Thorp and Shannon's wearable computer
Computadora corporal de Thorp y Shannon
- Date
- 1961 · confidence high
- Place
- Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States
- Credited to
- Edward O. Thorp and Claude Shannon
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
Thorp and Shannon built a miniature analogue computer, with a timer hidden in a shoe that measured a roulette wheel's speed and radioed tones to an earpiece, to predict which octant the ball would land in. They successfully tested it in Las Vegas casinos in June 1961, though wiring problems prevented commercial use.
The device was kept secret until 1966; some historians dispute whether it deserves the name 'computer', since it was not reprogrammable but task-specific hardware.
What it led to
- A claimed precedent as the first wearable computer
- Belated disclosure of the method in Thorp's book 'Beat the Dealer' (1966)