Hand-Hacking

Completely brilliant for those of us who are musically challenged but totally creepy as well.

From New Scientist...

Want to learn a musical instrument, but can't find the time to practise? A device now under development can take control of your hand and teach you how to play a tune. 

PossessedHand, being developed jointly by the University of Tokyo, Japan, and Sony Computer Science Laboratories electrically stimulates the muscles in the forearm that move your fingers. A belt worn around that part of the subject's arm contains 28 electrode pads, which flex the joints between the three bones of each finger and the two bones of the thumb, and provide two wrist movements. Users were able to sense the movement of their hands that this produced, even with their eyes closed. "The user's fingers are controlled without the user's mind," explains Emi Tamaki of the University of Tokyo, who led the research. 

Perhaps not surprisingly, the players found it unsettling to have the device move their hand by itself. "I felt like my body was hacked," said one. Tamaki is confident that people will get used to the idea once they see how useful it can be: "We believe convenient technology will overcome a feeling of fear."