6 ms·

Muse: the brain sensing headband

86 points by beltex 12y ago

kidsil 12y ago
Very little (almost none?) information given. Talk about the software connected to this.. Anyone spending 300$ for so little information?
voltagex_ 12y ago
>Muse uses 7 finely calibrated EEG sensors to detect and measure the activity of your brain. This sensory input is translated into real-time feedback on your tablet or smart phone via Bluetooth. The result is a rich, real-time audio and visual experience. Calibrated for whom?
- barkingcat 12y ago
  If you take a minute to read the information available http://www.choosemuse.com/pages/faq#using http://www.choosemuse.com/pages/faq#using says that there is a 1 minute calibration period at the beginning of each use.
dsl 12y ago
I'm glad it wraps around the front of the head. It's an amazing visual clue to everyone else that this is the type of person you want to avoid a conversation with.
- andreasklinger 12y ago
  personally i believe it looks surprisingly low-key
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- cstrat 12y ago
  had to laugh at this comment. is the plan that people wear this around day to day??
- Kiro 12y ago
  Funny comment but completely out of context since this is not something you're supposed to wear in public.
  - moron4hire 12y ago
    So the picture of the one woman laughing is not having a conversation with anyone, but actually having a psychotic episode?
    - rthomas6 12y ago
      She does appear to be in a padded room.
pknight 12y ago
I've been waiting for a basic device that just tells me roughly what brain state I'm in (alpha/beta/delta/theta/gamma dominant) with bonus points if it has a feedback mechanism to make it easier to train one self into a certain state. I don't think they got the pricing right. There are already quite a lot of consumer EEG devices on the market that either do more and/or are cheaper. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_consumer_brain%E2%80%93computer_interfaces http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_consumer_brain%E2...
- Breefield 12y ago
  But none that are as pretty and well tuned.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
andreasklinger 12y ago
There should be meditation apps which support this. Would love to train my focus more.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
barkingcat 12y ago
To give some more information, these tech info and sdk pages are linked from the faq site: Tech specs: http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0348/7053/files/muse-tech-spec-sheet.pdf?918 http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0348/7053/files/muse-tech-s... SDK guide: https://sites.google.com/a/interaxon.ca/muse-developer-site/home https://sites.google.com/a/interaxon.ca/muse-developer-site/...
Killah911 12y ago
A $300 consumer product that promises to help one be more "mindful" & "present" more "efficiently" than plain old meditation. What is sad is the irony in all of this. What's sadder is that I want to buy it... Might be brilliant on their part. Corporate consultant gurus are making quite a nickel telling execs to be more "mindful" & "present". Might be an opportune time to break into the market and displace some spiritual advisors with a little technology too. Maybe Verison 2.0 will help you down the 8fold path faster and without years of meditation & conditioning.
- flyfishcxy 12y ago
  see
- DaniFong 12y ago
  Two things: 1) A recently discovered very strong correlation (needs further longitudinal study) between mindfulness practice and a reduced decline in mental performance with age. http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fnagi.2014.00076/full http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fnagi.2014.00... 2) I had a demo -- the device is actually very responsive and seems to really work. The science (not conclusive but interesting) behind it is a well known correlation with meditation and brain alpha waves. YMMV.
  - nabla9 12y ago
    I have been doing zazen meditation as 2-3 hours per day for 10+ years. The way I see it, mindfulness practices and meditation gives long term effects because you are doing the effort yourself. It's not the mental state you are in during the meditation that brings the long term benefits. What works is your constant effort to look at your mind and notice what it does, even when you are distracted or feel vexed and especially then. When you do 7 day zazen retreat where you meditate 10-16 hours per day, you feel pain in your legs, periods of intense drowsiness, agitation, strong emotions, boredom, etc. all this while sitting and looking calm outwards. Within all this internal storm you are just looking at what happens your own mind at the current moment. Attaching yourself to pleasant mental states you get in meditation is just waste of time. The way these EEG devices work is by giving you feedback loop that gets you into relaxed state. That's not same as meditation. It can have good effects, but it's not the same. One person drives with car 10 km every day and other person runs 10 km every day. The amount they travel correlates very closely, but only one person gets exercise.
gsteinb88 12y ago
Is this at all different from the Melon[0] headband (a Kickstarter backed project from ~a year ago, and half the price)? [0] http://www.thinkmelon.com/ http://www.thinkmelon.com/
- Breefield 12y ago
  You can get it today (or 3-4 weeks rather for order fulfillment).
  - gsteinb88 12y ago
    Fair; I'm more curious about the technical aspects / whether the doubled cost translates into anything more than immediacy.
curiousDog 12y ago
Ahh, was hoping it was a device that delivered minimal tDCS. Does such a device exist?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcranial_direct-current_stimulation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcranial_direct-current_sti...
- icelancer 12y ago
  http://www.foc.us/ http://www.foc.us/ Foc.us does. I have one. Works well. EDIT: Downvoted for providing a link? I don't work for Foc.us or anything.
  - neverminder 12y ago
    It's target market seem to be gamers, but I was just wondering are there any other positive effects that a software engineer would benefit from, besides memory?
    - icelancer 12y ago
      I'm not much of a gamer besides the occasional game of League/DotA; I use it primarily while coding/reading/writing.
  - meowface 12y ago
    This sounds very interesting. I understand this has been approved as "safe", and I doubt it would ever lead to death or harm, but I wonder what the long term effects of frequent brain stimulation could be. It could be good effects, but it could also be bad. I don't believe any longitudinal study has been done on something like this. How do you feel while you're using it?
    - icelancer 12y ago
      It doesn't seem to produce any acute effects. The research I've read before buying this seems to indicate it's a chronic effect over time. Unfortunately I don't have the patience to really do a sham/active test cycle, so I've been just alternating pulse/continuous/random cycles 3-4 times per week, 10-20 minutes per session. Anecdotally it seems to work well. My major reason for investing into tDCS was to improve working memory, as I strongly believe I was rapidly deteriorating in that realm despite near-abstinence from alcohol and other drugs. In that regard, it seems to work well, but it could easily be a placebo effect from wearing a cool helmet. If I had to guess I'd say I'm 75% confident that foc.us has had a material positive effect on my working memory and cognitive functions. I can't say I am 90-95% confident and I'm not sure I ever will be, since doing a rigorous test is near impossible without a partner controlling the sham effects, and even then it's for personal use and not a research study so to speak. Not sure I would enthusiastically recommend it but the research out there points in a solid - if not dramatic - direction.
glassdoor 12y ago
Given that Jason has funded this startup, also invested in Calm (and I believe in his intelligence), I should not doubt this product. This product has been demonstrated first in the Launch Hackaton and it worked. Coming from the signal processing background I'm always very suspicious how sensors can preform such great filtering on the signal, but looking at the investor profile makes me think there is something there.
kalleboo 12y ago
I think I'll stick to http://www.necomimi.com http://www.necomimi.com
- tiziano88 12y ago
  uhmm interesting wiggle wiggle
tiziano88 12y ago
I'm having a hard time searching for this thing as "muse band" on Google :)
- beltex 12y ago
  http://interaxon.ca http://interaxon.ca The company behind Muse.
caycep 12y ago
The cynic in me feels that much of what they may be determining is from muscle artifact...i've been looking through some (plain old clinical/medical 32 electrode) EEG data and even that has a lot of artifact. Although I suppose it's some behavioral correlation - the more stressed out you are the more you clench your muscles, I suppose. At the very least if they've figured out how to get clean EEG w/o having to use smelly EEG conductive goop, props to them!
waterlesscloud 12y ago
Reminds me of the Atari Mindlink. http://www.atarimuseum.com/videogames/consoles/2600/mindlink.html http://www.atarimuseum.com/videogames/consoles/2600/mindlink... It worked via your forehead muscles. Weirdly, I did consumer research testing for this thing as a teenager. They showed us a video and then let us test it with River Raid (which was an Activision game, go figure). Then one of those group sessions where they interview you all with someone filming behind a two-way mirror. The Atari thing did kinda work. Sorta. Anyway, it was a fun consumer research thing to be paid for.
sciguy77 12y ago
Haven't there been a few of these on Indiegogo?
- drodgers 12y ago
  This was one of them: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/muse-the-brain-sensing-headband-that-lets-you-control-things-with-your-mind https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/muse-the-brain-sensing-he...
sz4kerto 12y ago
If we're at headache: the website gives me one.
pacoverdi 12y ago
Ooh, these sudden background color changes when scrolling really hurt my brain!
5partan 12y ago
This site demonstrates how the blink and marquee tag look in 2014
waps 12y ago
I wonder when the first real such product will exist. Like any system that synchronizes by waves it can be modified by waves, probably much more than you'd be able to do through chemicals. So who will make the first heroine headband ? It will probably need outputs as well as inputs though.
- moron4hire 12y ago
  It seems to just be a biofeedback device. It tells you when you are experiencing the right brain wave pattern so that you're consciously aware of it, but you have to do the work of meditating to alter the state.
nebulous1 12y ago
Just trying to read that site stressed me out. So they failed before they even got started.
- DavidSJ 12y ago
  Came here to say the same thing. Background colors and text changing without interaction and unpredictable consequences of navigation actions makes for quite the stressful experience.
n8m 12y ago
I wonder if someone with migraine somehow could benefit from such a device/training.
Serow225 12y ago
The tagline (the brain sensing headband) is hilarious, I'd love to see the app just respond Yes or No when a person puts the headband on ;)
mrbill 12y ago
As of May 14th, they were telling backers (of which I'm one) that delivery is delayed 4-6 weeks.
yoz-y 12y ago
Big issue with this kind of headband is the position of electrodes. Forehead seems like a good place in the first time since the frontal lobe is devoid of hair, however the EEG signal at this place is heavily artifacted by muscular activity (blinks, eye movements, facial muscles). The most "interesting" brain activity also happens in the central axis of the brain (going from nose, through the top of the head and back to the occiput). It is however a design challenge to get electrodes to this place without the use of ugly caps and gel.
figital 12y ago
To the best of my basic knowledge (and as mentioned here already) EEG isn't going to be super-useful for a consumer device like this ... HEG (infrared detection of oxygen levels) is a better option in terms of the ratio of easy hookups to meaningful (mass market) results.
herval 12y ago
I'd like to dispense just a bit of unsolicited feedback: the website is SO flashy/animated that I scrolled all the way to the end and didn't pay attention to any of the actual content.
- rambojohnson 12y ago
  agreed. the constantly shifting background colors gave me a headache. navigating the site wearing Muse would break the product.

86 points by beltex 12y ago

Very little (almost none?) information given. Talk about the software connected to this.. Anyone spending 300$ for so little information?

voltagex_ 12y ago

>Muse uses 7 finely calibrated EEG sensors to detect and measure the activity of your brain. This sensory input is translated into real-time feedback on your tablet or smart phone via Bluetooth. The result is a rich, real-time audio and visual experience. Calibrated for whom?

barkingcat 12y ago
If you take a minute to read the information available http://www.choosemuse.com/pages/faq#using http://www.choosemuse.com/pages/faq#using says that there is a 1 minute calibration period at the beginning of each use.

dsl 12y ago

I'm glad it wraps around the front of the head. It's an amazing visual clue to everyone else that this is the type of person you want to avoid a conversation with.

andreasklinger 12y ago
personally i believe it looks surprisingly low-key
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
cstrat 12y ago
had to laugh at this comment. is the plan that people wear this around day to day??
Kiro 12y ago
Funny comment but completely out of context since this is not something you're supposed to wear in public.
- moron4hire 12y ago
  So the picture of the one woman laughing is not having a conversation with anyone, but actually having a psychotic episode?
  - rthomas6 12y ago
    She does appear to be in a padded room.

pknight 12y ago

I've been waiting for a basic device that just tells me roughly what brain state I'm in (alpha/beta/delta/theta/gamma dominant) with bonus points if it has a feedback mechanism to make it easier to train one self into a certain state. I don't think they got the pricing right. There are already quite a lot of consumer EEG devices on the market that either do more and/or are cheaper. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_consumer_brain%E2%80%93computer_interfaces http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_consumer_brain%E2...

Breefield 12y ago
But none that are as pretty and well tuned.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

andreasklinger 12y ago

There should be meditation apps which support this. Would love to train my focus more.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

barkingcat 12y ago

To give some more information, these tech info and sdk pages are linked from the faq site: Tech specs: http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0348/7053/files/muse-tech-spec-sheet.pdf?918 http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0348/7053/files/muse-tech-s... SDK guide: https://sites.google.com/a/interaxon.ca/muse-developer-site/home https://sites.google.com/a/interaxon.ca/muse-developer-site/...

Killah911 12y ago

A $300 consumer product that promises to help one be more "mindful" & "present" more "efficiently" than plain old meditation. What is sad is the irony in all of this. What's sadder is that I want to buy it... Might be brilliant on their part. Corporate consultant gurus are making quite a nickel telling execs to be more "mindful" & "present". Might be an opportune time to break into the market and displace some spiritual advisors with a little technology too. Maybe Verison 2.0 will help you down the 8fold path faster and without years of meditation & conditioning.

flyfishcxy 12y ago
see
DaniFong 12y ago
Two things: 1) A recently discovered very strong correlation (needs further longitudinal study) between mindfulness practice and a reduced decline in mental performance with age. http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fnagi.2014.00076/full http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fnagi.2014.00... 2) I had a demo -- the device is actually very responsive and seems to really work. The science (not conclusive but interesting) behind it is a well known correlation with meditation and brain alpha waves. YMMV.
- nabla9 12y ago
  I have been doing zazen meditation as 2-3 hours per day for 10+ years. The way I see it, mindfulness practices and meditation gives long term effects because you are doing the effort yourself. It's not the mental state you are in during the meditation that brings the long term benefits. What works is your constant effort to look at your mind and notice what it does, even when you are distracted or feel vexed and especially then. When you do 7 day zazen retreat where you meditate 10-16 hours per day, you feel pain in your legs, periods of intense drowsiness, agitation, strong emotions, boredom, etc. all this while sitting and looking calm outwards. Within all this internal storm you are just looking at what happens your own mind at the current moment. Attaching yourself to pleasant mental states you get in meditation is just waste of time. The way these EEG devices work is by giving you feedback loop that gets you into relaxed state. That's not same as meditation. It can have good effects, but it's not the same. One person drives with car 10 km every day and other person runs 10 km every day. The amount they travel correlates very closely, but only one person gets exercise.

gsteinb88 12y ago

Is this at all different from the Melon[0] headband (a Kickstarter backed project from ~a year ago, and half the price)? [0] http://www.thinkmelon.com/ http://www.thinkmelon.com/

Breefield 12y ago
You can get it today (or 3-4 weeks rather for order fulfillment).
- gsteinb88 12y ago
  Fair; I'm more curious about the technical aspects / whether the doubled cost translates into anything more than immediacy.

curiousDog 12y ago

Ahh, was hoping it was a device that delivered minimal tDCS. Does such a device exist?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcranial_direct-current_stimulation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcranial_direct-current_sti...

icelancer 12y ago
http://www.foc.us/ http://www.foc.us/ Foc.us does. I have one. Works well. EDIT: Downvoted for providing a link? I don't work for Foc.us or anything.
- neverminder 12y ago
  It's target market seem to be gamers, but I was just wondering are there any other positive effects that a software engineer would benefit from, besides memory?
  - icelancer 12y ago
    I'm not much of a gamer besides the occasional game of League/DotA; I use it primarily while coding/reading/writing.
- meowface 12y ago
  This sounds very interesting. I understand this has been approved as "safe", and I doubt it would ever lead to death or harm, but I wonder what the long term effects of frequent brain stimulation could be. It could be good effects, but it could also be bad. I don't believe any longitudinal study has been done on something like this. How do you feel while you're using it?
  - icelancer 12y ago
    It doesn't seem to produce any acute effects. The research I've read before buying this seems to indicate it's a chronic effect over time. Unfortunately I don't have the patience to really do a sham/active test cycle, so I've been just alternating pulse/continuous/random cycles 3-4 times per week, 10-20 minutes per session. Anecdotally it seems to work well. My major reason for investing into tDCS was to improve working memory, as I strongly believe I was rapidly deteriorating in that realm despite near-abstinence from alcohol and other drugs. In that regard, it seems to work well, but it could easily be a placebo effect from wearing a cool helmet. If I had to guess I'd say I'm 75% confident that foc.us has had a material positive effect on my working memory and cognitive functions. I can't say I am 90-95% confident and I'm not sure I ever will be, since doing a rigorous test is near impossible without a partner controlling the sham effects, and even then it's for personal use and not a research study so to speak. Not sure I would enthusiastically recommend it but the research out there points in a solid - if not dramatic - direction.

glassdoor 12y ago

Given that Jason has funded this startup, also invested in Calm (and I believe in his intelligence), I should not doubt this product. This product has been demonstrated first in the Launch Hackaton and it worked. Coming from the signal processing background I'm always very suspicious how sensors can preform such great filtering on the signal, but looking at the investor profile makes me think there is something there.

kalleboo 12y ago

I think I'll stick to http://www.necomimi.com http://www.necomimi.com

tiziano88 12y ago
uhmm interesting wiggle wiggle

tiziano88 12y ago

I'm having a hard time searching for this thing as "muse band" on Google :)

beltex 12y ago
http://interaxon.ca http://interaxon.ca The company behind Muse.

caycep 12y ago

The cynic in me feels that much of what they may be determining is from muscle artifact...i've been looking through some (plain old clinical/medical 32 electrode) EEG data and even that has a lot of artifact. Although I suppose it's some behavioral correlation - the more stressed out you are the more you clench your muscles, I suppose. At the very least if they've figured out how to get clean EEG w/o having to use smelly EEG conductive goop, props to them!

waterlesscloud 12y ago

Reminds me of the Atari Mindlink. http://www.atarimuseum.com/videogames/consoles/2600/mindlink.html http://www.atarimuseum.com/videogames/consoles/2600/mindlink... It worked via your forehead muscles. Weirdly, I did consumer research testing for this thing as a teenager. They showed us a video and then let us test it with River Raid (which was an Activision game, go figure). Then one of those group sessions where they interview you all with someone filming behind a two-way mirror. The Atari thing did kinda work. Sorta. Anyway, it was a fun consumer research thing to be paid for.

sciguy77 12y ago

Haven't there been a few of these on Indiegogo?

drodgers 12y ago
This was one of them: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/muse-the-brain-sensing-headband-that-lets-you-control-things-with-your-mind https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/muse-the-brain-sensing-he...

sz4kerto 12y ago

If we're at headache: the website gives me one.

pacoverdi 12y ago

Ooh, these sudden background color changes when scrolling really hurt my brain!

5partan 12y ago

This site demonstrates how the blink and marquee tag look in 2014

waps 12y ago

I wonder when the first real such product will exist. Like any system that synchronizes by waves it can be modified by waves, probably much more than you'd be able to do through chemicals. So who will make the first heroine headband ? It will probably need outputs as well as inputs though.

moron4hire 12y ago
It seems to just be a biofeedback device. It tells you when you are experiencing the right brain wave pattern so that you're consciously aware of it, but you have to do the work of meditating to alter the state.

nebulous1 12y ago

Just trying to read that site stressed me out. So they failed before they even got started.

DavidSJ 12y ago
Came here to say the same thing. Background colors and text changing without interaction and unpredictable consequences of navigation actions makes for quite the stressful experience.

n8m 12y ago

I wonder if someone with migraine somehow could benefit from such a device/training.

Serow225 12y ago

The tagline (the brain sensing headband) is hilarious, I'd love to see the app just respond Yes or No when a person puts the headband on ;)

mrbill 12y ago

As of May 14th, they were telling backers (of which I'm one) that delivery is delayed 4-6 weeks.

yoz-y 12y ago

Big issue with this kind of headband is the position of electrodes. Forehead seems like a good place in the first time since the frontal lobe is devoid of hair, however the EEG signal at this place is heavily artifacted by muscular activity (blinks, eye movements, facial muscles). The most "interesting" brain activity also happens in the central axis of the brain (going from nose, through the top of the head and back to the occiput). It is however a design challenge to get electrodes to this place without the use of ugly caps and gel.

figital 12y ago

To the best of my basic knowledge (and as mentioned here already) EEG isn't going to be super-useful for a consumer device like this ... HEG (infrared detection of oxygen levels) is a better option in terms of the ratio of easy hookups to meaningful (mass market) results.

herval 12y ago

I'd like to dispense just a bit of unsolicited feedback: the website is SO flashy/animated that I scrolled all the way to the end and didn't pay attention to any of the actual content.

rambojohnson 12y ago
agreed. the constantly shifting background colors gave me a headache. navigating the site wearing Muse would break the product.