創新發現誌

The New Life Map

By Hu Xiu-zhu 

Life in the future as portrayed in some novels and movies has become a reality thanks to technological advances. In 1995, using scenario, DJ Yu, the cofounder of Scenario Lab, and its New York team successfully simulated the Wii games console launched in 2007. Five years later, your life Map is about to experience a major change. 

Food – When you go out, you only need your mobile phone, keys and wallet. You may not even need your wallet because you can pay with your mobile. If you are eating out, use your mobile to search the web and download the discount coupon of the restaurant you are interested in going to. 

Clothes – Through social networking websites such as Facebook and Plurk, you can invite friends to visit shopping websites and place orders together to grab goodies that are available only with a group purchase. 

Home – As in the movie Minority Report, futuristic cities often consist of several skyscrapers and roads are not on the ground but in the air. Japan is planning to build on the sea a futuristic building called the X-Seed 4000, or Sun City, and it is supposed to resemble Mount Fuji. This 800-story giant tower will be powered by solar panels fitted on its outer walls. Inside the building, the temperature and lighting are automatically adjusted according to the weather. Green buildings have entered the mainstream. 

Work – Smart mobiles allow you to work more efficiently. With the iPhone application Groups, phone books may be better categorized and managed. Another handy iPhone application is Contacts Journal, which you can use to list of how many meetings and meals you have had with Mr. A in one year and how many transactions worth how much have been concluded during that period. In case he forgets, you can refresh his memory with your iPhone. Other applications coming in handy are LinkedIn, which effectively expands your internet relationships; Twitterrific, something that enables you to always stay in touch; and BeejiveIM, your manager of email messages. 

Leisure – No more browsing through advertisements to find a hotel of your choice. A web-based room reservation system has tens of millions of user-rated hotels and tourist attractions ready for you to choose from according to your preferences and itineraries.

No more swiping cards to enter a hotel room because when you check in the networked camera system already records your facial features with a RFID issued to you. Everything you do – entering your room, swiping your card etc – is recorded in the chip. When you check out, your expenses will be deducted directly from your account. 

Learning – Not only can smart mobiles make phone calls, they can read books out loud for you. In the future, after digital content is incorporated into smart mobiles, you can listen to them “reading books”, making it easier to read on the move. 
 
 
 

Green Paddy Animation Studio Rises to International Fame via KUSO

By Hu Xiu-zhu 

  Bus riders must remember short BeeTV animated commercials shown on the bus. Since it was founded in 1991, BeeTV has produced numerous funny, comical works, from IRIS, a wedding biscuit box introduced by confectionery company I-Mei, and Coca Cola’s Qoo in the early days, to the more recent CCTV Olympic Games special “Fuwa Civilization”. 

  In 2006, BeeTV collaborated with well-known illustrator Jimmy Liao and produced a short animated film named “A Fish with a Smile”. Though it has a running time of only 10 minutes, the film has won 13 awards that include the Best Animation Award from the 51st Asia-Pacific Film Festival and a special award in the Kinderfilmfest category by the international jury from the 56th Berlin International Film Festival. 

  General Manager Chen Chun-xia notes that the government in 2002 aggressively promoted the digital content industry. Thanks to the “Two Trillion and Twin Star” program, Green Paddy’s interesting animations attracted Asia Pacific Telecom’s attention. In 2004 Green Paddy began collaborating with Asia Pacific to produce animations for its 3G mobiles. 

  Aside from their original stories and witty characters, one other characteristic of Green Paddy’s animations is that they are usually short. Chen indicates that a 22-minute animation costs at least NT$2 million to produce. Limited government subsidies are barely enough to pay employees for half the work done. 
 
 
 

The Next Decade – Who Will Rule the World of Toys?

By You Heng-ru 

  30 years ago, Taiwan was one of the top players in the world’s toy industry. For a period of time, its toy industry’s output was worth US$1 billion, making OEM toys for American and Japanese companies. In 1987, the output peaked at US$1.07 billion. Due to rising labor costs, its leading position was taken over by China, which eventually became the world’s biggest toy producer. 

  Now only a handful of companies are still designing and making toys in Taiwan. Because these toys are made in Taiwan, their sales have more than doubled in the past five years. Su Fang-xiang, the president of Taiwan Toy & Children's Article Manufacturers Association (TCMA) and the general manager of Red Box Toys, has been helping Taiwan’s toy companies find new business opportunities. 

  Red Box has initially decided to focus on stuffed toys. They are equipped with Skype and designed to be able to record voices and download music so that when someone phones, a toy puppy wags its tail. Another idea is to set your PC’s ringtone to be your girlfriend’s voice so that you hear her voice when she calls. These special features will certainly spice up your life. 
 
 
 

GoLiveCl@ss Enables the Chinese Language to Go Global

By Li Luo 

Fang You-en(Denny Fang), the general manager of IProom Communications, a company that provides videoconferencing software and hardware services, says, “Classrooms of the future are not high-tech physical classrooms but a new form and concept of learning. Technological advances always precede users’ habits. Despite that, they must take into account their needs. In the future, learning will be ubiquitous. Consequently, a learning portal that meets users’ needs must be available ‘anywhere’, ‘anytime’ to ‘anyone’ using any ‘device’.” 

He gives an example of how the above rule can be applied to language learning. 

Anywhere: a portal of the future must be multilingual and able to automatically connect users to their respective mainframes depending on where they are based. 

Anytime: it has to factor in the different time zones users are in when sending class notifications and scheduling classes. 

Any device: it should be available to any device, including fixed and mobile devices such as computers, mobile phones, e-books or any compatible terminal devices that can connect to the internet. 

Anyone: personalized services allow everyone to learn with satisfactory results, which requires grouping students according to their abilities, content on demand, a mechanism that helps students find teachers that best meet their needs, well packaged pre-class preparation and after-class review settings, customized combination of learning methods, and setting up learning groups (travel, hobby, star etc groups). 

After coming into contact with online interactive teaching in 2005, Ye Su-hua (Tanya Yeh), the chief executive of eChinesenet(Chinese Associate Academy), was convinced that it would be a new solution to the teaching of the Chinese language. Therefore, in 2007 eChinesenet(Chinese Associate Academy) began working with GoLiveCl@ss. Lin Liang-hui(Helen Lin), the general manager of eChinesenet (Chinese Associate Academy), notes that teaching in a classroom setting enables instant teacher-student interaction and is therefore a teaching method that will never be replaced. Nevertheless, with the arrival of the Internet Age, the phenomenon that students and teachers are placed in the same room must be changed. A synchronized online environment is in fact the same as teaching in a classroom setting with even more resources available (multimedia, for instance).