Scientists don thinking caps in wearable tech breakthrough

Smart clothing is a go-to item on the hype-cycle bandwagon, which never seems to arrive. Yet for anyone wanting to play Doom on their knitwear, a glimmer of hope was reported by scientists this week. A group of researchers based in Singapore report some success in developing tiny semiconductor components that can be fed into a …

[Pascal Monett]

A beanie and a sweater with batteries

For the beanie, the article states that it had a mainboard in the tip. I'm guessing that's where they put the battery, because I did not read that the beanie generated its own electricity.

I'm also guessing that the sweater had a (probably larger) board, also with a battery. From the image, it seems to me that the board could be on the shoulder.

The watch is obvious, the battery and control circuit are inside.

So we're going to be getting clothing with mainboards ? Is the fashion industry aware of this ?

I think this is going to be a nightmare as far as every day wear and tear are concerned. Maybe not for the beanie - after all, you don't bang your noggin all that much - but for the sweater ? In the Metro ?

Sounds like it's control board is going to be running the gauntlet every time it goes outside.

[ThatOne]

Re: A beanie and a sweater with batteries

Washing those clothes might be challenging too...

[KittenHuffer]

Re: A beanie and a sweater with batteries

For a certain generation .... still living in their Mom's basements .... washing may not actually happen during the lifetime of the clothes!

--------------> Mine's the one that makes a dirty mac look clean!

[HuBo]

Re: A beanie and a sweater with batteries

Or, if this newfangled optoelectronic semiconductor fibers tech can produce both photovoltaics, olfactive sensors, and ultraviolet, it could be a great solution for self-cleaning autonomous extended wear undergarments ... including socks!

[Graham Dawson]

Re: A beanie and a sweater with batteries

Who says you'll wash them? When they get dirty, you'll just send them by drone back to the Amazon apparel leasing agency and then wait in your pod for a replacement to be sent out. While you wait, you can watch adverts on your phone to cover the basic subscription costs, tailored to your exact preferences by your personalised ai assistant, or perhaps you'll be lucky enough to have the latest neuralink instead, so you can sit and stare at the wall while it projects those ads directly into your vision. This is the eco friendly future of of endless consumption envisioned for us by our betters.

looking for the off switch. --->

[renke]

Re: A beanie and a sweater with batteries

> looking for the off switch

--->

[b0llchit]

Opportunities for fortunes

We're all waiting for an internet connected sweater with a monthly fee to perform the "keep user warm" function. And, inevitably, the trousers with an internet connection to control the up/down motion of the zip online. All DRMed, of course.

Sometimes, very rarely, "the old days" are better.

[Anonymous Coward]

Everywhere we go

we are confronted by solutions with no known problem.

[gharris999]

Ok, since we're bound to see this in our lifetimes, let's get our nomenclature right:

In the US, it'll be "sentient sweaters." In the UK, "jumped up jumpers."

[b0llchit]

What is the penalty for washing a "sentient sweater" killingly hot?

[AceRimmer1980]

Read 'And The Dish Ran Away With The Spoon' by Paul Di Filippo. You won't want anything more sophisticated than a lightswitch in your house.

[AceRimmer1980]

I want a functioning Rorschach mask.

[0laf]

Just think of the ads

"We've noticed you've scratched your crotch 15 times in the last hour, why not try this new ball cooling lotion from [insert Chinese chemical factory] and we've assumed your consent to share this data when you remvoed the price tag and have passed it to 127000 trusted partners and signed you up to 7 TikTok streams on crotch related fungal infections and you've been auto enroled with your local GUI support group"

[Sceptic Tank]

Interesting thread

Your MCSE is useless with these new WinSock and multi-boot systems.