Integrator: Microsoft Kinect is ‘Game-Changer for my Business’

by Eyal Kattan

You’ve seen the hype around Microsoft Kinect, and maybe you’ve seen the product in action at trade shows. But how much do you really know about it? If a client asks you about the gesture-based attachment to Xbox, can you answer intelligently?

I wanted to try it for myself because clients were asking about it and, well, to have a little fun.

I've met so many integrators who are embarrassed to admit they still know very little about Kinect. So here is a primer on the system with my opinions about the great opportunities provided by the revolutionary new platform.

Installation

After seeing a demo of Microsoft’s original “Project Natal” and similar gesture technologies at CES 2010, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on one.

Shortly after Kinect was released in November 2010, I headed to the local Toys’R’Us to buy one (shhh, please don’t tell my son I went there…).

I wasn’t the only one. Within 25 days of its release, Microsoft sold over 2.5 million Kinect units around the globe

Installation was extremely easy and smooth. The system really does everything for you and it does it in an elegant way. After attaching the USB cable to my Xbox 360 and plugging in the power adapter, It took about 10 minutes to complete the installation and firmware update and I was ready to step into the future.

At first, it scans your body and analyzes the room. It really felt like a science fiction movie as you can see the progress bar in the shape of human body fills in green as the scan progress. Once the scanning was complete, the system guided me through the basics and allowed me to test the interaction. It worked very well without a single hiccup.

Experience

Playing games with the Kinect is a very strange experience at the beginning.

I believe this is a result of my long-time experience with traditional gaming controllers or using the arrows on the keyboard. Our brain somehow is programmed now to 2D movement.

Even the Wii gyro controller is somewhat limited as it isn’t aware of your position in the room. The Kinect is.

If you step to the left or to the right, your avatar will do the same and the scene will change the viewing angle accordingly.

Kinect comes with one game DVD named “Adventures,” which contains a few startup games. The first game I played was surfing in a crazy river and collecting points by jumping and moving to the left and right. The next game was trying to seal holes in my underwater tank, created by vicious fish and sharks.

Without expanding too much about the games, I can testify that after 20 minutes of playing, I felt a cold line of sweat on my face.

At the end of each game there is a small surprise – the system takes pictures of you as you play and then runs a quick slideshow. You can share the pictures with your friends through XBOX Live. (I was too embarrassed.)

My 4-1/2 year-old boy needed exactly 3 minutes and a couple of attempts before he became an expert surfer on the screen. I was pretty impressed with how easy it was to get into the gaming mode with the Kinect.

The Excitement

Gaming is indeed very exciting with Kinect. But what really makes this technology even more exciting is the potential it has to change the way we interact with other devices.

Within less than a week of Kinect’s launch, a software developers/hackers group named OpenKinect released an open-source driver that allows the Kinect sensor to be connected to a PC (rather than just Xbox).

Following this release, a German company named Evoluce released a video showing their prototype application controlling windows Media Center and the entire Windows 7 desktop.

One area where this technology could evolve is home control. Although Kinect is in its first consumer version and is somewhat limited, I can see how this technology could become a prominent user interaction method for home control. Imagine lowering the light by sliding your finger down in the air or browsing your TV guide by swiping your palm up and down.

And obviously you don’t have to worry about re-charging your controller because it will be done anyway when you snack on your popcorn while watching a movie.

Another potential advantage of the gesture technology is that it is cross-language and therefore applications could be developed once, and installed all over the world without the need to translate them into different languages.

Opportunities

Clearly the Kinect brings a groundbreaking technology and a new dimension of user experience to interaction with gaming and computers. It also seems that the software development community is adopting this concept and technology with great excitement.

If this trend continues in the same pace it has been for the past couple of months, the Kinect has the potential to change the way we interact with our home electronics. Time will tell.

From our business point of view, the Kinect opens a great opportunity to add additional revenue.

We’ve been using the Xbox 360 as a Media Center Extender for quite some time, so at the very least it offers a double-play of gaming and streaming media.

And that’s on top of recent initiatives by Microsoft to add TV content and an exclusive TV channel for XBOX.

Add to that the gesture controls and video chat (a CE Pro Top 5 Technology) capabilities of Kinect, and you have a real powerhouse that is bound to get customers excited.

When was the last time you found something that was so much fun to sell … and buy?

Furthermore, Microsoft is planning to spend $500M on marketing and advertisement for Kinect and Xbox 360. With the big buzz, big sales and upcoming marketing campaign for Kinect, there shouldn’t be any doubt that this device is going to be very hot among consumers.

I know at least a dozen people whose kids are already requesting to replace their Wii with Xbox Kinect.

Obviously the pricing of getting a whole new system for $400 could be a challenge for someone who already spent money on another console, but I have a feeling that Microsoft is going to slash prices pretty aggressively to lure existing gaming consumers into Xbox.

Already, though, Kinect has definitely been a game-changer for my business.
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Eyal Kattan is the owner of Media Nexus Inc., a Norcross, Ga.-based integration company specializing in the design and integration of A/V and computer technologies for residential and commercial projects. He has over 14 years of professional software engineering and user experience, analyzing business needs and functional requirements, designing, developing and managing large interactive Web applications through the full life cycle of the project.