So I am sure you have all heard of the microsofts newest toy, the xbox kinect.
The way it works, is light with reflected off the player, back at the sensor, and it detects movements that way. Well, if darker clothing is worn, it is absorbed.
The same is true, for dark skin.
An African American is sueing microsoft for racsim, beacsue it doesn't work since there skin absors the light. This isn't a rasict gesture, just the laws of light. Dark colors absorb light.
I can't give a link to a news article, as I can not find one. however, a quick google search brings up a large page of this story.
I find the case rediculous and think it should not be seen as an injustice.
I don't think anyone is going to take the African Americans side on this one. haha, it pretty ridiculous to think that Microsoft purposely made there device to exclude black people.
-sigh- you'd think the guy wouldn't win but I remember the case of a certain type of motion tracking webcam (I think) that couldn't track dark skin and the judge ruled in the favour of the guy suing.
Even if the motion tracker didn't work on blacks, Microsoft should not be sued. If it was proven that blacks could not use the Kinect, I'm sure Microsoft would try to fix the problem because they want customers. Regardless, there's no such thing as accidental racism and if Microsoft didn't intentionally plan for the Kinect to have problems with blacks, then they should not be able to get sued.
Anyway, it is clear that the Kinect does not have any problems when detecting blacks. I heard there's some problems with facial recognition, but it's not a feature many games are likely going to use.
What I've heard is that Kinect uses two 3D Depth Sensors (I think infrared based) and one RGB camera. So it actually can't be true that blacks are neglect.
i think microsoft wasnt thinking, but it is the law of light. If i could talk to the african american guy, i would tell him to buy a wii, or a playstation move
Considering I just got the red ring of death I am siding with this black dude. Also about that, It was working fined the night before, but my buddy brought his hard drive over and plugged it in, started up the game and then the screen pixleated. Now I am getting red ring of death even though it was only on for a couple minutes. What the Hell?
People are so lawsuit-happy these days, especially if there is a minority or evil large corporations. If the system truly did not work for darker skin color then there are ways to remedy it, wearing a white shirt, enhancing the sensor, body-paint etc.
I don't believe they would let this guy win.... I mean, yes it sucks, but suing for racism is wrong. They weren't in their little brainstorm room saying "ooooo lets make sure that it only can see white people an not black because i hate black people."
