Released just three days ago, Microsoft’s full-3D motion sensing doohickey – the Kinect – has been hacked!
It was just last week that New York based company Adafruit had announced that they would be offering $2000 for the group or individual who can come up with an open source driver for Kinect: i.e. base-level software for Kinect that would make it possible to use it for purposes other than dancing like a girl in front of your Xbox 360 + TV.
That bounty has, possibly, been answered today. In a video uploaded on YouTube, you can see its motor being controlled by a Windows 7 PC. The software is also shown to be reading data from Kinect’s accelerometer.
And Microsoft’s reply to all this hoopla, via CNET:
"Microsoft does not condone the modification of its products," a company spokesperson told CNET. "With Kinect, Microsoft built in numerous hardware and software safeguards designed to reduce the chances of product tampering. Microsoft will continue to make advances in these types of safeguards and work closely with law enforcement and product safety groups to keep Kinect tamper-resistant."
Adafruit has announced the “bounty” because they believe that Kinect’s hardware is amazing and shouldn’t be locked up just for the Xbox 360. There are near-limitless possibilities of how the Kinect could be used for other purposes!
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