SCHAUMBURG, Ill., 25 January 2006 ? The crowd favorite and ?MYMOTOCHOICE? winner of Motorola's first-ever MOTOFWRD competition ? a nationwide college search for the best depiction of the future of technology and communications ? is Purdue University graduate student Andrew Davidson's short film ?Hey, that would be nice!?
Davidson's piece takes a voyeuristic tour of real life ? seamless mobility style. The technology and psychology student answered Motorola's challenge to create a set of solutions that work to provide easy, uninterrupted access to information, entertainment and communication when, where and how people want regardless of the device, service, network or location with one unified system.
?I took the everyday moments where I pause and ask myself, ?Wouldn't it be nice if my (insert device here) could do this?? and took those to the next level by integrating everything,? said Davidson.
His text-focused, soundtrack-backed film includes a smart alarm clock that resets itself on a cell phone if it is not functioning properly, morphing music that follows the user from room to room to car via a location-aware ring and an automatic date planner that spots rain in the forecast before a picnic date and reschedules at a favorite restaurant.
Selected from more than 500 entries from 220 universities in the U.S., Davidson was named as one of ten finalists in the MOTOFWRD competition. His entry, along with the other top finishers, was posted online for public voting. As the online favorite, Davidson receives $2,500 and a product prize package.
Other MOTOFWRD winners include grand prize winner John Finan, Duke University, and runners-up Ryan Panchadsaram, University of California, Berkeley, Brian Ho, Virginia Tech, and James Goodrich, Northwestern University.
Finan and three runners-up were chosen by a panel of industry experts including founder of dodgeball.com Dennis Crowley, founder of blackplanet.com Omar Wasow, futurist Dr. James Canton, youth culture expert DeeDee Gordon and sci-fi authors Cory Doctorow and Catherine Asaro.
