This is a short review of a headband that can detect EEG signals (brainwaves); the product was funded on a crowdfunding website.
The packaging is very professional. The carrying case is light but sturdy, and it has plenty of room for the product and cables and instruction booklet. The booklet is also very professional, well written, and simple to follow.
At the time of this writing, the headband has one application that assesses whether you are relaxed or not. I downloaded the Android® version, and it works wonderfully well. The application takes you through the first usage of the product in clear, simple steps. A small but readable color-coded graphic in the corner of the screen lets you know if all the sensors are receiving good data. I did a quick test: I started doing mental arithmetic instead of relaxing, and the feedback from the application told me that I was not in a relaxed state. The application has a clean, polished design, and it Just Works. The application scores 10 on a scale of 1-10.
Notice that I haven’t mentioned the name of the product, or the company, nor put a picture of the product on this page? There’s a reason for that. I don’t have any desire to be sued. “I Am Not A Lawyer,” but a strict reading of their licensing agreement shows that they are (correctly) highly protective of their trademarks, and I don’t want to even come close to infringement.
My original purpose in buying the headband was to write a program that would display the brainwaves; I could use that program when teaching my Psychology class. However:
The customer support for the crowdfunding backers is virtually nonexistent. The product should have shipped in December 2013, but I received mine in mid-June of 2014. I understand that these crowd-funded projects are rarely on time, but the level of communication from the project during that time has been terrible; it scores a 1 on a scale of 1-10.
The project updates came infrequently, and were fairly tone-deaf. For example, one person is waiting for the product so he or she can finish a PhD thesis, and was quite displeased with an update that talked in glowing terms about how much tech reviewers were enjoying playing with their headbands. The company had to explain that the ones that the reviewers had were beta versions of the product rather than the shipping version. Yes, I understand that marketing is important—but there are people who want the product they already paid for. (By the way, if you are the PhD candidate who needs the headband and you don’t have it yet, email me and I will send you mine until you receive yours—whenever that might be.)
As of this writing (2 July 2014), there appear to still be people who contributed at the “earliest contributor” level who still have not received their headbands, or even any notice of when it might ship, and there is no public response whatever from the company.
It’s extremely disappointing that a company that understands brain waves so well has no idea of how to work effectively with the people who helped make the product possible in the first place.
If you want a stylish, well-designed device and are content to use the applications that the company provides for use with it, you will probably like the product. If you want to use it for your own purposes and develop your own software, well, maybe not so much. I certainly hope that the company becomes more attentive to the needs of its backers.
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