Yandex unveils gesture-recognition interface for social apps

Yandex Labs, the innovation arm of the Russian search engine, is collaborating with Carnegie Mellon University to develop a gesture-based interface that can be used on an internet-connected television to navigate social applications. The interface pulls data from Facebook, Instagram and Foursquare and other social networks to display content that can then be navigated using hand gestures. Users can swipe, flip or push an invisible “magnetic button” to play videos and music, read news or browse photos. Although just a prototype at this stage, a video created by Yandex and Carnegie Mellon gives some idea of what to expect.

According to the Yandex blog: “We have been thinking of controlling a social application with gestures for quite a while. When we found a team of like-minded enthusiasts, we took the opportunity and did a nearly three-month research project. The results of this effort were quite impressive and now we are looking whether we can implement them in real life application.” The interface was built on a Mac OS X platform and uses Microsoft Kinect for gesture recognition. But Microsoft and Yandex Labs are not the only companies to be investing in smart interaction. Last year, Samsung announced that its next-generation of smart TVs would include voice, gesture and facial recognition features.

Yandex already offers a number of services beyond its search engine including translation apps as as it seeks to boost growth and increase its search share, which in the fourth quarter of 2012 stood at 60.5%. In January, Yandex Labs launched Wonder, a US-only voice-powered social search app that would allow users to see what music friends had listened to or what news they’d been reading. The app was promptly blocked for infringing Facebook’s Platform policy, which states: “You must not include data obtained from us in any search engine or directly without our written permission.” Wonder is still accessible via Twitter, Foursquare and Instragram.