MIT nextlab - can you make a cellphone change the world?

http://nextlab.mit.edu/spring2009/main/

nextlab NOT being offered Fall ‘09
August 18th, 2009

Prospective students,

Welcome back from your summer vacation. Thanks for your many inquiries, but nextlab will not be offered during the Fall ‘09 semester. Please check back in late December or early January to find out details about next Spring.

We wish you a great 2009-10!

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
nextlab in the MIT homepage!
July 16th, 2009

Congratulations everybody, Check out the article!

nextlab_mit

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
nextlab event Spring 2009
May 15th, 2009

… and the nextlab Spring 2009 awards go to:

* Technology Innovation Award: HAMMOCK
* Venture Execution Award: DINUBE
* People’s Choice Award: MOCA

Posted in event | 1 Comment »
Revised Schedule for Tomorrow’s Event
May 13th, 2009

NextLabbers,

I have added 15 mins to tomorrow’s Event to make time for the announcement of the NextLab Merit Awards (Venture Execution Award and Technology Innovation Award), as well as the NextLab People’s Choice Award, which will be voted on by the audience. Here’s the schedule, with the changes in bold.

Thursday, May 14

- 10:00-10:45 A person designated from each team should come to the lower atrium of the Media Lab to set up your slides and video file on the Bartos computer. Bring your files on a virus-free USB drive

- 10:45-11:30 All members of the team should be busy setting up their stations for the live demos and poster session. You’ll need to set up your table, hang your 2 posters (technical and venture), have your prototypes working and set up a laptop with your video in case something in your prototype does not work or you need to show it to various people at the same time. At that time, pizza will arrive for NextLab staff and students. Come early to ensure you don’t miss out, as the box lunch handed out later will be specifically for event guests.

- 11:30-1:00 Team members should be on their stations doing demos and explaining their posters.

- 1:00-2:55 We will have the team presentations.

- 2:55-3:15 The NextLab Merit Awards will be announced.

- 3:15- The teams should get back on their stations to make another round of live demos and poster session

- 3:15-4:30 Final live demos and poster session. NextLab People’s Choice Award will be announced aprox. at 4:00

- 4:30-4.45 All teams should pick up their materials and clean up their stations. Please don’t leave anything behind, as there will be nobody specifically designated to clean up after the event

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
Almost Done!
May 12th, 2009

NextLabbbers,

Congratulations! You’re almost done for NextLab this semester. Hope we will still see you working on NextLab project after this semester.

Here’s the final deliverable list. All final Deliverables are team based.
- Venture Plan
- Presentation Slides for NextLab Event (Please embed your short video into it)
- Tech Poster
- Venture Poster
- Demo Video (5-minute one)
- Installation Guide (Step by step installation Guide with required hardware list)
- Source Code (accounts will be sent to Software Developer Officer accordingly)

Your team should upload everything to the link below.
http://nextlab.mit.edu/spring2009/main/assignment-upload/

I suggest you to upload your final presentation slides before 9AM, Thursday, May 14, so that I can test your slides before the event.

Last but not least, do come to Bartos Theatre to set up everything and check your slides before 10:30AM on May 14. We will prepare boards for you to post your two posters (two 24″x 36″, portrait!).

Good luck!

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
Congratulations Dinube!
May 7th, 2009

NextLabbers,

We can all be proud of our very own team Dinube, which was named Runner Up for the Mobile Track of the MIT$100K BPC. You should all know that MIT’s competition is the largest and most technologically sophisticated in the world. And congratulations to team Hammock, for putting on a great effort, and having made it this far.

Now, on to inspiring us for the May 14th event!

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
What you Need for Next Week
May 6th, 2009

NextLabbers,

This is what you need for the final week of the course. MAKE SURE YOU CHECK BACK THIS POSTING ON THE NEXTLAB WEBSITE FOR ANY ADDITIONS OR CLARIFICATIONS IN THE COMING WEEK.

Tuesday, May 12
- Please bring your laptop to class. This will enable you to fill the online course evaluation during class, and not have to do it later, when you’ll have other things in mind

Wednesday, May 13
- Remind your friends and colleagues about the event for the following day, because even your best friends are likely to forget given the haste of the last week of the semester
- Make sure you have your posters printed. They are cumbersome to print, and the process is often time consuming.

Thursday, May 14
- 10:00-10:45 A person designated from each team should come to the lower atrium of the Media Lab to set up your slides and video file on the Bartos computer. Bring your files on a virus-free USB drive
- 10:45-11:30 All members of the team should be busy setting up their stations for the live demos and poster session. You’ll need to set up your table, hang your 2 posters (technical and venture), have your prototypes working and set up a laptop with your video in case something in your prototype does not work or you need to show it to various people at the same time. At that time, pizza will arrive for NextLab staff and students. Come early to ensure you don’t miss out, as the box lunch handed out later will be specifically for event guests.
- 11:30-1:00 Team members should be on their stations doing demos and explaining their posters.
- 1:00-2:55 We will have the team presentations.
- 2:55-3:15 The NextLab Merit Awards will be announced.
- 3:15- The teams should get back on their stations to make another round of live demos and poster session
- 3:15-4:30 Final live demos and poster session – NextLab People’s Award will be announced
- 4:30-4.45 All teams should pick up their materials and clean up their stations. Please don’t leave anything behind, as there will be nobody specifically designated to clean up after the event

For the event you must bring:
1.- A USB drive with your slides with the embedded video that you’ll play during the team presentation
2.- Your working prototype
3.- Your 2 posters to be hung in your posterboard and enough tacks to hang them with (posterboards are 4′x3′, the tables to set down your equipment are 6′x30″)
4.- A laptop with all versions of your project video, so that you can show to more than one person at a time
5.- Business cards and any other literature you may want to produce for people to take about your project

Notes
- Paul Yang will be helping you with technical matters. Please find him if you need help.
- Spaces within the lower atrium of the Media Lab for the demos and posters will be given on a first come first served basis. That is, for a better spot, come in early, and set up your station in the best spot available
- Dress is somewhere between casual and business casual. Preferably no jeans, sandals or t-shirts
- Remember we will order pizza specifically for NextLab students, so please don’t take the lunch intended for the guests. We may be short of these as it is
- If you print your posters at the Media Lab, feel free to come to my office to leave them there overnight so that you don’t have to take them back to where you live

Friday, May 15
- You will have until 2:00pm of May 15 to upload all your Deliverables to the NextLab website. Please understand that I will not be able to hand in the grades of any student from a team that does not have ALL Deliverables uploaded
- Paul is the Final Deliverables Tzar. Talk to him directly for any questions.

Come to class with any questions not addressed here.

See you tomorrow.

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
Links to NextLab I December Presentations
May 5th, 2009

NextLabbers,

To avoid any confusion with the multiple videos we have from last semester, I’m enclosing the exact links where you’ll see the better final presentations from NextLab I. Make sure you see the actual live student team presentations, as opposed to other videos sprinkled across the website. This being a program on the rise, and NextLab II teams have enjoyed more resources and freedom than NextLab I teams, I am expecting substantially more polished, inspired set of presentations this May than we had last December.

Here they are:

http://nextlab.mit.edu/fall2008/mobilediagnostics/

http://nextlab.mit.edu/fall2008/disastermanagement/

http://nextlab.mit.edu/fall2008/mcommerce/

Good luck.

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
This Week – May 4 to 9
May 4th, 2009

NextLabbers,

These are the points to keep in mind for this week:

1.- I have begun to publicize the May 14th event. A lot of important people around the world will be visiting the event site (http://nextlab.mit.edu/spring2009/event/). Read your project description in that site and if you need any changes, contact Luis Blackaller ASAP.

2.- I found the presentation and discussion of your projects’ financial status and future plans to be important. Please make sure to include those slides in the final Venture Plan you will be handing in as your Final Deliverable.

3.- You will be required to upload Feedback for all teams for Milestone #5 this week. Please don’t forget to do so before the Friday, May 8th deadline, at noon. Go to Milestone #5 on this link: http://nextlab.mit.edu/spring2009/main/m-feedback/

4.- For your poster session on May 14th, you should bring both a technical as well as a venture poster. That is, you should have 2 posters hung in your posterboard that day, so that the technology can be explained separately from the venture side of your project.

5.- Again, the format of the presentations is 15 min slots for both your venture as well as your technical slides in the presentation. You should leave a few mins for Q&A within that 15 min slot.

6.- Since some teams have important commitments to attend this week, I have decided to publish the order for this week’s presentations. It is:
- Tuesday: Dinube, Hammock, Moca (not necessarily in that sequence)
- Thursday: Celedu, n3eight, Zaca, CiviRep (not necessarily in that sequence)

See you tomorrow!

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
Tomorrow and Next Week
April 29th, 2009

NextLabbers,

For tomorrow, Thrusday, April 30th, you will be sharing the following points with us in class:

• The expenditures you have made from your budget thus far

• The implementation plans you have for your project beyond May 14

• The expenditures you plan to make in the future (from now to May 14, as well as any others starting May 15)

• How you plan to obtain funds/support in case your total budget exceeds what you’ve been allocated at NextLab

Please bring a few slides so that your team can present that in no more than 5 mins (+3 mins for Q&A).

Next week in class, we will have a ‘dress rehearsal’ where you will present your full project (both venture and technical) in one single presentation: the format of the actual May 14 event. However, due to time constraints the allocated slots for all teams will be 15 mins, as opposed to 20 mins. This means your slides should aim for 10-11 mins, leaving 4-5 mins for Q&A. I’m sorry for the time reduction, but otherwise the event becomes too long.

Please visit the newly launched “nextlab event Spring 2009” website at http://nextlab.mit.edu/spring2009/event/ so that you know the exact order in which you will be presenting during the event, as well as the times in which there will be live demos and poster sessions.

I strongly encourage you to forward this URL to your contacts, and invite them all to come see you and your fellow teams on May 14th. There will be free lunch, refreshments and dessert. It’s been quite a successful event in the past, and covered by the media and various bloggers. If they can come only a few minutes, they can come to one of the live demo and poster sessions, and/or your particular team presentation.

See you tomorrow!