lower arm to do
different things.

I definitely could not have anything wrapped around my neck as it's too
fragile, and the thought of having something wrapped around my neck gives me
horrors. Maybe scalp muscles could be used, that would be cool.

Thanks

[1]:[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjnBpiirfr7LL-
mUk9uSpZw/vid...](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjnBpiirfr7LL-
mUk9uSpZw/videos?disable_polymer=1)

~~~
wlesieutre
A product like Muse might be useful as a headband interface

[http://www.choosemuse.com/developer/#sdk](http://www.choosemuse.com/developer/#sdk)

Key Features

• Discover and connect to all Muse headbands

• Receive raw EEG, accelerometer, gyroscope, and battery data

• Leverage built-in algorithms for band powers, eye blinks, and jaw clenches

• Record and/or playback data to and from a file

• Full documentation

It’s geared toward mobile, but I imagine you could have an iOS/Android
companion app that acts as a remote for a computer over Bluetooth/WiFi.

I tried a quick search to see if anyone was working on this as a general input
device for people who can’t use mouse/keyboards but it didn’t turn anything
up.

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jVinc
My experience working with EEG headsets is that you can create a few cool
demos where you show people how you can control this or that very restricted
interface, but only after you spend ages calibrating the system for you
specifically and for that demo specifically, and make sure the power supply is
very steady and there is no strong wifi or bluetooth around. And even then
it'll be too frustrating to work with for you to want to use it for anything
except showing it off as a demo.

This section: "Then he strapped the bracelet on my arm. I had worse luck — the
thumb on the computerized hand reflected the motions of my thumb, but the
index and pinkie finger didn’t — they remained stiff. Berenzweig had me
recalibrate the system by angling my wrist slightly, but to no avail." and
this: “It acts like an antenna,” he said, “so it’s susceptible to
interference.”

Sounds a lot like my experience. If you can't make a system people can just
pick up an use right away, I predict it will just be too much hassle for
anyone to want to use. And throwing buzzwords like ML at the problem doesn't
seem to change that.

~~~
yorwba
When I read that section followed by "He chalked it up to the demo’s
generalized machine learning model." I also got doubtful, but then the second
demo seems to indicate that they can drastically improve the results by
adapting the model to the user.

In machine learning terms, it seems that they can manage supervised learning
(given a known task, they can figure out how signals correspond to movements)
but not unsupervised learning (given a new user's signals, they can't decode
them without knowing what the user is trying to do).

So I can imagine this working if new users first had to complete a short
initialization sequence (maybe gamified in some way) but could then use it
without errors more common than typos when using a keyboard.

~~~
krona
One would presume they have data collected from more than one individual to
train their model.

~~~
yorwba
The situation could be similar to accents in speech recognition, where you
need some form of speaker adaptation. You would obviously use data from more
than one individual to train a model that adapts automatically, but that
adaptation will still take a little time.

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Fej
Normally I am bearish on this type of technology, given the number of previous
similar attempts with similar marketing that all failed to deliver. This line
gave me pause, though:

"Within just a few seconds, moving the cursor with thought became almost
second nature, and I was able to steer it up, down, and to the left and write
by thinking about moving — but not actually moving — my hand."

That's quite a strong statement. If true, I'd hop on that bandwagon.

~~~
djsumdog
The article mentions all the big investors too. They had to have impressed a
lot of people to get that kind of funding.

Let's hope this device holds up when it's released, and doesn't turn into
another Nintendo Power Glove.

~~~
justinclift
> The article mentions all the big investors too. They had to have impressed a
> lot of people to get that kind of funding.

On the other hand there's Magic Leap. Which from the sounds of things will
turn out to be somewhat scam-ish. :/

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crooked-v
This seems like it could contribute to discreet AR tech in interesting ways.
Voice control in public spaces is a bad idea for obvious reasons [1], but this
gets you something roughly touchscreen-equivalent for e-glasses or whatever.

[1]:
[http://dilbert.com/strip/1994-04-24](http://dilbert.com/strip/1994-04-24)

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DoreenMichele
I think it is actually a plus that they are shooting for a consumer product
and not a medical one. If it's available to _anyone_ , that includes
handicapped people, minus the stigma that "only crips use that." (Yes, I'm
aware that is an offensive word.)

Bonus points: It will probably be more affordable as well.

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Senderman
If I can keep my hands on the keyboard all the time, life gets a whole lot
better.

~~~
lioeters
Looks like the next step is almost there technologically, where we'll have
programmers coding away while moving the mouse with their minds.

Next steps after that would be programmers coding away with their minds..?

~~~
vinceguidry
Give me one of these and a set of Newgle Glasses, all connected to a
wristwatch computer on the other arm and we'll be able to dump laptops.

Imagine literally being able to work anywhere. On the beach, climbing a
mountain, anywhere the hardware works.

~~~
lioeters
I can see it: virtual screens projected in our eyes (or directly to brain),
with mind-controlled keyboard, mouse and/or other input types..

So programmers of the future might just look like high-tech monks meditating.

~~~
vinceguidry
Dreaming up artificial realities using only our brains.

One day we will all be gods.

~~~
pavel_lishin
> _One day we will all be gods._

Or the entire world will be our cubicle.

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mannykannot
Thinking about moving without doing so breaks the proprioceptic feedback loop
that is important in precision motor control, so I wonder if using any device
working on this principle will require some learning on the part of the
operator, as well as the electronics. This may be more of an issue for me than
most people - I find a mouse to be a much better control than a touchpad,
which I think is due to having to move an actual object having a small but
perceptible heft and drag, which gives me feedback.

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7373737373
What's the difference to Thalmic Labs' Myo?

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fapjacks
I have a Myo, and it's the device which taught me that what I'm actually
interested in is interface technology that reduces my movement cost, and the
Myo -- while being a pretty cool device and also one of the few that actually
works within 10% of what's advertised -- unfortunately _increases_ my movement
cost. It's also got a pretty narrow range of actions. More than a few, but not
enough to make the increase in movement cost worthwhile, IMO.

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acbart
The potential for accessibility seems massive here!

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FrozenVoid
This could be neat if combined with haptic gloves. VRchat or something of that
class, will be the VR killer app with cheap haptic feedback.

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abritinthebay
The comment about Minesweeper is a particularly smart observation that is true
of AR as well.

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angel_j
I wonder if their error function is to sense the user's frustration when the
model performs badly.

I have a feeling that actual human neural activity does not generalize well,
but that ML models needs to be good at adapting to individuals.

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ddingus
How do they close the feedback loop?

In all of these systems I've seen so far, there is a ton of calibration
needed.

The user should be able to do that.

Edit: say it is a two way street.

System takes input and renders it right back as a shock, or vibration,
something.

There then is an exchange.

System presents its message, user present theirs.

Simple things, like shock, or pressure, vibration on and off.

Then levels.

Then modes.

Together, that results in "thought as action", much like we get when we do
things with our bodies.

Once there, mapping that to things like cursors, could be standardized, IMHO.

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intended
This can work.

Moving cursors with your hand means a use of calories.

Not using calories means less effort for the same work. That’s a gain.

~~~
taneq
Leaves you with more calories to spend at the gym where we pay money to burn
unwanted calories!

~~~
have_faith
People seem to treat gyms are like carbon credits; you can do the wrong thing
most of the time and then pay to offset it later.

~~~
TeMPOraL
It can be more efficient this way.

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avcdsuia
So mind control will be the replacement of vim movement and other stuffs with
steep learning curve?

~~~
themodelplumber
I dunno. There's some real lag you can see in the video, and, worryingly, the
cart says "dogfooding cart." Typically dogfood is labeled "dogfood" for a
reason--it's not really fun or stable or effective to use/interact with
(yet?).

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mcphage
> Typically dogfood is labeled "dogfood" for a reason--it's not really fun or
> stable or effective to use/interact with (yet?).

“Dogfooding” is also a term for using your own products like you expect
customers / clients to use them. In that usage it isn’t a criticism of the
product’s quality.

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jakecrouch
I believe that their problem will be finding the small group of users that
derive enormous value from it. When you really dig into all the applications
they've suggested, they don't quite make sense.

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YaxelPerez
I'm waiting for EEGs to get vim keybindings

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Herodotus38
Why is it so important that the office overlooks Herald Square, is that just
poor editing or am I missing a deeper meaning?

~~~
robbyt
It's an expensive location for an office. It doesn't much matter for the
story, and regardless the fact may be lost on people who don't know NYC.

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niceperson
My brainwaves are my own, no thanks, microsoft.

~~~
gitgud
Next up, advertising based on your thoughts...

~~~
andai
It would be nice to get some tangible benefits from the mind scanning
satellites we're already paying for.

