AdaLovelaceDay09 Pattie Maes: invent bandwagons rather than jump on them
On January 6th I signed the Ada Lovelace Day pledge:
I will publish a blog post on Tuesday 24th March about a woman in technology whom I admire but only if 1,000 other people will do the same.
The goal has been reached: so far 1.508 people signed the pledge.
I found the woman in technology I admire through Elise Huard: When I grow up, I want to be like Pattie Maes.
Belgian scientist Pattie Maes, currently an associate professor in MIT’s Program in Media Arts and Sciences, was one of the speakers at this year’s TED conference and an expert in human-computer interaction, intelligent interfaces and ubiquitous computing.
One of her projects is Siftables, which “aims to enable people to interact with information and media in a physical, natural manner that approaches interactions with physical objects in our everyday lives.” But at TED, she demoed sixthsense, “a wearable gestural interface that augments the physical world around us with digital information and lets us use natural hand gestures to interact with that information.”
This quote from Pattie Maes explains what really drives her:
“We like to invent new disciplines or look at new problems, and invent bandwagons rather than jump on them.”