Lets (Finally) Talk About Myo
If you follow me on twitter you will notice that I talk about my Myo. Not too much. Not like a crazy person, but a lot. The fact of the matter is I use one (sometimes two) every day. Usually for around 8 hours. My Myo IS my mouse, and I love it.
Myo is a myoelectric gesture control armband that uses the electrical signals your brain sends your muscles for computer input. It also tracks acceleration, pitch, and yaw. This means that you can essentially wave your arms through the air and interact with things (a computer, a smart phone, a tablet, anything with bluetooth capability.) It is absolutely magical.
I'm not sure if I've mentioned it before, but I pay the bills with interactive design and art direction. It means that, among other things, I spend a lot of time editing images. I can pen tool with Myo as my mouse in the same or less time than it took me before, and I'm no slouch when it comes to image clipping.
The thing that originally made it possible to use Myo as a mouse was Global Mouse Control, a fantastic Myo application available to any Myo user on their Myo Market Beta. Now, however, I bounce back and forth between that and their native keyboard mapper. The keyboard mapper allows for more sophisticated gesture control and provides more haptic feedback on things like mouseclick. It is my hope that eventually their native keyboard mapper will allow me to map to both Myos and then I can technomage my computer to do my bidding.
A side note about Myo, I recently tried using it during AltspaceVR's beta weekend (that ended up being longer than a weekend) for control within their program. It wasn't without error, but it was a fantastic experience that definitely lended to my sense of presence. Waving your hands through the air in VR feels just like waving your hands through the air in real life. Who knew?
If you have the money you can get Myo on Amazon or from thalmic labs directly. I use mine daily, think very highly of it, and would absolutely recommend it to a friend. Or a stranger. Or an ai agent, if they had arms.