
Hands-on with the Xbox One: Kinect, interface, and OS impressions - morkbot
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/11/hands-on-with-the-xbox-one-kinect-interface-and-os-impressions/
======
RyanZAG
_" The first time you set up the system, it takes you through a 30-second
process where you log in to your Microsoft account. Kinect then builds a
personal profile it will associate with that account based on facial
recognition but also the camera's basic skeletal model of your body. This
process forms a unique biometric ID that the Kinect uses to automatically
identify a user, logging them in to Xbox Live and bringing up a personalized
menu that includes their recent apps and favorite items."_

That doesn't sound very good. I remember all the complaints from Apple just
taking your fingerprint - this is taking your picture, skeletal model of your
body, and linking it to a record of everything you watch or play, along with
always on camera and audio recording.

I don't think I'd put one of these things in my house even if you paid me.
I'll stick to Steam, I guess.

~~~
ern
The biometric info isn't stored in the cloud (applies to both the Xbox and
iPhone), so that helps reduce the risk.

I have set up Kinect profiles for my family with the Xbox 360, but it is a bit
hit and-miss, and signing in and out becomes a hassle. If the recognition
works as seamlessly as described in the article it would be a great
improvement.

~~~
uptown
"The biometric info isn't stored in the cloud (applies to both the Xbox and
iPhone), so that helps reduce the risk."

I'd bet they store their version of "meta-data" in the cloud. That way they
can target ads to specific users based on attributes derived from people's
physical attributes and characteristics. I also expect to see Microsoft (and
others) explore the concept of 'pay-per-view' where an increase in viewers for
media content results in an increased viewing fee using facial-detection to
establish the cost.

~~~
chc
This is going to sound flip, but I really don't know the answer: So what? Am I
meant to get het up that advertisers will know that (in a very generous
information-sharing scheme) a skinny guy five feet nine inches tall exists
somewhere in America?

~~~
uptown
Maybe it's anonymized .... maybe it's not anonymized enough ... or maybe they
change their policies to share this information more-liberally. Take OnStar
... one day they decided they were going to start sharing information about
vehicles equipped with their technology even when the owner wasn't an OnStar
subscriber. These consumers had no agreement with OnStar so they had no
agreement that was being violated. Only when the public outcry and government
investigations ramped up, did they backtrack.

Personally, I believe that meta-data collection is an interim-step towards
more-aggressive sharing of this information. What does that mean? It means
that your FitBit, Withings Scale, Nike Fuel, and Kinect Exercise regimen will
one-day be sold to your health-care provider. Initially it'll be opt-in ...
consumers can choose to reduce their rates if they share such data with an
insurer --- but eventually it'll be mandatory. The XBOX One's early press
boasted that the new Kinect sensor is so amazing it can detect your pulse.
What would that data be worth to insurers?

Same goes for autos. OnStar opened the door showing that there's value in the
data they collect. Progressive has a product called "Snapshot" (
[http://www.progressive.com/auto/snapshot/](http://www.progressive.com/auto/snapshot/)
) that feeds driving-data to the insurance company in order to inform how they
adjust the policy rates they offer to you. Automatic (
[http://www.automatic.com/](http://www.automatic.com/) ) has their dongle that
collect similar info. Cars will all be connected one-day, and it won't require
extra hardware to collect and transmit this information. All of this data will
be sold to insurers. First, it'll be opt-in ... but eventually it'll be
required.

Is any of this paranoid? Sure - but the past 6 months of revelations about the
level of data-collection taking-place wherever and whenever possible confirms
that wherever there is data - it will be collected and sold to anyone that's
buying. Just look at the $10 million+ that AT&T makes selling data to the NSA.

So yeah - I am concerned that information is being shared and sold on my
behalf for no apparent personal gain.

------
iamshs
I had a chance to play with a set in local store. Controller is massive
improvement regarding rumble and grip. Simple touch of coloring the letters
ABXY and not whole buttons looks so appealing. Nice to see such a beautiful
UI. We (me and roommates) use 360 for TV, netflix, Play-To, and games. This
will be nice upgrade, especially with UI being beautiful. I was hoping that
the internals would be powerful, I want to see 4K games 5 yrs later. I do not
think present internals will be able to push that many pixels. But Dead Rising
3 and Killer Instinct are addicting games. Will pick it up after Titanfall
launches. I could totally connect with the use-cases shown in the video, as
each one of us has different preferences and it becomes a hassle signing in
and out. Will be nice to see it switching preferences on-the-fly. Here's to
next-gen.

Some videos: 1) Giantbomb impressions:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXwud8fSNhs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXwud8fSNhs)

2) Xbox UI walkthrough: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhe6jV-
APwM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhe6jV-APwM)

~~~
drzaiusapelord
>I want to see 4K games 5 yrs later

Me too, but I'd rather have the console generation lifetime be shorted. Why
not a new Xbox after 3 years? The 360 was released almost 9 years ago. How is
this the norm?

I'd love to see us PC gamers given some level of competition here. I can't
tolerate 360 graphics unless they're super cartoony. It just looks like a PC
game from 2004 or so.

Incremental updates work for things like phones and tablets. I mean, people
line up by the Apple store near me for a couple blocks (downtown Chicago) for
a slight bump in hardware specs. Not sure why we can't have a faster update
schedule with consoles.

~~~
clarky07
To be fair, we did get lots of incremental upgrades to the 360, they just
didn't change the name. The 360 selling now is much different than the one I
bought 9 years ago.

~~~
drzaiusapelord
You got power and noise/fan savings and hardware fixes. In almost 9 years you
went through 3-4 generations of video card technology, yet the 360 I buy today
has similar performance of the one that shipped in 2005.

My PC from 2005 would be a joke to game on.

I think a lot of this shows the lack of competition in this area and plain
greed. Why redesign when we can milk the current design? Our only real
competitor feels the same and those critical of this will just buy PC games.
Seems like console gamers are being abused a bit by these policies and the
gaming world is always many years behind on consoles.

~~~
chc
I don't think it shows a lack of competition and greed. As far as I can tell,
it illustrates a fundamental attribute of consoles: _They are a fixed target_.
Game developers can hyper-optimize for the specific hardware in a console
because 100% of the people using that console will be using that hardware
configuration.

With PCs, there's the question of how well your computer will play a game.
With consoles, this question is instead binary: Either your Xbox 360 will play
the game exactly as well as all the others or it will not play the game.

~~~
drzaiusapelord
>Either your Xbox 360 will play the game exactly as well as all the others or
it will not play the game.

That's not the case, or at least it shouldn't. PC's aren't magic. You can ship
a game with low res textures and high. So if you have the Xbox1 2013 you get
the low, but if you have the Xbox1 2015 you get the high and maybe a bump in
resolution.

This is a solved problem in the PC world. I understand its different than the
status quo, but its silly to think it can't be done.

I suspect the console makers are simply scared to make the early adopters have
a worse experience than the kid with the new box and it serves them to make
the generation last as long as possible from an economic pov.

Regardless, I hope someone disrupts this duopoly. I had higher hopes for
android gaming devices, but who knows, its still early in the game. I could
see a deviation on the steambox really shake things up.

I also imagine the economics get better as time goes on and you don't make a
profit until sale # x million. Considering how much cheaper hardware is
nowadays, I wonder if this formula still applies. You can make a gaming box
that beats these next gen consoles for not that much.

------
deaconblues
_" And switching inputs is death for gamers, because it cuts them off from
their community. As soon as you turn inputs on the TV, you're no longer
getting game invites, multiplayer invites, leaderboard change notifications,
or invitations of any sort. You are cut off."_

I've always wondered: how prevalent is this kind of hyper-social gamer? I've
played my fair share of games, but I've never been flooded with requests of
all sorts, and switching inputs to quickly do something else never caused me
to cry out in anguish.

~~~
benihana
Also, this is a 2006 Xbox 360 problem, not a 2014 Xbox One problem. Hi,
Microsoft, I have a computer in my pocket. If I'm watching tv, just send me a
notification to that. Chances are I'm on it if I'm on the couch anyway.

~~~
simba-hiiipower
to be fair, i think they do realize that and smartglass does just that..

------
tgb
It sounds like it's depressingly close to true now that consoles are better at
multitasking while gaming than PCs are. Steam overlays are only so good. At
least most games are now adopting fullscreen-windowed modes so that alt-
tabbing isn't an exercise in frustration anymore.

~~~
electromagnetic
Two of my favourite game series are very stable to alt-tabbing. The X series,
X3: Terran Conflict never gets close on my system just tabbed out of. Same
goes for Tropico games. Tropico 4 was open on my computer once and I got
through the entire campaign just tabbing out when needed.

There's something about those German developers, because my usual greeting to
a tabbed out game is "noooo!" I remember leaving X3 running for a weekend and
when I got home my wife had tabbed out. It was the first time tabbing out and
thinking I'd have lost like 60 hours of auto trading, but no it tabbed right
back and didn't even skip a beat to reload graphics.

For me, the simple ability to tab out of a game will gurantee me as a player.
Total War games seem semi-stable usually just a long reload time every time
you do it.

------
sandycheeks
I've often wondered if the feedback provided by Kinect could be used to induce
trance states. As an amateur magician I spent some time studying stage
hypnotism and NLP. It seems that a lot of the cues used for that could be
detected through the Kinect in its current state. Please understand that I
don't mean hypnotizing someone to be an assassin or cluck like a chicken every
time they hear the word 'avocado'. I'm talking about making some people more
prone to suggestion than they would normally be.

~~~
nchuhoai
Off-topic, but do you have great pointers on how to get started with
Hypnotism/NLP?

------
bbx
I wonder how they will handle voice commands issued by someone not currently
playing because it looks like the Xbox will capture _any_ sound.

Also, I hope that they didn't hinder usual controller-based commands because I
usually have issues with speech recognition. In English, my French accent gets
in the way. And in French, the recognition is less accurate. So I end up not
using it at all.

~~~
shootinputin
Xbox will know who is talking and when, it can also listen when you are
playing the game full volume.

[http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/8/5075216/xbox-one-tv-
micros...](http://www.theverge.com/2013/11/8/5075216/xbox-one-tv-microsofts-
plan-to-take-over-the-living-room)

------
untog
Quite interesting that gaming seems to be the least interesting part of the
Xbox One, so far. I kind of want one.

------
BashiBazouk
With voice commands, what happens during a spouse/sibling fight over channel
selection or other uses? If one person is playing a game, can another person
that has the biometric ID set up come in and take over? Is there a hierarchy
in control or total chaos?

~~~
ryusage
I suppose it would be similar to the existing scenario: the person already
playing a game or watching TV gets pissed off at the person changing the
channel or pausing their game. I can totally see this with kids and their
siblings, but is this really a common issue between spouses? Not that I have
tons of faith in people, but I would really imagine most adults were above
that.

------
hexasquid
Metro makes more sense in this context.

