

Augmented reality helps Marine mechanics to be 56 Percent Faster - ca98am79
http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/23800/?a=f

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rflrob
One thing that always irks me about things like "56 percent faster" is the
potential confusion. On the one hand, it's fine to say you do things 56%
faster: that describes a rate of speed, and now the rate is 156% of baseline.
But when they say, "it can help users find and begin a maintenance task in
almost half the usual time," I'm not sure if 64% of the time is really
"almost" half, or now if the writer seems to think they did it in 56% of the
time.

Still, pretty neat. I can't wait until this stuff trickles down into the
public sector (more than just a handful of iPhone apps).

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sketerpot
YES. They should teach this in journalism school: if they did it in 65% of the
time, then phrase it that way.

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ryanwaggoner
The next 20 years are going to be incredible. Think about technology like this
applied to the medical field, or tourism, or food preparation. Of course, some
of these tasks will probably be made irrelevant by robotics soon after this
kind of technology becomes widespread, but I'm sure we'll find uses for it.

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patio11
I think it will be far easier to sell the relevant guilds on augmented humans
than it will be to sell them on robots. They can continue to collect dues from
the humans, after all. (Granted, they'll fight this _tooth and nail_ anyway.
56% more productive is just another way to say 36% less mechanics.)

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sketerpot
Luckily, 56% more productive also means that a mechanic who uses this can make
more money and tell the guilds where to shove their objections.

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patio11
I was thinking of industries (airlines) where you can't be a mechanic without
being a member in good standing of the Right Honorable Order of Artificiers.

