Type n Walk mobile app

The Type n Walk iPhone app enables you to see in front of you, via the iPhone's camera, while typing. I haven't tried it yet, but it's a cute concept. I'd imagine their lawyers wouldn't let them call it Type n Drive. Type n Walk (Thanks, Jason Tester!)

David Pescovitz is Boing Boing's co-editor/managing partner. He's also a research director at Institute for the Future. On Instagram, he's @pesco.

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Church

This’d be great for an ebook reader.
Anonymous

Of course, it’s lawsuit city as soon as someone walks in front of a bus while using this application… it’s obviously defective, since it doesn’t allow people to see things coming at them from the side…
Tzctlp

Some people really need to get a life. Both in the using and programming side.
Avram / Moderator

Cute idea, but I suspect that most users will be so focused on the words they’re typing that they won’t actually notice any trip-overables showing up on the screen “behind” the words.
- Church
  
  I dunno, Avram. I’ve managed multiple-block walks while reading, and that with only my peripheral vision to work with.
  
  Of course, YMMV.
MrScience

Obviously, this needs image recognition to place polygonal outlines around potential dangers!
rb3m

Thanks to videogames I have good spatial awareness, but when I really need to concentrate while walking I just get close to someone who’s walking ahead of me, just enough to see their feet and that’ll let you know if you should lift your head.

And, of course, if you’re crossing a street you shouldn’t look at your phone.
- Tzctlp
  
  “Thanks to videogames I have good spatial awareness”
  
  Oh, dear goodness….
  - Jerril
    
    You think it’s funny, but depending on the type of video game you’re playing they actually DO teach you not to hyperfocus.
    
    Confession: I’m a WoW raider, which makes me some kind of gutter-nerd or something… but even by the time you get to level 80, there are still a LOT of people who actually don’t notice when they’re standing in a FIRE (in the video game, obviously, I hope they’d notice IRL whether they’re texting or not). One of the skills you have to hone to be successful in end-game raiding is situational awareness – pulling back your focus from the roughly one-inch-square area of your screen with the boss monster on it and taking in the whole situation.
    
    Gradius-type top-down shooters also need you to process the entire situation at once, famously so in fact.
    
    Yeah, you’re only focusing on the whole screen of your monitor or TV and not your enitre field of view (generally about 15 to 20 degrees of your field of view) but humans don’t normally DO that when they’re paying attention to things. It’s hunter-tunnel-vision.
- Anonymous
  
  And, of course, if you’re crossing a street you shouldn’t look at your phone.
  
  Thing is, people busy on their phones appear not to even notice they’re crossing a street. And it’s not just crossing the street either – there’s plenty of danger in just walking down the footpath where cars are turning in or out of driveways.
  
  Sure, those cars ought to be giving way to pedestrians – but, chances are good that they’re talking on their phones too. And if, as a pedestrian, you’re entrusting your life to motorists – well, you might just kill yourself now…
Chuck

There’s not problem here. I can write on a local city park’s jogging trail with a pen and clipboard — people just assume you’re crazy and move out of your way (OK, not really). I’ve done the same reading ebooks on my phone.

But app or not, dogs will probably still bark at you.:-) (Or maybe there’s an app for that as well.)
gws

So clearly designed for driving, and a clever idea, but the video is a little pointless. Have they not made the app yet and this is a proof-of-concept? Do one’s hands disappear while using Type n Walk?
doozerd

here’s a free app: you want to text – stop walking

boom! saved ya $.99
- Sceadugenga
  
  Right – you’re just trying to hook us on the free app, then you’ll offer some minimal pro features for $3.99. I’ve seen this before.
r_salis

Watching the video on my iPhone was especially trippy.
MB

Huh. I wonder what kind of bounty we could raise for a worm/hack that sent the user into the nearest manhole . . .
XCool

iType2Go Pro does more with a much-requested landscape keyboard feature. It also lets you update your Facebook and Twitter as well as send as email without leaving the app!

No more typing, copying, exiting the app, open another app, paste and risk hitting the wall while doing all these.

Check out iType2Go Pro via http://bit.ly/itype2go

Thanks :)
Ian70

Type’n'Bobsled !
singrum

Just let’s you type… NOT TEXT… you still need to copy/paste it into the texting app… so, you’ll just walk into the pole then… Almost, but FAIL
Anonymous

http://news.yahoo.com/video/us-15749625/fountain-lady-nobody-went-to-my-aid-23909987
Anonymous

Try out Text Vision from the app store. Same concept, but much better features. With Text Vision you can write a tweet, facbeook status, email, all through the app itself. Texting of course needs you to copy and paste. Also, Text Vision allows you to take a picture while you type so you can share that via email, facebook, twitter too!

http://bit.ly/textvision
Anonymous

Oh my, it’s come true…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdzUZDDi5aM

Satire becomes reality…
Anonymous

I prefer the Type n Drive app.
Mitch

Oh, I can just watch where I’m going when I walk and type when I get home.

Anti-gadget people are pretty annoying but so are people who can’t be without them for a few minutes.
holtt

Maybe the free version throws up fake obstacles now and then. But the pay one shows you the actual picture.
Ian_McLoud

Now I can type during love making! Oh, thank you Type n’ Fuck!
Dave367

This is a funny joke, but this IS the future. Look, we’ve used heads-up displays in jets for 50 years; already in autos for 10-12(Cadillac has an actual augmented reality app on the road today–displays an enhanced view of the road ahead and peripherally on the windshield, overlaying reality). Boeing has been using this method to build 10,000-mile wiring harnesses for big jets for 5 years. Augmented reality–glasses with data in our field of view–are less than 3 years from ubiquity, says I. It will plug into your iPhone, too. ;-)
Anonymous

It would have been better if in the middle of writing the message, a guy in a hockey mask ran up waving an axe. Just sayin’.

-Eli.
jdgiotta

Inventive idea, but it still won’t work. The majority of focus is in the action of locating and tapping the proper key. Maybe if you’ve become trained on key layout you could conceivably type and not focus entirely on the location, but since the sense of touch is eliminated you still can’t sense location efficiently.
Deidzoeb

People are still looking at the keys, and can’t look at the video. It would be the same as turning the screen into a larger keyboard and trying to keep the keyboard and real life in your vision or in your attention at the same time.

Here’s the solution for people who are hard-core: full-size, functional QWERTY keys integrated onto the thighs of pants. Anyone who can type without looking at the keyboard (not as difficult to learn as it seems, also fairly easy for musicians and their instruments) should be able to use that without taking their eyes off what’s straight in front of them, although occasional glances at a display would help.

Alternately, people could just withdraw from society, stop walking or driving, and crawl into their devices permanent-like.
Anonymous

The Rick Mercer Report, a weekly Daily Show-esque news program in Canada, prototyped this a few years back. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdzUZDDi5aM