August 18, 2009: World Series Of 'Tubing

Take one part YouTube, one part augmented reality, and one part competition. Mix with a bunch of geeks in an open-source setting. The result: The World Series of 'Tubing.

Competitors chose their top videos from YouTube, and the AR rig projects the images on a pair of special symbol cards. The audience votes for their favorites via laser pointer. The entire event is fun and competitive -- just the sort of thing AR needs to fire the interests of the next generation of developers.

Or maybe it'll end up like VR -- a cute toy with more hype than utility. That's the thing about the future: you never know which one you'll get . . .

-- Paul Chapman