45 years ago, a man named Martin Luther King stood in front of the Lincoln memorial and spoke to 250 000 people. His voice carried the words “I have a dream” across the National Mall. Today a part of that dream finally come true, as the first non-white president swears the oath on the opposite site of the National Mall with the Lincoln memorial in sight.

Truly a big day for the world. Yesterday was the birthday of Martin Luther King and today we are finally rid of one of the greatest warmongers in modern time. Regardless of what Obama will come up with, it can’t possibly be any worse than the eight years of “W” (least popular president of all time according to polls).

Steps of the Lincoln memorial Standing in the footsteps of Martin Luther King, on the steps of Lincoln memorial.

But this is not about politics. Two years ago I wrote about Photosynth, a technique that combines 2D photos into a 3D spatial mesh. Today CNN urges people to send in their photos of the event during the day, which will be processed in Photosynth and assembled at The Moment site.

Obama inauguration Photosynth mesh from The Moment, 24 hours after the inauguration.

It is a fascinating concept and it will be interesting to see how the result turns out later this day. Also interesting is how it collides with the plea from the telecommunication operators, who urges people to avoid making phone calls and image transfers (!) during the ceremony to keep the mobile net from collapsing.

2 comments

  • avatar
    mandus
    22 Jan, 2009

    Fun idea, but it seems like the demos of the Photosynth are way cooler than what I could get from this one. :/
    Guess you should avoid at all cost if you are prone to sea sickness. :)

  • avatar
    22 Jan, 2009

    Yeah, the demos are tuned to the strengths of Photosynth to show off as a cool feature. When it comes to a real situation and dealing with photos from all sorts of regular people, the result can be quite underwhelming.

Leave a reply