Communicator Clothing

coondoggie writes "The crew of the classic science-fiction show's Starship Enterprise wore small devices on their chests that they could tap to communicate instantly with their colleagues. Such communications technology is now closer to reality thanks to a Finnish company which this week demonstrated high-tech clothing that can send and receive messages via satellite. The demonstrator antenna, built by the Patria Aviation Oy company, looks like a simple patch of cloth but is capable of operating in the Iridium and GPS frequency band as part of clothing. The Iridium satellites allow two-way voice and data communication, while GPS provides positional data to the user. Iridium could also relay the position of the user."

!Classic

[Anonymous Coward]

"The crew of the classic science-fiction show's Starship Enterprise wore small devices on their chests that they could tap to communicate instantly with their colleagues."

No, that was the crew of the tenth-rate spin-off's Starship Enterprise.

Allrightium

[Anonymous Coward]

Cool, but I really dislike anything that makes tracking people any easier.

So its a phone then?

[MosesJones]

I've got this amazing thing that is just like something out of Star-Trek, you put it on your ear and it enables you to make and receive calls. I can even TELL IT WHO I WANT TO CALL and it automatically connects me with them.

Oh wait its a Bluetooth headset and a Nokia 6310i

2001 called they want the future back.

Re:Allrightium

[dougisfunny]

Communication must be hard for you if you dislike it so much then.

Re:chests?

[bickerdyke]

Oh come on....

perhaps meanwhile TNG became a classic too?

Wearing an antenna???

[Ptur]

EEEK... I wouldn't want to wear a transmitting antenna *on* my body with the antenna being on the exact same spot the whole time... Sound like this hasn't been thought out very well.

Re:I don't care...

[wjsteele]

Personally, I'd like them to call me when someone invents either part of it! Trans-warp or Beaming technology would both be very cool.

It's military equipment..

[Anonymous Coward]

Patria is a company working on defence and aerospace sectors. That should explain why the technology should not rely on mobile networks and why the "wearer" may want to have his/her position known by others.

Re:Keeps happening

[10Ghz]

Every now and then a 'designer' unveils a jacket or whatever with some kind of technology built into it (for the past ten years at least), and says that its 'new' and 'amazing' or whatever, and that its going to change the world.

IT WON'T. People DON'T WANT that stuff built-in to their clothing. It's uneconomic to build that stuff in to clothing.

Patria is a defence and aerospace-company. So you wont be seeing this technology on some average jeans, but you might see it in military flight-vests, uniforms and the like.

Re:chests?

[camperdave]

Come on! Even in Next Generation the communicators were badges that were added to the uniform, not built into it. No Star Trek featured any clothing with built in communicators (at least the Federation never had that tech). If you're going to count stuff like that, well then, we've had wearable electronics since the invention of the digital watch. No, wait! Since the invention of the walkie talkie. [modernmechanix.com]