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Facebook "Likes" Become Hugs With This Interactive Jacket

The Like-A-Hug jacket from MIT Media Lab’s Tangible Media Group hugs you for every like you receive.

like a hug HR 1 2 from Melissa Chow on Vimeo.

You may get lots of “likes” on Facebook with your posts and photos, and while it’s nice to be popular and everything that number can’t give you a warm hug now, can it? Well, it can if you’re wearing the Like-A-Hug jacket from MIT Media Lab’s Tangible Media Group.

Reminiscent of Cute Circuit‘s Hug Shirt that lets wearers hug each other across the expanse of space-time, the Like-A-Hug jacket will give you a hug every time someone likes a post on your wall or a photo you’ve uploaded—reminding you that beyond the avatars and misspellings exists a real human being, a physical person who could hug you themselves if they weren’t too busy on Facebook.

This “wearable social media vest” is yet another example of the online world eeking out into the physical, and while in the fashion stakes it may have a few hills to climb, they say the idea was to explore beyond the limitations of video chat when it comes to long-distance relationships. So somewhere between Skyping and teledildonics, lies this more cuddly area of interaction.

[via Kurzweilai.net]

@stewart23rd