Wireless Audience Response Systems? 49
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."
It's been done... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:It's been done... (Score:2)
Re:It's been done... (Score:2)
-- Adam Schiff
Suggestion... (Score:4, Insightful)
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)
In this situation wires seem better to me.
Agreed (Score:2)
And what costs are we comparing to? (Score:3, Interesting)
i use the following system (Score:2, Funny)
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)
It's instantaneous and doesn't have the problem of a hundred people pounding on a keyboard in the middle of a show.
Re:These already exist and in a better format: ana (Score:1)
wireless (Score:1)
i hate to say it, but.... (Score:3, Insightful)
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.
Re:i hate to say it, but.... (Score:3, Interesting)
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.)
Re:i hate to say it, but.... (Score:2)
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.
It's a Love Connection!!! (Score:1)
Unrefinedlayman (Score:2)
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)
MadScience(TM) may be on to something! (Score:1)
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)
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)
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:2)
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)
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:1)
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:1)
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:2)
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:1)
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:2)
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?
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:2)
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
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:2)
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
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:1)
Re:PRS (Personal Response System) (Score:1)
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)
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.
Re:H-ITT (Score:2)
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
laptop... (Score:1)
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)
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)
Re:You're missing the obvious (Score:1)
Re:You're missing the obvious (Score:2)
Re:You're missing the obvious (Score:1)
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
Ad hoc network (Score:2)
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
Re:Ad hoc network (Score:2)
Neat stuff.
Just pick one, so we can get started (Score:2)
CANRF? (Score:2)
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!
Studio audience memebers... (Score:1)
We have this exactly... (Score:2)
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