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Editorial Wireless Networking Hardware

Wireless Audience Response Systems? 49

Posted by Cliff from the polling-the-peanut-gallery dept.
kjeldahl asks: "I've got some project ideas involving what I have learned are named audience response systems. These are small devices (typically a small keyboard with a few buttons) that can be handed out to an audience where they can participate in some kind of 'voting' or selection process where they press some buttons and their selections are recorded by a central server. Looking further, the wireless options include RF and IR, although IR senders typically conflict with eachother in environments with lots of people pushing buttons simultaneously. To be useful, one typically needs to be able to know the various devices apart (device X sent keypress Y). Some of the more advanced devices even include two-way communication with display abilities. Anyway, these devices seem very specialized and kind of tied to the platform (including hardware and software) - in effect quite expensive. Does anyone know of open audience response systems which use well-known technologies which can be adapted for use for audience response systems? I would guess the candidates include wireless keyboards (assuming they do not conflict with eachother), Bluetooth and WLAN-based systems."
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Wireless Audience Response Systems? More

Wireless Audience Response Systems?

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  • It's been done... (Score:5, Funny)

    by El ( 94934 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @06:23PM (#7098591)
    It's called "applause". If you don't hear any, then the show sucks...

  • Suggestion... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by zoloto ( 586738 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @06:24PM (#7098608)
    How come you don't make the keyboards embedded into the chair in front of them, or pullout keyboards like some college lecture rooms have pullout 'deskspace'?

    This is rather simple and conversion from ps/2 or usb to cat5 cable for the sole purpose of keyboard data isn't very difficult.

    • Re:Suggestion... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Mod Me God ( 686647 )
      I agree, mainly because 'wireless' things go missing (the audience want a souvenir etc) but if it is plugged in they will not take it with them, and it is technically simpler and cheaper.

      In this situation wires seem better to me.

    • I think the poster of the question needs to let us know why wireless over wired? We're assuming the audience is sitting in seats, not moving. So why do you need devices that move freely, are able to be stolen, and have all the problems you mentioned?

  • And what costs are we comparing to? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by borgboy ( 218060 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @06:28PM (#7098646)
    It seems to me that a large portion of the inherent costs of a system like this is the hardware. What are your per-audience-member costs for a typical system? Maybe a bunch of wireless palms and a smallish pc server could do the deed?

  • i use the following system (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I call it "public entertainment-induced manual impact resonance" or "PEIMIR".

    The PEIMIR system is based on the simple fact that striking two surfaces together makes an audible mechanical wave (a "sound", if you will).

    Now, what use is this you say? Well, it turns out that the human body itself has two surfaces useful for this purpose: the palms of the hands!

    With minor training at the beginning of your show or talk, you can teach your participants this simple technique. At first they may not be willing, bu

  • These already exist and in a better format: analog (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Dancin_Santa ( 265275 ) <DancinSanta@gmail.com> on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @06:43PM (#7098780) Journal
    Previewing audiences are frequently handed little boxes with a dial on it which they use to dial in their approval of the show. If they like it a lot they can dial all the way up. If they hate it they can dial it all the way down. If they find something mildly amusing they can dial it to somewhere in the middle.

    It's instantaneous and doesn't have the problem of a hundred people pounding on a keyboard in the middle of a show.
  • If you use a very wide bandwidth to the signal, then you can have wireless transmitters in the studio... but why is it now that we must take a method that works and change it so? I mean we all remember those dials they used in America's Funniest home videos. Also, for Candian Idol, they let people vote via text messaging on their mobile phones. That worked well and they got better voter turn out than our federal elections. Cheers.

  • i hate to say it, but.... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by avi33 ( 116048 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @06:47PM (#7098812) Homepage
    bluetooth!

    ok, kidding. sort of. You could use PDAs (ok, not cheap, but lots of people have them) and use a 'base station' for each clump of people.

    I wouldn't want to implement it (any idea what the collision issues would be, anyone?). but hey, it's an idea.

    how about cell phones for that matter. or sms-enabled pagers. seems like there are devices out there that do similar things, just not in such enclosed spaces.
    • In the UK, you could just tell the audience to send text messages, and give each member a unique ID that makes sure it's coming from them.

      You could probably even not pay them back for it... seems if it's got "SMS" in the idea, people will think it's excellent.

      (No... I'm not getting pissed off with everything being done by text message. Including a pilot scheme by the police to allow calling them with text messages.)
      • This has finally jumped out of the UK now, too.

        Here in St. Louis, during TV time-outs during baseball games, you can use SMS to "vote" for what stupid top-40 hit you want them to play over the PA.

        It's actually kind of an interesting idea to get people to throw their money away, given that Cingular has sponsored it all.
  • I think that Chuck Wollery could give you some advice.
  • Maybe I'm missing something, but if you hand out little wireless enabled gadgets to the audience that are not securely tethered to the location where they'll be used, aren't you asking for them to be stolen?

    Obligatory: anyone want to get ahold of these and get ahold of a free wireless device?

  • Simple solution, brought to you by MadScience(TM) (Score:4, Funny)

    by ArmorFiend ( 151674 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @08:20PM (#7099522) Homepage Journal
    Simply shrink each and every audience member to be the size of a nickel, then have up to 104 of them stand on your keyboard. If they like something, have them jump, thus depressing their key.
    • You are laughing... but this might be a workable solution.

      Don't shrink the audience... expand the keyboard!

      Get an industrial-strength keyboard, and dissect it. Thoroughly. Read the previous slashdot post from the guy who took his keyboard and an old typewriter, and made the typewriter act *as* the keyboard [slashdot.org].

      Then give each member of the audience a "key" (whammy-happy-button) to press when fun things happen. Have a few PCs that "read" the keys pressed from the keyboard, and do a frequency analysis comapr

  • Most such systems are wired (Score:3, Interesting)

    by mbstone ( 457308 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @09:39PM (#7100009)
    The typical audience response system involves mere dozens, or a couple of hundred at best, user stations, and for TV live broadcasts or tapings they are typically wired (so as not to interfere with audio or video, esp. wireless mics). Any wireless system of sufficient numerosity to overcome the efficiency of merely using a wired system would be subject to packet collisions and crosstalk (infrared, from studio lighting; RF, to/from various other RF receiving or emitting devices). Real TV shoots burn too much money per minute to incur the risk response-system debugging delays.

    Audience response systems (wired, for maybe 10-20 people, max) are used in TV show test-audience previews, e.g. at the Venetian or MGM Grand hotels in Las Vegas where you can earn $10 by previewing the latest NBC or CBS programs, respectively. Tell the nice lady you are between 18 and 49.

    (MAD magazine once theorized that new network TV shows are selected according to how many preview-audience members fall asleep on their "I Like" buttons as opposed to the number of testers falling asleep on their "Don't Like" buttons.)

    The best known and most widely used audience response system in television is the Applause light where a wired system connected to a single SPST switch illuminates an Applause sign. For some reason, this device, when activated, causes the audience to respond with applause, whether or not the subject matter is praiseworthy or even entertaining (e.g. the appearance of a new washing machine on The Price Is Right).

  • PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:3, Interesting)

    by pyite ( 140350 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @10:00PM (#7100118)
    At Rutgers University's [rutgers.edu] Physics Lecture Hall [rutgers.edu] there is a PRS (Personal Response System) setup. Basically, every student who ever takes a Physics class has to buy a $30 transmitter to participate in class. It works via IR so the system can get overloaded with a large class. However, the IDs of the units responding show up in a dynamic list on the projected screen as you respond (so you can see if your answer got registered). The system then displays a graph (or presumably other information) detailing which answers were chosen. It's good because it can't hurt your grade if you are there to press the button (you get one point for pressing the button, two for being right, out of a possible one point). It's bad because you lose points off your PRS portion of the grade if you don't go to class or forget your transmitter. You cannot borrow someone else's because an ID is hard coded into the device and then one to one associated with your student ID.
    • UC-Berkeley's Chemistry 1A [berkeley.edu] classes also use this same thing. The device is fairly cheap, but has 10-15 response buttons on it.

      On an aside, the classes are also webcast via real player, and many of the quizzes and homeworks are done via web based demos. It's a model for future wide-area classrooms, imho.(I took the class and found the model very sucessful)
    • We also have that same PRS system here at NDSU where I am a student... I took an ME course that utilized the system and can say from experience that it was a useful tool.. it was IR and we never experienced any interference issues that I noticed - there were several receivers located variously around the room to help that. The system does seem to be catching on in a lot of courses.
    • I'm a little confused how this works exactly. What's stopping a student from getting his friend to press a button for him? Or even better, having the smart kid press buttons for you in exchange for beer/drugs/prostitutes.
      • Well, in order for someone to press it for you, they'd have to actually have your "remote." You can't spoof who you are. There's nothing to lose if you get an answer wrong. You get full credit even if you're long. Really, I think it's just to try to keep you awake and make you actually go to class... something a lot of us never do.
        • Well, in order for someone to press it for you, they'd have to actually have your "remote."

          Right, that's what I'm saying. What's stopping someone from spoofing you by just bringing your remote (and a few others) to class and pressing buttons all through lecture?

          • A significant majority of us still think that academic integrity is something that needs to be upheld, and that's enough to not do it.

            For those that don't, the course website there says that people caught responding with a remote that isn't their own will lose course credit and will be referred to the dean of students.

            Also, I don't know how that school in particular does it, but limiting the amount of time within which you must respond would probably lessen the chance of someone being able to put down and
            • A significant majority of us still think that academic integrity is something that needs to be upheld, and that's enough to not do it.

              In which case, I would assume that students would attend class and participate because it's a good idea, not because there is a mechanism to force them to be present.

              I'm not trying to debate this to death, but the reason I'm going through all this is because while I was in college I was subjected through innumerable schemes to boost attendance and participation, some of

    • Jees, that sounds rather forced... What ever happened to "come to class, listen to the lecturer, and occasionally take this 10 minute written quiz to encourage you to come every day." Do they also prop open your eyelids (ala A Clockwork Orange) to make sure you don't take a nap?
      • Do they also prop open your eyelids (ala A Clockwork Orange) to make sure you don't take a nap?

        I wish. Can you buy those things in stores? I have fallen asleep in all but two of the courses I've taken at my University. In most cases, I would fall asleep in every session. Many of my fellow students have the same problem.

        My solution: play backgammon on my palm. That way I'm awake enough to hear the important part of the lecture. Paying partial attention to the prof. is better than paying total attention to

  • H-ITT (Score:3, Informative)

    by caseih ( 160668 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @10:45PM (#7100347)
    I've only had experience with the H-ITT device (http://www.h-itt.com [h-itt.com]). It's IR and has lots of problems when everyone uses it at once. Based on my experience with this, I think some kind of rf-thing is better. Perhaps some like of 802.11 or something that can handle overlapping requests.

    For any that are interested, I've reverse-engineered the serial line protocol for H-ITT, which would allow one to write their own clients for the hardware. H-ITT only gives out the software for Windows, and dispite the academic demand refuse to develop for Macintosh, so we are working on a Mac app for our faculty.

    • I don't think they refuse. they probably just don't have the man power to do it. Academic demand for the mac isn't THAT big. And even in educational institutions it is still a minority. Especially in a lecture hall type environment.

      I know IR is not the optimal solution, but that is what you get with a significant price drop over RF. The PRS system is 10x more expensive and it uses IR as well, and works no better (it does have more buttons tho). The system works decent, and as long as you have enough recie
  • If everyone has a wireless capable laptop they can bring in, just write up a webpage with Java servlets or something, wire the room with wireless access points and servers, and you're done.

    If not, that previous wired keyboard option was a good idea, but does anyone know how much it would cost to build a wired keyboard to wireless converter? If you're only going to rely on a few buttons, I don't imagine that it would be a lot..

  • Classroom Peformance System (Score:3, Informative)

    by djmitche ( 536135 ) on Tuesday September 30, 2003 @11:23PM (#7100556) Homepage

    As a teacher I was given the opportunity to use a system my district purchased called classroom performance system. Basically it's a bunch of small infrared "remotes" with buttons A-H on them and an infrared receiver. It's designed for classrooms, so it's oriented around a question-response mode and assessment, but it is also very useful for rough surveys, votes, etc. In particular, I am told that the state of South Carolina (luddites that they are) used this system to enable an enormous gathering of teachers to vote on which questions should or should not be included in their high-stakes NCLB-compliant test, the PACT.

    Dustin
    Disclaimer: I don't work for eInstruction; I just used their product when I was teaching, and was very impressed.

  • You're missing the obvious (Score:3, Insightful)

    by sakusha ( 441986 ) on Wednesday October 01, 2003 @12:42AM (#7100974)
    I've built a system like this before, and I can tell you the one reason why they don't use wireless handheld gadgets. People will STEAL the damn things if they're not wired down. This is another classic case of why engineers should not be put in charge of product design. They're so caught up in the coolness of some new technology that they forget that PEOPLE are involved.
    • You could always make the things scream like hell when they loose a connection for more than a second. It won't eliminate theft, but having the thing yell "Help me, I'm being stolen" might reduce it a bit. Additionally you could have a sensor at the doors to the place like they do in book stores. Instead of just beeping, the sensor could turn on a siren and flashing lights. I think if you humiliate the thief enough, they'll think twice before they do it again.
      • Oh yeah, that would work GREAT. A temporary glitch in the system, a little RF or IR interference, and suddenly the whole audience has their alarms going off in the middle of the show. And it would be almost impossible to figure out just which person in the crush of people exiting the theater is the one pocketing the device. But of course you could always put GPS tracking devices in them and chase people down, should only add about $100 to each device. Are you starting to get the point that this wireless gad
        • You seem to have mistaken me for someone who disagrees with you.

          I also think that handing out wireless devices to a crowd of people is a bad idea if you expect to get them back. I was just listing some ways that could be used to reduce losses. I even covered your "temporary glitch" problem by addin door sensors and making the alarm wait for a significant period of no signal.

          If someone is going to go with wireless and untethered devices, they might want to look into something like what I suggested. If they
  • To me, this sounds like the perfect application for a short-range wireless protocol such as Bluetooth. With the integrated Bluetooth chipsets coming out these days, manufacturing would be pretty inexpensive; I mean, it only has to read a few buttons.

    If you connect every single device to a central node, that's a LOT of bandwidth you're asking for. If you have every device capable of gathering information from its neighbors and passing it along, you can get the information to aggregate itself along the edges
  • Look, I don't want to seem impatient here; but, could we just pick one wireless system now, so we can get started hacking it right away?
  • This may be more expensive, but CANRF [canrf.com] modules might be good for this.

    Since the bandwidth needs are almost nil, it seems like there ought to be some really sleazy, simple, and effective way to do this with RF. Perhaps have a central device that polls each voter sequentially for their answer(s) several times a second. This would get rid of the need to sense collisions or other stuff that happens when multiple conversations take place simultaneously. Good luck!

  • lock in your votes!
  • Our University used to have one of these systems that they paid thousands for... Then some people in our physics department figured they could make the same thing for about 1/10 the price. They designed an RF transmitter and reciever and wrote software (works via serial port, connects through cat5 cable, and recievers can be setup around the room daisy chained to eachother).

    The remotes you pass out to the audience (students in our case) are the size of an ink pen. They are very inexpensive and the reciever

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