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Wednesday, May 30, 2007
When Steve Jobs introduced to the world the iPod for the first time, the crowd instantly knew a hit was in the hand of this CEO. No one really knew, though, that it would change the world. Today, everywhere you go, you can spot a biker, jogger, walker, and even an illegal use of the white headphones in the ears of a driver (at least illegal in here in California.) White cords dangle over just about everyones cloths today. The iPod changed the world.
Microsoft will do the same with Surface. With its advanced and broad feature set, commercial customers will take the brunt of the high price for the high appeal factor and through these purchases, bring down the price to a more affordable consumer price range fairly quick. Once the consumer market starts tapping into the table, the glass is sure to break open. What person doesn’t want the ease of setting your digital camera on the Surface and have it automatically download the images and instantly show you your images right there on the table? With its easy editing, filing, and even forwarding as an e-mail all with your fingers and gestures, sans a keyboard and mouse, many families and bachelors alike will surely justify the cost of purchase. Heck, Grandma may be even sell her Caddy in the driveway to grab one of these!
While I don’t see the Zune integration taking off too much, anything’s possible by the time these become common in living rooms across America. (Yes, I’m inferring that Zunes may become popular and usable with this. 
) Dragging and dropping songs from your music library to your Zune (maybe an iPod, too?!) is pretty darn sweet!
While the iPhone is sure to be a success, Microsoft has not done bad with its Windows Mobile platform and blending PDA use with Surface is just brilliant. To, again, drag tickets from a movie you looked up on the table and then have driving directions all import into your PDA that is sitting on the Surface is just how technology is suppose to work in the future…now.
Now I know most tables of America hold nothing more than feet and magazines and thus the complication lies with the Surface. But I think habits can be changed and I think Microsoft can change the world with its Surface if it plays its cards right. If Microsoft doesn’t kill it before it even clears the gates (no pun intended) like it did with the Zune, Surface has a great chance at becoming a great icon in technology history.
May 31st, 2007 at 7:48
…Other than the fact that when Apple demoed the iPod they were demoing something you could buy whereas this thing is not shipping. AND the fact that the demo as is requires everything to have a barcode attached so the cameras can see what they are. Yeah – fantastic.
Actually Sven the MS surface thing is typically MS: Large, expensive and clunky to the extreme.
May 31st, 2007 at 9:08
Actually most people thought the original iPod was going to be a flop (except for a few Apple fans).
Also this multi-touch surface technology was demonstrated several years ago and not by Microsoft. And the whole piles of photos thing they demonstrated… the purpose of computers was to enable easy organization and search, why would I want to shuffle through a messy pile of things?
So we’ve come full circle, from a “real” messy desktop, to a “virtual” messy desktop. No thanks.
May 31st, 2007 at 9:19
Surface has one killer aspect, the integration of real and virtual objects that could make this great. But the Zune had one killer feature, the wireless social networking, that M$ managed to just restrict to the point of uselessness.
If the barcode can be expanded to read the credit card numbers on the back of you card, and the wi-fi and/or blue tooth interface is made wide open, this surface technology with the seamless integration of the real and virtual objects has the potential to significantly change the way we interface with our personal computers on a daily basis.
I worry that M$ will not do this right, whereas if this was an Apple tool set, I would be excited beyond belief. The real object aspect of this can be just amazing if done right.
May 31st, 2007 at 10:04
I don’t agree with your statements regarding the surface computer.
As others have said it’s bulky and expensive. Plus, you wouldn’t use it for the most common efforts on a computer, email, word processing, spreadsheets, programming.
Finally, Jeff Han has been showing this technology for over a year. Microsoft is once again a follower and not an innovator.
May 31st, 2007 at 11:18
This multi-touch table PC technology has been show several other places, so is not the new gee-whiz tech that Gates is presenting it as. It has some nice features, but is hardly paradigm changing. Also, do you know how often you’re going to have to clean that screen? Even clean human hands will leave an oily residue behind, not to mention whatever kids hands have gotten into.
Finally, Apple has also demonstrated multi-touch technology in its iPhone, iPhone is running Mac OS X. so it’s not a great leap to see that MT tech applied to desktop and laptop systems in the same time frame or earlier than Gates predicted.
May 31st, 2007 at 11:36
Actually, this faked product release is just another desperate attempt by Microsoft to appear innovative. It may look new to the uneducated public, but the computer industry has been following the multi-touch story for a while now. Microsoft showed nothing that Jeff Han hasn’t already been showing us for a year, and Apple is way ahead with a multi-touch product release, the iPhone, and resolution-independence, coming in Leopard, which is critical to multi-touch functionality. This obvious fake job was timed to make Bill Gates look cool sitting next to Steve Jobs yesterday – a hopeless impossibility.
May 31st, 2007 at 14:07
Nunuvyer, your statement on every Apple product is just like that of what you accuse Microsoft of: products that aren’t shipping. Remember Steve Jobs said at last years WWDC that we’d see Leopard within the year. Yet next week he’ll be doing a rerun of the very dog and pony show of last year…of a product that still has months before it hits the shelves. Microsoft Surface will surely be available before Leopard!
The iPhone is certain to release in “June” but don’t be surprised if the date is closer to Independence Day than WWDC day.
As to everyones Jeff Han comparison, yes, SvenOnTech featured an article on him months ago and yes, multi-touch isn’t cutting edge news; however, note that Jobs cronies where one of the first to ask Han on the iPhone project (but not specified as such when he was asked) after his TED presentation and he declined Apple’s offer. So let’s not be so quick to call Apple “cool” when it too did what Gates has done as well. There’s a long list of Apple success that’s not Apple’s to begin with.
May 31st, 2007 at 14:11
John, take a look at your cameras bottom. Look at your credit cards. Note anything? My Nikon D70 and my Visa and AMEX all have bar codes on them. Think they knew about this Surface thing years before we did or maybe Microsoft just saw a pattern in the industry and seized on it?
May 31st, 2007 at 18:43
Careful Sven with quotes like
“Nunuvyer, your statement on every Apple product is just like that of what you accuse Microsoft of: products that aren’t shipping. Remember Steve Jobs said at last years WWDC that we’d see Leopard within the year. Yet next week he’ll be doing a rerun of the very dog and pony show of last year…of a product that still has months before it hits the shelves. Microsoft Surface will surely be available before Leopard!
The iPhone is certain to release in “June” but don’t be surprised if the date is closer to Independence Day than WWDC day.”
This is beginning to resemble the time when you said “Macworld will be a wash out because of CES” and that ended up being QUITE a wash out as the iPhone seemed to drown out most of the other news happening at CES and many journalist were left saying “why aren’t we at MacWorld?”
Anyroad – clunky is what I said and clunky is what I meant – does it really require 5 cameras to do this kind of stuff? Will that REALLY be practical? It’s all smoke and mirrors mate.
The whole point of this was to try and get SOME kind of buzz about Microsoft at D: and generally – looking at the press coverage – the press wasn’t fooled.
May 31st, 2007 at 19:26
Also
Having followed your advice NONE of my credit cards have barcodes – neither has my Nikon digital Camera – what colour is the sky where you live?
May 31st, 2007 at 21:05
Crap! Microsoft must think I’m going to buy this table then, John, if I’m the only with these bar codes!
Seriously, though, I have ‘em. My AMEX card is a Costco card and my Visa is from a lesser known bank, so maybe that’s why.
Currently my sky color is black with a faint dark blue.
June 1st, 2007 at 7:41
Oh may aching back. Staring down on a table for using a computer is just a bad idea. Briefly using one in a business situation may be acceptable. But sitting on a couch or chair and mucking with a screen pointing straight up at you is a bad idea.