Ever looked ahead during a long walk home and wished you could just get to that one tree, one block in front of you, without any more effort? Now you can, with a mind-control longboard by the labs division of the mobile application company Chaotic Moon. The board works similarly to the Prius mind-controlled bike, which reads its rider's brainwave patterns to change gears. The mind control here is more direct, however, as the boarder's thoughts actually control the entire movement of the longboard.
"It detects your brainwaves," said "Phil," one of the developers, in a video. "It actually figures out where you want to go. You imagine yourself being there and it actually takes you forward."
Like the Prius bike's riders, skaters on Austin, Texas-based Chaotic Moon's "Board of Imagination" wear a neuro-headset that detects the faint electrical activity that the brain gives off when people think. The headset communicates to a Samsung tablet that is attached to the front of the board. The tablet, in turn, controls a motor that turns the back wheels of the board. Riders can start and stop the motor with their mind.
Considering the balance needed to longboard or skateboard, a mind-controlled longboard sounds as if it may be a little bit less dangerous than Chaotic Moon's previous invention, a gesture-controlled longboard that the Austin Chronicle called the "Plank of Death." But perhaps the Board of Imagination might take a cue from the Prius bike and have its riders wear the associated tablet in a vest on their backs. It seems a bit nerve-racking to have a $400 tablet strapped to the front of a longboard, where boarders normally place their feet to steer.
Watch the board at work in a video from Chaotic Moon:
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