Less than a week after release, Kinect was opened up and hacked already so that it could be used when hooked upto PCs and Macs. Ever since, we’ve seen all kind of amazing uses for it, such as self-driving mini-cars, flying machines, and Minorty Report like hand detection for on screen displays; best of all this was all done within two months. During the first couple months Microsoft was angry about Kinect hackers, but later decided they embrace it and promised official PC support would be coming, and today it was revealed that infact they will be making Kinect development much easier by releasing the full software development hit to the public.
Currently, the Kinect modders have to go through a lot of trouble to make it work with PC and other devices since launch, the SDK will “meet the needs of higher-level people who don’t care how the camera works.”
Windows 7 users will be able to get their hands on it sometime this spring for non-commercial use. It’ll be really exciting to see what people can come up with now that Microsoft is providing the SDK. Even better, support will be coming at a later date for those who want to sell what they develop for Kinect, which opens the door for some really high-quality apps and software.
