MIT Media Lab Extension: The New Home of Face-Melting Research [MIT Media Lab]
In case you haven't had the opportunity to swing by this particular block in Cambridge, Massachusetts, here's what the old Media Lab looks like. It's still there. In fact, you can see the extension under construction, and marvel at the stark contrast in design.
Mensa Tetris
The six-level, interconnected extension, the work of the famed, award-winning architectural firm Fumihiko Maki and Associates, is like an immense Tetris puzzle. Every piece represents a functional element that is tightly connected to others, giving anyone inside the feeling of being inside a finished puzzle. Maki, himself the winner of a Pritzker Prize, was on hand over the weekend to officially open the MIT Media Lab. (It's technically been in operation since December.)
Color aside, the trait hitting visitors in the face before they even walk through the door is glass. Cambridge building codes prevented a 100% glass exterior, so Maki came up with a loophole: bamboo. Inspired by translucent Japanese bamboo screens, Maki covered the remaining exterior with a mix of glass and aluminum tubes.
The result is at the same time beautiful and energy efficient, but also functional. We're constantly reminded that this is one incredibly open, collaborative working environment.
From the street, especially at night, passers-by can literally see lab work happening within. Maki called this "filtered views," inspired by the work of the pointillist artist George Seurat (lots of dots!). MIT played a part too, having provided Maki with an image of the Visible Man to further drive home the point that this lab space be open.
Well, if the past is any indication, plenty. The place that saw the beginnings of Guitar Hero, e-ink displays, OLPC and Lego Mindstorms is still driving much of the stuff that gets the Gizmodo editors, at least, sweating profusely in their blogging sweatpants.
The Media Lab will help "plumb the depths of how technology can have a greater impact on industry, society and business," said Media Lab director Frank Moss.
To net denizens and geeks like you and me, that boils down to robotics, prosthetic limbs, AI and the obligatory Minority Report UI reference that any article mentioning 3D interfaces must include.
Fluid Media
If you know Arduino, you'd be at home here, alongside the luminescent wallpaper, smart fabrics, "sewable computing" and inexpensive 3D fabricators that had me waxing nostalgic about Cory Doctorow's Makers.
Kindergarten Kids, Forever
The sense of play felt throughout the Media Lab's open spaces owes itself to the students, of course, but it's certainly assisted by the design. Moss called the atmosphere "serious fun," in a building where bright minds "design by serendipity." It's pretty spot on. One lab leads into the other, encouraging social and professional interaction. Artists huddle with biomechanical engineers. Sometimes the union is short-lived, and sometimes it's Guitar Hero.
But it's serious fun: There's a mission here, one that's produced limbs for soldiers maimed in war; helped children learn robotics with crazy new Lego software; and created a paint brush, simply called I/O, that captures the essence of whatever you point it at—visual, musical or otherwise.
Image credits: The Visible Man is a well-known see-through anatomy model from Craft House Corp. Composition in Yellow, Blue and Red from Wikipedia.
The German company's released a few tuner sticks here and there in the US, but like cheese, David Hasselhoff and soccer, Elgato's far bigger in Europe. Having said that, their latest 
VPN software lets you join private networks as though you're sitting at a local computer on that network, giving you access to shared folders and tons more handy stuff. Here's a look at five of the most popular VPN tools.
Cisco has a high market saturation in corporate and educational environments, and for many of you, any experience you've had with virtual private networks is through such exposure. The price to run a Cisco VPN is highly variable—and you can't even get a concrete number without a quote from the company—but you can, as an end user, download the free Cisco VPN client for Windows and Mac—though many readers complained about the lack of 64-bit support in the free Cisco client.
Posts
