If you haven’t watched Jeff Han’s demo of multi-touch computing yet, then you need to. Watch it now. No excuses! Microsoft have also come to the party with their own multi-touch appliance, called Surface which has taken that extra step of applying the technology to home use and mobile device interaction. Their vision is that maybe one day soon, we’ll all have one of these digital coffee tables in our homes, just like most of us now own a TV.

I’m really excited about this technology! Multi-touch is going to revolutionise the way we use computing devices. Jeff Han illustrates the point when he refers to the user interface “disappearing” to be replaced by intuitive systems that just behave how we would expect. The old WIMP paradigm of GUI computing has plateaued in it’s advancement and we’re not going to make any progress in human-computer interaction while our systems are constrained by this outdated model. I watch these videos and am disgusted that I’m confined to such inefficient input devices. Compared to multi-touch, the keyboard and mouse seem antiquated. Then there’s all the side effects like RSI. I want multi-touch and I want it now!

To be fair, it would be hard to play a first person shooter using this technology. It suffers from the limitation of requiring close proximity to the screen.

Something I do find curious about Han’s demo is is the onscreen keyboard idea. Why use a keyboard at all? Obviously handwriting recognition would have immediate applications to this kind of technology. Imagine “digital blackboards” in schools. These already exist to some extent but use a projector and only have single contact sensitivity. In terms of words per minute though, typing is usually faster.

It’s also worth checking out Jeff Han’s website to delve into some of his other fascinating projects, like Holodust, “a true open-air volumetric display.” And there’s another really awesome video demo at www.perceptivepixel.com.