As sales of the Kinect pass 10 million,
http://www.xbox.com/en-US/Press/archive/2011/0308-Ten-Million-Kinects
Guinness World Records has recently confirmed that Kinect for the Xbox 360 is the fastest-selling consumer electronics device,
selling an average of 133,333 units a day from Nov 04th 2010 to Jan 03rd 2011 for a total of 8 million units in its first 60 days on sale.
It’s arrived
out of the box
and ready for action
More to follow …
I thought it wasn’t available yet (at least in the UK 
due to get one on the 10th though), but here is a look at what goes together to make the Microsoft Kinect a peripheral for the Xbox 360 that provides a controller-free experience for playing games.
The Kinect is a horizontal bar of sensors connected to a small base with a motorized pivot, and is designed to be positioned lengthwise below the video display.
As usual, iFxit provides full details of the Microsoft Kinect teardown at
http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Microsoft-Kinect-Teardown/4066/1
Just before the opening of the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in Los Angeles, Microsoft revealed Kinect for the Xbox 360 – previously this was known under the banner Project Natal.
Kinect makes you the controller by sensing your body movements and using these to control the application running on your Xbox. You can simply use a single gesture, wave of the hand or your whole body to interact with the game being played.
The Kinect sensor uses a full body tracking system, interpreting data captured from a VGA motion and Depth camera also has voice control.
Scheduled to be available in November 2010.
Read a few more details at
http://store.microsoft.com/microsoft/Kinect-Sensor-for-Xbox-360/product/C737B081
Remember Scratch – a drag and drop programming paradigm from MIT?
If not refresh your memory at
http://www.kf12.com/blogs/techno/2007/11/drag-and-drop-programming/
or
Well, now there’s something else, in a similar vein, Kodu from Microsoft Research. (Based on Boku – here’s a Boku report from March 2007)
http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2007/03/microsoft_resea.html
Kodu is a a visual programming language which has been designed for creating games by children. It runs on the Xbox and uses the game controller for input.
Kodu - Visual Programming
Using a simple language, which is entirely icon-based, programs are broken down into rules which are further divide into conditions and actions.
http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/kodu/
There’s a video of an interview with Matthew MacLaurin the man behind Kodu
CES 2009 Matthew MacLaurin on Kodu
Kodu will be available for download from the XBox Live Community Games channel.
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