It wasn't long ago, when we had a dedicated terminal sitting in a corner of our room, which we accessed to get data and play games. We have come a long way from that and there are touch screen interface on almost every device these days that give us instant access to a connected world.
I was in a cab recently and on the back seat they had a small screen that was showing some commercials, maps and news that the user can select to watch. I tried swiping at the screen and was wondering why isn't the screen reacting and then realized that the unit had physical controls to navigate the menu options.
Around the same time, I read the Future of Screens article from The Astonishing Tribe (TAT), who are known for their User Interface designs and got recently acquired by RIM. TAT was also been involved in the Platform User Interface design for Android OS from Google. When I saw the below video from the TAT article, it seemed plausible but more into the future.
It has not been 6 months since then, but the technology has already developed a lot in the mean time. We already have transparent displays (video link), have flexible displays (video link)with good resolution from Samsung and other major vendors.
Today I read this article from Engadget, that showcases a mirror available commercially in Japan, that shows the temperature of the person when standing a feet away. Agreed that this mirror only measures the skin temperature and not the core temperature that is required for proper medical purposes, but the technology is still amazing. It uses Infrared sensors to get the temperature reading, but when not in use displays the date, time, humidity and ambient temperature on the mirror itself.
Having seen this, I don't thing the vision from TAT is too far in the future. It is only a matter of years or even months when we have data enriched mirrors and walls that would recognize the passer by to give the information that is required.
One of my favorite movies in the Sci-Fi genre was Minority Report, for the vision of user interface that was demonstrated in the movie. We have already seen many cases where the famous gesture based controls (Kinect) are getting more viable and commercial. The above mentioned devices make the targeted commercials and electronic displays shown in the movie a few years away.
The technological developments and the choices available today, provide a lot of options for the designers. Its a promising time ahead and eagerly looking forward to what lies in store for tomorrow.
Author: Vinod
Source: Engadget, TAT
Mark and I were talking the other day about how our lives now consist of a series of gadgets we carry around with us that tether us to the outside world. Our iPhones, laptop, landlines (for work). desktops. And we actually mentioned "Minority Report" (also a favorite in our house) where in a few years, the chips implanted in our heads will make all of this "carry around" technology obsolete. It's coming, and we in the development industry are primed to help make it happen. But, the question is, how far can it go? How far do we WANT it to go? Hmmmmm.
ReplyDelete@Deb: With all the privacy concerns, I am sure there will be a push to prevent any public devices that can identify individuals like in the movie. At the same time, we can have profiling done by the devices and then display commercial based on Male / Female, Group / Single etc...
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