Microsoft Surface: Will It Be Tabled?
Or shelved? Okay, probably not--witness Tablet PCs, and Microsoft certainly soldiered on after the money-losing (original) Xbox--but nothing beats a little devil's advocacy in the wake of cork-popping "that looks so cool!" reactions to technology that no one's paired with much practically speaking beyond a few casino deals and mobile phone kiosks.
What the heck's Surface? If you haven't already, take a look at Melissa Perenson's overview of the technology with pictures.
Now whiz-bangery aside, think about Surface functionally for a second, noting the calculated PR comparisons to Minority Report, a popular science fiction movie everyone's seen. Who doesn't identify with those iconic sequences in which Tom Cruise gesticulates before a transparent collage of images like a conductor in front of a ghostly orchestra? Cruise's arms glide and swivel and luminous pictures snap to attention, zooming and shuffling obediently in an elaborate tango that seems as visually intuitive as rifling through a pile of papers on your desk. (File cabinets? We don't need no steenk-ing file cabinets!) But aside from what I'm sure is generating a lot of "imagine if" conversations over cubicle walls today, what about the "problem" Surface is supposed to be solving, anyway?
A while back, for a story on game interface trends, I spoke with Logitech's director of strategic magketing Fred Swan, a 17-year interface design vet. Here's what he had to say when I raised this question with him. (My emphasis in bold.)
Me: Sony's obviously onto something with its Eye Toy, and you have a few niche companies playing with "projection" keyboards and motion-tracking tools. Are gestural interfaces ala Minority Report the next step?
Fred: With the projection keyboards, what in theory they?re doing is replicating a device that you already have, but doing it in a new way that allows it to be used in a different environment with somewhat more flexibility, and I can see apps for that. Portable apps. Palm pilot projection. Weighs less, takes up less space, than lugging even a folding portable keyboard. You could put LEDs on a keypad where the LED keys can change the key labels dynamically. There?s a company called Ergodex with a product that?s sort of a flat piece of plastic onto which you can put a bag full of keys and put the keys wherever you want them and the device just knows which key you?re pressing, etc. These things have apps, because it?s not completely changing what people do, it?s just allowing people or applications to be more efficient or more flexible within the same sort of realm of behavior.
When you get into other stuff, though, whether it?s the common use of gestural interfaces, or the full-on skin suits, it?s a diff story. What I would say is that in general, I think that that type of interface [in Minority Report] is both charming and very dramatic. It?s dramatic because there?s motion, because it?s new, because whether or not Tom Cruise has the most expressive of faces he knows how to make broad, crisp motions with his body that are compelling to the audience when the right environment is created and it?s interesting in that way.
Me: Would you actually want to have a gestural relationship to data that?s literally about moving and swiveling your hands?
Fred: I would take it even more basic. First of all, what Cruise was doing is essentially possible. Richard Marx at Sony who?s the godfather of Eye Toy and a great R&D guy, he has demos where you can essentially do what Tom Cruise is doing. From a technical standpoint it?s very possible, but my question gets back again to, why would you want to do it, and would people actually do it? Is that the fastest way to manipulate data? The most functional way? Is it familiar to people? And finally, is it comfortable? Are you going to be more comfortable working all day standing in front of a big screen and a camera, or sitting behind your desk with a cup of coffee and a mouse and keyboard and screen? The second thing: is it really more efficient? Is his way of manipulating the data any faster than using a mouse and keyboard? I don?t think so. The benefit of that type of thing would again be in an environment where you don?t have a mouse/keyboard, say a living room, or let?s say you?re a teacher and standing in front of the class with a whiteboard and you want to manipulate data, but that?s obviously a vertical app. In the living room, you could certainly use gesture to replace remote controls, but then you have to remember what are all the gestures that do what. You have to have either an environnment that provides more light than one might want while watching a DVD or have a camera that?s very good in low-light situations. You have to have something that?s going to track you without an object, because if you pick up an object, you might as well pick up the remote control, and then you have to remember what all the gestures are. And there are some people that still have a hard time on DVD players remembering the little triangle button means play and the rectangle button means stop. At least with a remote you have labels. If you have a gestural system that isn?t sort of polluting the screen by putting up prompts or a help system, you have to remember all that.
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