Freshman MIT Students Automate Dorm Room 290
Inessa writes "Two freshman MIT students have automated their dorm room, complete with a big red party button which generates an instant party. Their custom-engineered system is called MIDAS, the Multi-Function In Dorm Automation System. According to the MIT News office, "Gone are the light switches and glaring fluorescent lights of a typical dorm room. Zack Anderson and RJ Ryan's room has several lighting schemes, remote web access, voice activation, a security system, electric blinds and more ... With the touch of one red button, their dorm room becomes a rave. The lights go out, the blinds close, the displays read, "feel the energy" as a voice repeats the same phrase over a deep bass beat.""
What a couple of nerds... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:What a couple of nerds... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:What a couple of nerds... (Score:3, Insightful)
Right. MIT students automated their room. Isn't this a dog-bites-man story?
YES! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What a couple of nerds... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What a couple of nerds... (Score:5, Funny)
Two cave men, Oog and Ug need to move rocks to the top of a hill. Now, Ug is a hard worker, and doesn't mind carrying all those rocks uphill all day. Hey, you do what you have to. But Oog is sick of it, and wants to go home and look at his private "cave drawing" collection, so he invents the wheelbarrow sohe gets done in 1/4 the time as Ug.
The next day, Ug collapses of heat exhastion and is crushed by a rock he was carrying, ensuring Oog's reproduction, setting up humanity to be perfectly fine with inventing new things so they can be lazier.
Re:What a couple of nerds... (Score:4, Funny)
Otherwise it wouldn't be MIT... would it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Inoculation? (Score:2)
I read "inculcation" as "inoculation", and was hoping you could provide me with information on the curative properties of binge drinking and pot smoking...
Re:MIT's drug abuse problem (Score:5, Insightful)
I would not discount all MIT grads based on one negative experience you've had.
Re:MIT's drug abuse problem (Score:4, Insightful)
However, what's vastly more important than simply getting good grades for the top jobs and especially graduate work is demonstrating your ability. Come out of any halfway respectable school having published a paper in a decent journal (or at least written a good paper), done some sort of other neat research, written (and sold!) some great programs, etc, and you have a huge advantage over someone who's merely got the grades and the school rep.
Professors in college are mainly there to teach you how to properly teach yourself and give you the fundamentals in the field you've finally chosen. As long as you got a couple professors who know what it is to research and work in industry that aren't total bums, they should be able to impart all the necessary wisdom to you. Being instructed by Nobel Laureate Professor X. Winnar or Fields Medalist Q. Bert Hawtsauce is nice for letters of recommendation, I'll give them that, but in my experience hasn't shown much of a difference as far as undergrad learning.
To make up for the environment at my smaller and less tech-oriented school, I spent semesters and summers abroad at programs targeted to people in my situation. Going to those programs were invaluable, they were funded by the government, and they gave me a chance to really get immersed in my subject with students who felt as passionately about it as I did. It also gave me some amazing contacts in terms of notable names in my field, one of whom has offered to fund my grad studies.
So really, like most other things, it's your talent, the effort you put in, and lots of plain dumb luck. Had I chosen a more highly ranked school I would've come out of undergrad with amazing amounts of debt, and I don't know if I would've really improved on my grad outlook. This way, I have something like $10k in low-interest government loans and I'm getting fully funded with a very nice stipend at a good grad school.
Re:MIT's drug abuse problem (Score:3, Insightful)
As a manager at a high tech company, my experience has been entirely different. While we don't get a lot of MIT graduates coming to the west coast, the ones who have worked for me have been fantastic in terms of being bright, energe
Re:MIT's drug abuse problem (Score:2)
simple: advertising and media
Re:MIT's drug abuse problem (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:MIT's drug abuse problem (Score:2)
So... inexperienced programmers should become experienced by... ?
Assuming they did a computer science degree, it's rather odd they got through their entire degree while refusing to use constants, however a computer science degree is not a degree on programming. Sure, some institutions will train their students to a level where they can hit the ground running in a programming job, in the environment they're used to. Howe
Re:Otherwise it wouldn't be MIT... would it? (Score:3, Insightful)
Nobody said it was the best institution there is, but I'd like to see you form a (constructive) argument against calling it one of the premier institutions. In the future I suggest you avoid unfounded statements.
I'd also like to hear the reasoning behind your being awarded a score of "5, Insightful." I know bashing the USA on Slashdot is as trendy as typing Microsoft with a doll
great, but (Score:5, Funny)
Didn't you know? (Score:4, Funny)
Instant women... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:great, but (Score:5, Funny)
B.U.
Re:great, but (Score:2)
Re:great, but (Score:5, Insightful)
The chicks are geeks. Some of them are probably reading this now, and hoping to have a chance to check it out. Many will understand MIDAS well enough to build their own.
Basically these guys have designed a perfect solution for their environment. It might not work that well at another school, but at MIT they have it made... for a while at any rate. Like most geeks the chicks at MIT will want to see upgrades, new versions and bugfixes.
Thanks, Mom and Dad (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Thanks, Mom and Dad (Score:2)
You had it easy. (Score:5, Funny)
When I went to school, Velveeta hadn't been invented yet. We had to walk in all manner of weather conditions to the vetrinary science buildings, uphill both ways, and steal milk from the cows, which we then had to curdle in the bathroom sink. Only then could a Friday night celebration be had.
Re:You had it easy. (Score:2)
Cows? We used to dream about milking cows. We had to milk the rats that infested the cardboard box we called a dorm room. Cows indeed!
It's possible I'm romanticizing my college years a bit, though.
Re:Thanks, Mom and Dad (Score:5, Funny)
LK
Re:Thanks, Mom and Dad (Score:2)
Re:Thanks, Mom and Dad (Score:2, Informative)
MIT students definition of a party... (Score:5, Funny)
Nice work and all that, but most decent parties at college include three staple ingredients
1) Alcohol
2) Women
3) Alcohol
Though alcohol appears twice this is on purpose, once to get you drunk enough to ask, then a woman to ask, the second to get her drunk enough to agree. Now an automated party system that achieved that... the guys would be millionaires by next Wednesday.
Re:MIT students definition of a party... (Score:2)
So...you're saying that the party button should automate a call to an escort service?
Re:MIT students definition of a party... (Score:2)
Re:MIT students definition of a party... (Score:5, Insightful)
All sex is paid for.
Women control (Score:3, Funny)
After going cavern diving one day he told me:
"Women control half of the money, and all the sex in the world".
I want to slit my wrists
Re:Women control (Score:3, Interesting)
So we're left with a simple bargain: love for sex. One party provides each and desires the other.
Wierd, huh.
Don't Be So Depressed (Score:3, Insightful)
If you just look at women as sexual objects then I'm sure you'll end
Re:MIT students definition of a party... (Score:2, Insightful)
I personally do not care much for the fracas and rukus of the normal college parties for meeting women. Try a library or a coffee shop. Be interesting even when not intoxicated.
Re:MIT students definition of a party... (Score:3, Funny)
But they've all got those damned stupid-looking glasses on!!!
Re:MIT students definition of a party... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:MIT students definition of a party... (Score:3, Funny)
don't you ever watch the movies? every nerdy chick becomes hot when you take off the glasses and let their hair down!
But... (Score:5, Funny)
In soviet russia... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:In soviet russia... (Score:2, Redundant)
In Soviet Russia, the rave throws you!
If they're hoping for female company... (Score:3, Funny)
not many good ones (Score:2)
The good ones are often to distracted by their own academic success to think about starting a family. They have a meaningless career, then panic at age 40 when they realize that menopause is coming soon. Whoops. Should have thought about that earlier.
Re:If they're hoping for female company... (Score:2)
Oh yes, all that's important to women is their prospective husbands' earning potentials. It's not as if financial gain is secondary to some women. After all, all men are bastards and all women are whores.
Who knows, there may even be women out there with large earning potentials of their own.
Re:If they're hoping for female company... (Score:4, Funny)
MIT guy: And check out my wired dorm! Playing "feel the energy"!
Girls: Collapse in helpless laughter
MIT guy: Wait! you can't laugh at me! Think of my huge earning potential!
-- 2 seconds utter silence --
Girls: Collapse in even more hysterical laughter...
Re:If they're hoping for female company... (Score:2)
(Note to plumbers out there: My favorite uncle is a plumber, well-educated, and very intelligent. The preceding joke was, in fact, merely a joke, based on stereotypes...)
Rave??? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Rave??? (Score:3, Funny)
Ah, the best years of my life.
The REAL first rave (Score:2)
Next project... (Score:5, Funny)
Feel the energy? WTF? (Score:5, Funny)
Appearantly, these "freshmen" haven't been out of their dorm room since the early 90's
Re:Feel the energy? WTF? (Score:3)
Real geeks would used the 'Pure Energy' sample by Leonard Nimoy.
Re:Feel the energy? WTF? (Score:2)
"feel the energy" (Score:3, Funny)
One Man Party (Score:4, Insightful)
Not as small as the Miniscule of Sound! (Score:2)
Re:Not as small as the Miniscule of Sound! (Score:2)
Next Story (Score:5, Funny)
It May Look Nice... (Score:2, Insightful)
After running a few LAN parties, I know full well, set up is half the time of take down.
So assuming these boys have been at this whole Dorm Party System for a couple of months, dare I say a year? How are they going to take all this down?
I bet everything has been screwed or nailed in, modified and altered to accommodate all this equipment. Who allowed them t
Re:It May Look Nice... (Score:5, Informative)
If they want, they don't have to move out for three years. On most halls at East Campus, you can squat your room as long as you want (except that they'll probably have to keep squatting it as a double).
I bet everything has been screwed or nailed in, modified and altered to accommodate all this equipment. Who allowed them to do this?
Joe Graham. ("Kids making illegal modifications to their rooms? I'm on it!")
Last time I checked you weren't allowed to mess around with dorm rooms.
At East Campus, you actually are allowed to mess around with dorm rooms. Murals are painted everywhere, and all sorts of cool shit happens. The building is so old that nobody cares anymore, except for the Cambridge Fire Department. And if you keep the room's door locked during inspection, they don't have to know about it.
Nice system and all, but -10 practicality. Maybe it would have worked better in a house or apartment. They should have worked more in how it looked and how it was to be set up instead of just building it.
Yeah, but by the time they live in a house or apartment, they won't have the free time to do this kind of stuff. Heck, next term they probably won't have that kind of time.
Re:It May Look Nice... (Score:5, Interesting)
This degree of customization is quite common and encouraged here. The building was built in the 20s and its condition very much reflects that. For that reason students are allowed to do pretty much whatever they can get around the fire code. Many rooms feature lofted beds, weird paint schemes and odd lighting. The hallways are covered completely with student painted murals.
If they tear it down tomorrow (or Saturday since that was check-out for the summer) and leave big holes in the walls nobody would know the difference. If they leave it in the next residents will take it over since they'll be the same type of person. Also, most people live on the same floor for all four of their years, many staying in the same room.
My floor, 2E, features a lounge with a lofted couch, hacked together projection system, a water cooled media center, and a 16 processor Alpha (4x ES40) cluster in our kitchen.
Re:It May Look Nice... (Score:3, Interesting)
You're more or less right. Right now, four of them are crunching away with distributed.net, and the other twelve are pretty much doing nothing.
One more Alpha is serving up pictures and a wiki, and occasionally withstanding partial Slashdottings. We actually have 19 Alpha processors on the hall in total, which is probably way too many. Ne
Video (Score:5, Informative)
How the hell do you afford all that stuff? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:How the hell do you afford all that stuff? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:How the hell do you afford all that stuff? (Score:2)
Also has fleeing female mode.... (Score:5, Funny)
In other news... (Score:2)
[Been there (MIT), seen that. Some of the most amazing projects were done by students who never completed their studies. Of course, many of them went on to be entrepreneurial millionaires, while the rest of us became 9-5 drones...]
Instant party, just add... (Score:3, Funny)
Hah..... (Score:2)
Of course it's a red button... (Score:2)
Two simple questions (Score:2)
As a college student and a full-time employee, I find it incredibly difficult to keep up with things. There are dozens of cool ideas I'd love to implement, but they sit on the back burner due to lack of time and money. Maybe these two are like the many freshman I see on campus. Mommy and Daddy pay for everything. So they blow off their studies, have no major financial debts, and
Re:Two simple questions (Score:2)
I'd rather employee people like these two who can demonstrate not only do they have their bits of paperwork (assuming they pass) but the ability to actually use their knowledge. Too many grads I've seen in i
thoughts on why is this news? (Score:2, Interesting)
Party mode (Score:2, Funny)
"The system is down! The system is down!"
"Hey The Cheat! I told you, no more light switch raves!"
Fenway House (Score:2)
And what's kitchen pantry without an Athena terminal? 8)
Re:Fenway House (Score:2)
Well (Score:2)
You obviously can't teach good taste.
"feel the energy"? Fiddlesticks. (Score:3, Funny)
-jhp
Stupid kids... (Score:5, Funny)
On Second Thought (Score:4, Funny)
Typical EC (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Bit small for a party (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Bit small for a party (Score:2)
Re:Bit small for a party (Score:2)
1) Must be able to be launched at the spur of the moment. MIDAS seems to have that advantage.
2) High density occupancy - again a dorm room is perfect. Gets bodies closer to each other and lets gravity do its thing.
3) The music has to be pumping.
4) A co-ed crowd (or a same sex crowd, lets not be discriminatory here.)
how we manage (Score:4, Informative)
Usually you can pay extra to ditch the roommate, but this may involve a much longer walk to class. If the school is uncrowded and/or you claim to have some sort of mental issue (Asperger's, severe ADD, etc.) you might be able to get a regular double to yourself, with or without paying double.
Many places have dorms for married students, regularly visited by the stork.
Re:how we manage (Score:3, Funny)
How does one sleep in a shower?
Re:Bit small for a party (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bit small for a party (Score:5, Funny)
"Never go out with an MIT student; they are horrible dates. More than
any other college men, they are only after one thing:
Sleep."
Re:One thing is for sure (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Wow! (Score:5, Funny)
It all looks very impressive on paper, but they're having trouble getting enough juice to those magnets, and as yet have been unable to give the BALMER anything but a dry run.
Re:Wow! (Score:2)
The alternative view is that, no matter how poor their social skills or bad their body odour, when they patent their invention and license it for millions of dollars, they are going to have to fend of the avalanche of babes targetting them with the proverbial manure-covered prodding implement.
Re:Party (Score:2)
Seriously, a geek getting a date? Come on now. Next you're going to say Aliens are being held in Area 51.
Re:a little slow? (Score:2)
Re:Where did they get the money for this? (Score:2)
Im not sure about you but Im getting paid $15.00 an hour plus overtime working at an company that has been mentioned on Slashdot and I've only been through one and half years of college. :) 40 hours a week and well its very sweet.
Re:Where did they get the money for this? (Score:4, Interesting)
If you read the article, it mentions they got most of the gear off the "reuse" mailing list at MIT. Apparently, it's the equivalent of institutionalized dumpster diving, where they cut out the middleman and just hand equipment to people directly.
Retail Package at Think Geek... (Score:2)
Re:Cost (Warning: Ramble) (Score:2)
Once, the centrifugal clutch got full of mud and jammed in the engaged position. My dad chased the riderless kart around the yard and tackled it, hurting his thumb in the process.
If you're a licensed driver, you could conceivably find a place to ride whenever you want,