In addition to the use of SenseCam as an aid for people with memory loss, the device has a number of other potential applications. In 2005, Microsoft provided some of the first SenseCams to a number of academic collaborators interested in the general area of ‘digital memories’, i.e. life-recording. These projects applied SenseCam in a variety of ways. For example The Centre for Digital Video Processing at Dublin City University, Ireland, is working on systems that will automatically generate ‘landmark images’ through analysis of the large number of images and other logged data recorded by SenseCam. In this way a personalized memory experience of a visit to a museum, national monument, etc. can be automatically generated, based on data collected by SenseCams worn during the visit.

We have also worked with the Universities of Nottingham and Bath, the BBC, BT and two small companies, Blast Theory and ScienceScope as part of a project called Participate. The purpose of Participate is to design, develop and test the utility of novel, pervasive, lightweight and wearable technologies that support mass participation in science, education, art and community life. SenseCam has been used by a number of school children as part of this project. In a separate piece of work, SenseCam has been used in the classroom to enable teachers to create a log of their day, supporting various aspects of reflective practice and thereby enabling users of the device to analyse their day afterwards. SenseCam has also been used in an office environment to support studies of how office workers spend their day, and in particular how they manage to work simultaneously on different tasks.

We are also collaborating with a number of other researchers around the world to further explore yet more potential usages for SenseCam, including:

• As a recording device for monitoring food intake, helping dieticians see the type, the quantity, and the timing of food a patient is eating.
• As a tool to assess accessibility issues encountered by wheelchair users.
• To coordinate disaster response by recording visual information encountered by those responding to disasters, people preoccupied with providing hands-on help.
• As an automatic diary that doesn’t require expensive, intrusive recording equipment or restrict a user’s activities.
• To monitor physiological data to help patients understand the sequence of events that precedes a period of intense anxiety or anger.
• To monitor lighting conditions in schools and to learn how they affect students.