Touchscreens Make a Grab Beyond Smartphones
Information Week
Feb 28, 2009
“During the 2009 Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona this month, Samsung introduced a slogan for its mobile phones -- "Touch Power!" -- a pretty clear indicator from one of the world's largest makers of mobile phones that the future is all about touch.”
Silicon Valley looks towards 2009
BBC.co.uk
Dec 31, 2008
“Other technologies that seem to be getting people excited are robotics and haptics, the science of touch.
"One word that should be in everybody's vocabulary is haptics," said technology forecaster and futurist Paul Saffo.
"At the moment we look at our machines and they look at us but they don't have the sense of physical touch or feedback. So haptics is the way to give sensory touch between machines and humans.
He said their use, while common in things like surgery, is creeping into everyday technologies such as the Nintendo Wii console and the iPhone. He also described the increasing use of haptics as part of a "sensor revolution".”
The Next Big Sensation?
Washington Post
Dec 12, 2008
“This has been the year computers began to deliver feelings to us in a mainstream way. Following their uncanny ability first to interact with our eyes via screens and then our ears through speakers, now tens of millions of them are acquiring touch feedback.
Indeed, the touch-surface juggernaut marches relentlessly toward the day when push buttons that physically move in and out are gone forever. Already being conquered are televisions, washers, ovens, printers and workout machines, says Steve Koenig, director of industry analysis at the Consumer Electronics Association. Touch screens are now invading dashboards, desktop phones, remote controls, music players, navigators and cameras.”
Primal, Acute and Easily Duped: Our Sense of Touch
New York Times
Dec 8, 2008
“Long neglected in favor of the sensory heavyweights of vision and hearing, the study of touch lately has been gaining new cachet among neuroscientists, who sometimes refer to it by the amiably jargony term of haptics, Greek for touch. They’re exploring the implications of recently reported tactile illusions, of people being made to feel as though they had three arms, for example, or were levitating out of their bodies, with the hope of gaining insight into how the mind works.”
Big data: The next Google
Nature.com
Sep 3, 2008
“Ten years ago, if you mentioned the word 'haptics' most people would think you were talking about some form of liver disease. Interfaces that provide tactile feedback have been in an innovator-driven 'push' mode; they have been technologically challenging, expensive and restricted to niches. Now there is a public pull, thanks to the spread of touch-screen devices.”
Touching the Future
The Economist
Sep 4, 2008
“Microsoft has already demonstrated a prototype of Windows 7, the next version of its flagship operating system, based around “multi-touch” capabilities, which allow a touch screen to sense more than one finger at once. …. So the touch screen could be on the verge of becoming a standard part of computer interfaces, just as the mouse did in the 1980s.”
Touchscreens heat up enthusiasm for gadgets
Reuters.com
Oct 29, 2008
“Touchscreen technology has been sweeping consumer electronics, leaving few devices untouched, and even digital cameras are affected. … Global touch-screen module revenue is forecast to grow to $6.4 billion by 2013, rising at a compound annual growth rate of 13.7 percent from 2008, according to market researcher iSuppli.”
Get ready for a revolution in the way you interact with your computer
Guardian.co.uk
Dec 5, 2008
“The way we control and interact with computers is set to change rapidly in the next five years, according to a leading computer scientist who will give this year's Royal Institution Christmas Lectures.
Prof Chris Bishop, who is chief research scientist at Microsoft Research in Cambridge and professor of computer science at the University of Edinburgh, will tell his audience that just like Tom Cruise's character in the film Minority Report, more of us will be manipulating and combining digital information by gesturing in thin air and flinging our hands over touchscreen devices.”
Are you ready for the immersive Internet?
ITWorldCanada.com
Nov 18, 2008
“In ThinkBalm’s report, The Immersive Internet: Make Tactical Moves Today for Strategic Advantage Tomorrow, the research company defines the immersive Internet as “a collection of emerging technologies combined with a social culture that has its roots in gaming and virtual worlds.”
“What’s not immersive is FaceBook or LinkedIn,” Driver says – those are simply social networking sites. Three-dimensional video, directional stereo sound and haptic devices for touch feedback aren’t necessary, though “they contribute an amount to the immersive experience,” Driver says. At a minimum, it’s an immersive experience when people can meet in an environment and interact, usually through avatars. “If you feel your presences has been projected into the environment,” it’s an immersive experience.”
5 Technology Trends to Watch – 2009 - (PDF)
CEA Report
Jan 2009
Items in the report:
- Touch feedback makes personal electronics “personal” – it’s about improving the user experience
- Haptics improves performance and user satisfaction
- Touch input and tactile feedback are becoming mainstream solutions for the human-machine interface
The Future of the Internet III
PEW Internet & American Life Project
Dec 14, 2008
“Tactile interaction requires feedback,” noted Richard Osborne, a Web manager at the University of Exeter. “That’s why our hands are designed the way they are.”
A survey of experts shows they expect major tech advances as the phone becomes a primary device for online access, voice-recognition improves, and the structure of the Internet itself improves.
Technology stakeholders and critics were asked in an online survey to assess scenarios about the future social, political, and economic impact of the Internet. They said that voice recognition and touch user-interfaces will be more prevalent and accepted by 2020.
Touch Screens: Pace of Change Accelerates in a High-Touch World
iSuppli Corporation
May 2008
“Generally, the industry believes that tactile feedback can improve the certainty of “touch” and reduces errors.”
In this report, iSuppli:
- Finds that touch screen unit shipments more than doubled from 81 million units in 2006 to 218 million units in 2007.
- Forecasts that there will be 341 million units of touch-screen modules shipped and $3.4 billion in value in 2008
- Forecasts that the market will grow to 833 million units by 2013, for a CAGR of 25%. The market value is projected to grow to $6.4 billion by 2013, for a CAGR of 17% from 2007 to 2013.
- Identifies several important drivers for touch screen adoption
- Easy and intuitive interface
- Improvements in software and hardware
- Improved productivity and reduced labor costs
- Innovative applications
- Falling prices
