Original article from Edge Magazine

Manipulating images using hand gestures saves up to an hour per procedure, surgeon says.

Surgeons at a Toronto hospital are using Microsoft’s Xbox 360 motion sensor Kinect to save time calling up images during operations.

The Winnipeg Free Press reports that surgeons at Sunnybrook Hospital are using open-source Kinect drivers for PC to allow them to manipulate images of medical scans – something which normally involves a meticulous cleanup operation to ensure sterility around the patient, taking around 20 minutes each time.

Dr. Calvin Law, a surgical oncologist who helped integrate the system at the hospital, said checking of images often added an hour to surgical procedures. Using hand gestures to call up, rotate and zoom in on images, Law believes surgeons can be more precise in saving, for example, healthy tissue when removing a tumour, as well as saving time.

The hospital has used Kinect in six procedures so far, and hopes to roll it out across the hospital and into other areas, such as physiotherapy.

While Kinect has been the subject of increasingly creative hacks since the device was first reverse-engineered and open-source drivers released shortly after launch – prompting Microsoft to leverage hobbyist interest with the imminent release of an official Windows SDK – this is arguably the most beneficial alternative use yet seen.

Source:Edge Magazine and Winnipeg Free Press

USC Institute for Creative Technologies has created a free Kinect based keyboard emulator that allows users to play video games, such as World of Warcraft without a keyboard or hand held controller.  This is really more of a demonstration of capabilities and most likely not something that hardcore “WOW” gamers are going to embrace anytime soon.

The video demonstrates the software  and then provides an overview of the technology involved.    The software named FAAST (Flexible Action and Articulated Toolkit) can be downloaded from the USC website:  http://people.ict.usc.edu/~suma/faast/

TheStreet recently announced it’s top 10 innovative companies where Microsoft took top spot, beating out Apple and Google.   The primary reasons for the #1 pick was the release of Kinect, Windows Phone 7, Windows 7 and enhancements made to Xbox Live.   Congratulation to those product teams!

The brand new Windows Phone 7 just recently hit the shelves, and already state and local government users are embracing the experience it brings together for both work and play. At the same time, developers are discovering how Windows Phone 7 provides a platform for compelling apps that can work across phone, web, and PC. With this powerful application platform in mind, Microsoft is looking for 50 amazing state and local government apps for Windows Marketplace.

So this week we launched the Microsoft Windows Phone Government Apps Contest for state and local government partners. The contest is an excellent opportunity for all of our partners, developers, and hobbyists to showcase their development skills by creating a Windows Phone 7 application that meets real needs of citizens or government customers. I hope that many of our partners will take advantage of Microsoft’s powerful and familiar development tools that allow developers to create compelling applications for Windows Phone 7, the web, and the PC quickly and efficiently.

Read the full article

Article written by Kristin Bockius, State & Local Government Social Media Marketing Manager

According to an article on readwriteweb the XBOX 360 Kinect device is selling twice as fast as Apple’s iPad, which may make it the fastest selling gadget in history.  In just 25 days Kinect sold 2.5 million devices; it took Apple twice as long to sell it’s 2 millionth iPad.

So with that bit of news, I have a question for you:

Have you purchased or played Kinect yet?  If so, what is your favorite game (and why?).    If you haven’t purchased a Kinect yet do you plan to buy one in the future?