Ambient Orbs to Save Earth

Have you seen this? Ambient Devices has come out with this new thing, this...orb. It uses ambient technology, which, as I understand it, is designed to give us information in a manner less stressful than a scrolling, flashing banner or aggressive pop up. Imagine that.

A wall clock is an old fashioned example of ambient technology. When you're in a room with a wall clock, you always know what time it is, even if you don't consciously check the time. Apparently, the orb is like a wall clock, only it doesn't have numbers and it looks radioactive.

So they tested this orb by hooking a few of them up to different people's stock portfolios. Each person's orb sat on their desk and when their stocks were doing well, it glowed green. If they started to lose money, the orb lightened, then turned lavender, then a dark purple. People could see how their finances were doing at a glance, and they ended up trading more often and with less anxiety.

But who cares about stocks? Now, they're using the orb to conserve energy. They hooked these things up to 1000 people's homes in England and monitored how much energy each house was using. And lo and behold, people were more prone to turn off the kitchen light if the orb in their living room reminded them to.

Then they went one step further and hooked the orbs up to the internet, so that now all the data gets recorded online. People can log on and see how much energy they're using, how much they're neighbors are using and, even cooler, how much energy all globe users are saving together. For the first time, people will be able to see how keeping their AC on low actually affects the environment.

Isn't that cool?? People can be so smart.

GTD from davor163@taira-steel.com:
Hello mir
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