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A Paris-based design agency has designed a piece of wearable bracelet technology that they say will allow the user to view and interact with their smartphone screen projected onto their wrists.

The ‘Cicret’ bracelet is wirelessly connected to the user’s smartphone and can project the phone’s screen onto the wearer’s arm. A video explaining how the device works has already garnered over 3,800,000 views on YouTube – a fact that Cicret’s founder Guillaume Pommier is himself amazed by.

“For two months it was on 200 views, and then on 21st November it just went huge. A guy in Dubai put the video on his Facebook and in three days he’d had 90,000 views. I think he’s on 13 million now. I have tried to get in touch with him to send him a Christmas gift but haven’t had any luck so far.”

The Cicret website describes how the bracelet will “make your skin your new tablet”, but goes on to explain that the company are in need of donations to finish making a model. “We need €700,000 euros to finish the first prototype of the Cicret bracelet… If everyone gives us €1, we will make it and release our products.”

The bracelet works by projecting the interface onto the user’s arm using a tiny ‘pico projector’. When the wearer places their finger on the display projected on their skin, it interrupts the sensors encased in the bracelet, and this information is then relayed to the processor which responds – thus allowing the user to scroll, answer calls and generally use the screen projected on their wrists as they would their actual phone.

If their crowdsourcing is successful, the waterproof Cicret bracelet could allow a user to access their phones services underwater, answer calls and texts without actually using their handset and access films, games and music with ease whilst on the go. The promotional video even shows a user playing a game of Fruit Ninja by stroking his arm.

The bracelet will come with two different storage sizes – either 16GB or 32GB – and will be available in 10 different colours.

The same company have also developed a Cicret app, whose focus is on anonymity and privacy. The company says that it is a “secure and free solution for those who want to chat, share and exchange safely with no chance of being traceable”, and that it uses “encrypted technology providing anonymity and full control on all contents you have shared, even after sending them”.

Pommier explains that the idea behind the bracelet started with the application: “It all began with the app. We liked the idea of using your own operating system so everything would be secure. Then we started thinking about moving away from the cloud where all your information is stored and onto a server.

“We wanted a hard drive you could have close to your and keep control of, and then the idea of the hard drive as a bracelet came up. We started thinking how you could do the screen a different way and that’s where it started!”

Pommier says that the bracelet will be priced between €300-€400 and that he hopes it will be ready for the industry and to mass market by June 2015.

Wearable technology has become increasingly popular over the last few years. As well as smart sport bracelets which can track your movement, calculate calories burnt, and even update your social media with the statistics of your exercise, tech companies have raced to create the most up-to-date smartwatches, which can do everything from answering calls to acting as GPS devices.

Source:NewsWeek