Microsoft: ‘Natal can replace remote’

Marc Whitten, the general manager responsible for Microsoft’s Xbox Live service, has been talking at the Streaming Media West show in America and described how Natal is going to replace your remote control.

“With the flick of my wrist I can change a channel,” he said, “With the power of my voice I can start a movie.”

As we all know, Skynet is going to be made up of a super-brain cluster of networked PS3s controlling the U.S. Military. Xbox and Natal are making their own bid for world domination but instead of taking over missile silos to rain death from above, they will take over your living room.

“Watching a movie is a passive input, but a TV should understand what you’re trying to do,” Whitten added. “Laughter is an input, yelling at the TV when I know an answer on ‘Jeopardy’ is an input. Attention is an input. The number of people in the room at one time is an input.”

According to Whitten in the future Natal will identify the users in the room by their voices. Knowing the identity of the users and their specific entertainment preferences, Natal will automatically offer up a variety of games and media suitable for those present.

Personally this sounds all a bit too creepy for my liking, I don’t want my games console spying on me. Imagine if you and your partner were feeling rather frisky – will Natal recognise the “ooh” and “ahhs” and Clippy from MS Office will pop up on screen saying “I see you’re about to have sex – would you like some porn?”

Source: Yahoo Tech