The wearable technology while cool in science fiction movies has never really taken off and often time has been made fun of, by those in the fashion world. The reason for that is pretty obvious as well considering that most of the wearable technology that comes out is often large, bulky, tacky, often downright ugly, and all too often ridiculous and unnecessary. Examples of this are things like cooling underwear or drumming trousers, and there are many more. Even smart watches seem to be falling into the pits of the grave of wearable technology that just never quite made it.
However, creators from the media lab at MIT think they just might be able to break that little stigma that wearable technology has come to have. They believe that their new product that they refer to as NailO just might win over customers and be a product that will be a hit with most of everyone. NailO is a trackpad that can be worn on the fingernail of one’s thumb.
For the size of this trackpad, it is quite powerful and accurate. When tested, this little trackpad was able to score up to a 92 percent accuracy rating. NailO’s capabilities are also quite impressive for something that is worn on your thumbnail; it has a blue tooth chip, battery, and microcontroller and touch capabilities just like any normal trackpad. But there is still the question of when would people use this? Why would they choose to use NailO? At what part of life does this tiny trackpad become a luxury people don’t want to live without? Well, the creators at MIT believe that they have created an answer to that question as well with giving examples on how and why people would take advantage of this new piece of technology. The creators believe that this little trackpad would be helpful in many situations in which you don’t always have hands available. Examples of this would be a formal dinner because pulling your phone would be considered rude and wildly inappropriate manners. Another case in which this would be helpful is when cooking; if both hands are busy but you’re working with a tablet for your recipe and need to scroll down then this would be extremely helpful. At least that is what the creators of this product believe.
However no matter how useful it may be there is always one huge obstacle literally everyone has had when it comes to wearable technology. That is that too many times it just doesn’t work; it is ugly and not worth it. Well, the creators believe that they have a solution to that too because they have created covers for the little trackpad to be stylish and go with nail polish. That way it can change your wardrobe. When put on, it has been said that it just becomes part of you and that it’s unobtrusive. But there is still a down side to the little trackpad, and that is that with wearing it all the time and it being so small yet sensitive you could potentially have accidental activation when wearing the device. No matter how well the product is designed, right now in terms of being something that wearer has full control of in the fashion statements and that it is designed to be able to be easy to be both put on and took off to give the customer full control with the product it is still in what would be considered development. At the moment, the developers of the product have disclosed that they have been talking with China about making the battery smaller. But all news when it comes to that means that this product won’t be even near customer’s hands in any way for another three years.
So will NailO make itI Will it be forgotten in a sea of lost bits of wearable technology? Will NailO finally break that trend? And when could we really expect something of this technology to be available as three years is just for what is wanted to work on the battery. With constant technological changes all the time there are plenty of questions yet to be answered when it comes to this, and if that is the only change that is wanted to be made to the product. But naturally the biggest one is about how marketable this will be and how successful it could be on the market. Right now no wearable technology is making a big hit, although there are a few pieces which are in high demand. Not even the highly marketed smart watches are becoming a global hit, so in three years or so could this possibly change all thoughts about wearable technology?