Stock Orb

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http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/21/technology/circuits/21GEE1.html


March 21, 2002

GADGETS


A Glowing Delphic Orb Says 'Buy,' 'Hold' or `Panic'

By DAVID J. WALLACE

f the devil is in the details, don't tell the people at Ambient Devices in Cambridge, Mass. The company is staking its future on a demand for more timely and personalized yet less specific information from gadgets and computers.

In May the company will roll out its first product, the Stock Orb, a glowing colored globe that receives wireless information and changes hue and intensity depending on the movement of the Dow Jones industrial average.

Offered through the Hammacher Schlemmer catalog for $299, the orb glows yellow for neutral, green for rising prices and red for, well, you know. It was tested last year by clients of Fidelity Investments and can be adapted to specific stocks or indexes, weather data, traffic reports or the amount of e-mail in an In box.

The orb receives a signal on a wireless frequency used by pagers. Don Norman, a co- founder of the Nielsen Norman Group, product- development consultants, and the author of "Everyday Things," said that this kind of nonspecific information could be a powerful tool.

"It's making an art form out of otherwise what would be a technical, nerdish object, and second, it's trying to use peripheral awareness to get attention," he said.

Ben Resner, chief engineer at Ambient, said that the company was looking into other applications for the orb, including the wireless relay of information about a patient's condition from medical devices to a loved one or someone who provides care.

"I feel like such a victim of my wireless devices," Mr. Resman said. "We want to make information more polite and less intrusive."