What if shoes can talk? They’d probably scold us for how we use them. Well, creativity has no boundaries and we have to admit, Google does possess such quality. In its Art, Copy & Code project which was located just across the Austin Convention Center where the SXSW was being held, Google unveiled the talking Google shoes.
Google is not threatening the likes of Nike and Adidas in the industry as they have no plans of diversifying their portfolio to include shoes. All that they wanted to do was show off that technology is flexible and give shoes a bit of personality.
The shoe, which came from Adidas (they had the blessing of the company to use their product), has a custom made microcontroller located on its tongue. On top of that is a circular speaker that provides feedback based on one’s movement (it basically serves as the microphone that reacts to the movement). Of course movement is detected by internal accelerometers, gyroscopes and pressure sensors in the sole. When a person moves, the shoes automatically provides voice feedback to the user. It basically monitors everything that happens below.
We can’t blame Google if they are not wanting to be involved in the footwear business but let’s be honest, shoes that can talk and serve as “motivators” are cool and quite interesting.
(via)
