emeryfox•13d agoMost Upvoted

Watched a demo at a neurotech meetup in Austin and flipped on eye tracking

I used to think eye tracking for BCIs was just a gimmick, too slow and clumsy for real use. But last month I went to this meetup at a co-working space on Congress Ave where a guy showed his open source setup. He typed a full sentence just by looking at letters on a screen, no hands at all, and it took like 30 seconds. That was the moment I realized my bias was from old tech, now I'm actually building my own calibration tool for gaze-based selection. Has anyone else had a hardware demo completely change their mind on a BCI approach?

2 comments

2 Comments

elliot_grant3813d ago

I mean, "completely change your mind" feels a little strong. I saw a similar demo once where a guy was spelling stuff out with his eyes and it took way longer than 30 seconds, more like a couple minutes, and it kept messing up on the letter "Q" because his calibration was off. So yeah, it's cool that it worked for you at that meetup, but I think people get hyped on the demo and forget how finicky this stuff still is in the real world. A lot of those setups work great in a controlled room with perfect lighting and a steady chair, but try doing it on a bumpy bus or in a dimly lit living room. I'm not saying it's a gimmick forever, but I need to see it hold up outside of a perfect demo before I start buying parts.

emerychen13d agoTop Commenter

Yeah, that's the thing I keep noticing in tech lately. Everything works perfect in a demo but falls apart the second real life touches it. It's like those smart home gadgets that work great in a YouTube video but then your cat knocks the sensor off the wall and the lights just start flashing at 3am for no reason. We get so caught up in the "wow" factor of the setup and forget that the real test is how it handles Tuesday at 4pm when everything is slightly wrong.