You know, the QWERTY keyboard was designed to slow typers down, and I wonder if future generations will get *bored* of typing things into a computer. Check out this demonstration of Sony’s DATATiles. That’s “data tiles” for the non-l33t. I really like the part when he sets his phone on a tile to presumably buy and download the song.
This isn’t the only far out interface that I’ve seen lately. The result of Multi-Touch Interaction Research is extremely compelling. Be sure to watch the photo organizing (and enlarging) part of the demo.
There’s also the Mixed Reality Interface developed by kommeraz. I hope your German is good for that last link. This one looks like maybe just a little fun at first, but there are probably some big implications for practicing things on a system like this. Surgery, perhaps? Proper shelving of library items? ;)
Panasonic has an “Intelligent’ Table that controls the functions of a house, manages personal data, and represents files in the form of neat little fish.
Another Sony item is BlockJam. It is more of a musical interface than a musical instrument (tho the case could be made for either). It is being billed as a collaborative tool:
We also believe that the divisions of composer, performer, and audience will be blurred, by the introduction of such media.
This idea really takes the notion of participatory consumers – something that we need to continue to explore on our websites – seriously. True to interactive form, you can play with an online version of BlockJam. Go make a nice tune and think about how it might be similar to doing Readers’ Advisory.
