#Opinion – Bye #Kinect, thanks!

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Today I start without a [Hello!], because based on some news today it should be a sad day. I summarize it in a simple line

Microsoft has decided to discontinue the manufacture of Kinect.

Matthew Lapsen (Xbox Devices Marketing Manager) together with Alex Kipman have made this news to the public, so that’s it. Several years after the launch, the path of Kinect has come to an end. During its launch was the best-selling device in history, Kinect broke several records and generated a hype that few devices at Microsoft have been achieved.

It also time to finally stop listening and left behind to the ones who predicted the failure of Kinect (don’t get me start here). And I say “left behind”, because knowing a bit about how the market has evolved, it is easy to see how the ideas that were housed inside Kinect today exist in many everyday devices.

During the past 2 days I read, at least 10 articles that commented that Microsoft has decided to stop making Kinects, and has passed the baton to Apple which incorporates them in their new iPhone X.

Actually, iPhone X uses 3D scanning capabilities to perform tasks such as Face recognition or to animate some very cute Emojis. This is Kinect technology evolved up to today, a miniaturized sensor inside a $1000 device which allows us to animate Emojis faces! Chan! I sorry, I lost myself.

I once wrote about the reason for the rejection of many people about Kinect, so I will not touch the topic (link). What I do is remember the more than 20 events I gave all around Europe and America sharing my experiences creating Apps for Kinect.

Thank all the people who had the patience to attend these events,and hear how excited I was with each SDK breakthrough. I would also like to thank everyone who helped me with Kinect Apps tests in my house and my office. Remember that to try Apps that used Kinect, the most normal thing was always to have someone in front of it. Here Victor gets the biggest THANK YOU!

hackerman

Finally add that Kinect is one of the few products I have had so much fun. I have been fortunate to present the capabilities of Kinect to many people, clients and events and the truth is that it is one of the moments where I have heard the best ideas to create Apps.
I have not had such a grateful and enthusiastic public until these last years with Hololens.

Note: Hololens have a pair of mini Kinect embedded in the Helmet.

Well, I thank Kinect for everything. I will keep my 4 devices in the collection of gadgets and surely when I have grandchildren I can explain how fabulous it was to detect that a person raised his hand over his head or waved and with that make an App!

Happy Coding!

El Bruno

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