Charlie's Diary

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Mon, 23 Feb 2004 Thinking outside the [beige] box Wave Report takes a look at a really cool NEC research project aimed squarely at replacing those boring rectangular computers we interact with with something ... different. P-ISM is a "concept computer" -- an exercise in blue-sky design aimed at reconceptualizing what the hell a computer ought to be like. Wave Report's folks say: "the design concept uses five different pens to make a computer. One pen is a CPU, another a camera, one creates a virtual keyboard, another projects the visual output and thus the display and another a communicator (a phone). All five pens can rest in a holding block which recharges the batteries and holds the mass storage. Each pen communicates wireless, possibly Bluetooth." I got yer computer, right here in this pocket protector. But seriously, this is cool; I don't hold much hope for the projector screen (it adds a hidden requirement -- for a flat white surface), but flexible OLED roll-up displays are on the way, and they'd do the same job. I'm not sure about the virtual keyboards (ever tried touch-typing on the top of a table?) but a minor design compromise would be to use something like Think Outside's forthcoming folding bluetooth keyboard for PDAs (itself not much bigger than the base station for the P-ISM) when a keyboard is required, and a bluetooth-equipped stylus with some kind of position sensor for mouse/handwriting input the rest of the time. Storage is getting cheaper and consuming less energy, to the point where the next generation of PDAs (due by 2005) will sport gigabytes of solid-state storage, so it's a done deal. Power is still a headache but maybe fuel cells will replace batteries some time soon -- who knows? The key thing is to get away from beige boxes. The beige-box appliance model is inherently limiting, as a quick glance at the history of home stereo systems will demonstrate. Back in the 70's we all had chunky racks of boxes, sized for a 19" rack because that was just big enough to accomodate a turntable and tone-arm sized for 33 rpm vinyl disks. And everything fitted around this form factor, because the box was a standard size. Even cassette decks were sized to fit the turntable and the 12"-diameter LP record, until the Walkman came along and upset several apple carts by demonstrating that you could have high quality stereo cassette players that were sized in proportion to their own medium. More recently, we've seen music centres shrink until they're sized in proportion to the compact disc format -- about 12 centimetres wide. It's taken the iPod to break us free from that particular blind spot, and it's still very much a handicap of all modular sound systems that they are built to accomodate the largest standard physical medium currently in use. It's the same with computers. We size them to fit their big, rigid, glass-fronted screens; thus we have PDAs (a screen with a slab of electronics glued to their ass), tablet PC's and notebooks (a bigger screen with a slab of electronics hooked up to them via a hinged joint), and desktops (the IBM "three box" layout, dating to about 1982). But once we cut loose from physical screens, or switch to flexible displays or projector displays or eyes-up displays, we can throw the traditional form factors out of the window and have fun. I don't think the Borg-style wearable is going to catch on as a day-to-day system for most people (although discreet spectacle-mounted displays and tiny cameras for life journaling are a bit more plausible) because they're simply too intrusive. As Peter Cochrane noted, about the quickest legal way to empty a first-class railway compartment is to open your briefcase and start attaching your mobile office to your head. People respond to wearable computers with reflexes honed by years of exposure to "Terminator", "Universal Soldier", and Star Trek. Which is to say, only the bad guys wear their hardware on the outside. However, I think something that resembles a pen case with five pens and a fold-out keyboard is much easier to accomodate on your person and fit into your life, and it kicks the shit out of a traditional laptop design. Remember the old monochrome plasma-screen luggables of the late 1980's? Or how your archaic stereo separates system with the turntable on top looks today? Thats how cumbersome today's iBook is going to look in five to ten years' time. This is a viable model for how the future will look, and I'd be surprised if something conceptually similar to the P-ISM isn't near-as-dammit permanently attached to my anatomy by 2014. [Link Via slashdot] [Discuss toys] posted at: 19:59 | path: /toys | permanent link to this entry

specials: Is SF About to Go Blind? -- Popular Science article by Greg Mone Unwirer -- an experiment in weblog mediated collaborative fiction Inside the MIT Media Lab -- what it's like to spend a a day wandering around the Media Lab "Nothing like this will be built again" -- inside a nuclear reactor complex Quick links: RSS Feed (Moved!) Who am I? Contact me Buy my books: (FAQ) Missile Gap Via Subterranean Press (US HC -- due Jan, 2007) The Jennifer Morgue Via Golden Gryphon (US HC -- due Nov, 2006) Glasshouse Via Amazon.com (US HC -- due June 30, 2006) The Clan Corporate Via Amazon.com (US HC -- out now) Accelerando Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB -- due June 27, 2006) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK HC) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK PB) Free download The Hidden Family Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB) The Family Trade Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB) Iron Sunrise Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK HC) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK PB) The Atrocity Archives Via Amazon.com (Trade PB) Via Amazon.co.uk (Trade PB) Via Golden Gryphon (HC) Via Amazon.com (HC) Via Amazon.co.uk (HC) Singularity Sky Via Amazon.com (US HC) Via Amazon.com (US PB) Via Amazon.com (US ebook) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK HC) Via Amazon.co.uk (UK PB) Toast Via Amazon.com Via Amazon.co.uk Some webby stuff I'm reading: [ Engadget ] [ Gizmodo ] [ The Memory Hole ] [ Boing!Boing! ] [ Futurismic ] [ Walter Jon Williams ] [ Making Light (TNH) ] [ Crooked Timber ] [ Junius (Chris Bertram) ] [ Baghdad Burning (Riverbend) ] [ Bruce Sterling ] [ Ian McDonald ] [ Amygdala (Gary Farber) ] [ Cyborg Democracy ] [ Body and Soul (Jeanne d'Arc)  ] [ Atrios ] [ The Sideshow (Avedon Carol) ] [ This Modern World (Tom Tomorrow) ] [ Jesus's General ] [ Mick Farren ] [ Early days of a Better Nation (Ken MacLeod) ] [ Respectful of Otters (Rivka) ] [ Tangent Online ] [ Grouse Today ] [ Hacktivismo ] [ Terra Nova ] [ Whatever (John Scalzi) ] [ GNXP ] [ Justine Larbalestier ] [ Yankee Fog ] [ The Law west of Ealing Broadway ] [ Cough the Lot ] [ The Yorkshire Ranter ] [ Newshog ] [ Kung Fu Monkey ] [ S1ngularity ] [ Pagan Prattle ] [ Gwyneth Jones ] [ Calpundit ] [ Lenin's Tomb ] [ Progressive Gold ] [ Kathryn Cramer ] [ Halfway down the Danube ] [ Fistful of Euros ] [ Orcinus ] [ Shrillblog ] [ Steve Gilliard ] [ Frankenstein Journal (Chris Lawson) ] [ The Panda's Thumb ] [ Martin Wisse ] [ Kuro5hin ] [ Advogato ] [ Talking Points Memo ] [ The Register ] [ Cryptome ] [ Juan Cole: Informed comment ] [ Global Guerillas (John Robb) ] [ Shadow of the Hegemon (Demosthenes) ] [ Simon Bisson's Journal ] [ Max Sawicky's weblog ] [ Guy Kewney's mobile campaign ] [ Hitherby Dragons ] [ Counterspin Central ] [ MetaFilter ] [ NTKnow ] [ Encyclopaedia Astronautica ] [ Fafblog ] [ BBC News (Scotland) ] [ Pravda ] [ Meerkat open wire service ] [ Warren Ellis ] [ Brad DeLong ] [ Hullabaloo (Digby) ] [ Jeff Vail ] [ The Whiskey Bar (Billmon) ] [ Groupthink Central (Yuval Rubinstein) ] [ Unmedia (Aziz Poonawalla) ] [ Rebecca's Pocket (Rebecca Blood) ] Older stuff: June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003 May 2003 April 2003 March 2003 February 2003 January 2003 December 2002 November 2002 October 2002 September 2002 August 2002 July 2002 June 2002 May 2002 April 2002 March 2002 (I screwed the pooch in respect of the blosxom entry datestamps on March 28th, 2002, so everything before then shows up as being from the same time)

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