TR#430: The Locust Swarm: An Environmentally-powered, Networkless Location and Messaging System

Thad Starner, Dana Kirsch, Solomon Assefa

Presented at International Symposium on Wearable Computers
Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA, Oct. 1997
Original full version (presented here) had authors of Kirsch and Starner only

The Locust infared system provides location information and messaging without batteries and without its own network. The system is ``privacy aware'' in that it supplies information to the wearable computer user who can then control how much of this information is shared with others or the installed infrastructure. By combining the abilities of Locusts with an appropriately equipped wearable computer, the user can interact with web-like hyperlinks, graphics, and sounds virtually associated with objects in the physical world. In addition the user can annotate and change these links as desired.