Microsoft Surface takes a step forward
First, there were Jeff Han’s demos. Then the iPhone. Then the rumors. Now, Microsoft’s contribution to the party has surfaced, and it’s called: Surface. Welcome to the social.
The demo videos on both Microsoft’s site and Popular Mechanic’s Microsoft Surface video and article leave one a little ho-hum at first — it’s strange how pushing pictures around with two fingers already looks normal. The interactions shown are surprisingly minimalistic for the most part, which is a bit odd for Redmond. Yet the technology goes beyond multi-touch. Cameras and phones can be used in a whole new way. In the demos, pictures are copied off a camera without any wires, wizards, or self-congratulatory popups about “New Device Found, click me to resume your work”! Just physically plop your device onto the screen, and start dragging things in and out of the device itself.
That is an intuitive simplicity that Apple cannot afford to ignore. Of course, Microsoft’s device is starting life as a posh vending machine, and by the time Windows Vista Superb Plus Zurface Edition comes out the user interactions might start taking on their familiar Microsoft-style tackiness. Yet how long until users are ready to ditch the WIMP style interfaces of the past decades for a new upstart’s design? Where could a company take ripening technologies like multitouch screens, wireless peripherals, hypermedia influenced semantics and a touch of Raskin-esque zooming if they weren’t chained down by last year’s model?
Update: Walt Mossberg asks Steve and Bill similar questions throughout his interview, especially addressed in Part 5 of 7.