Awhile back Microsoft announced a new multi-touch technology called Surface. Surface is a table-top computer without mouse or keyboard. The concept is that the computer becomes integrated into one’s reality.

Microsoft states that Surface will break barriers between people and technology. Users have direct interaction and can literally “grab” digital information with their hands. Surface provides a multi-user experience and also has object recognition capabilities – making transfer of digital content very easy.

It uses an acrylic tabletop for the screen, an LED light source is aimed at the screen and movement is read by infrared cameras and a rear-projection DLP light engine. The underlying operating system is a modified version of Microsoft Vista.

Surface won’t hit the commercial market until spring of 2008 although they will begin putting the machines in hotels bars and restaurants.

Have a look at some of the videos on the Surface website.

Links:

Microsoft Surface

Popular Mechanics article – (with more information on technology specifics)

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Pinger is a new mobile service that just became public this week. Basically, it’s an alternative to SMS that has some similarities to Twitter. You call a local number and record a spoken message. Then you can speak names of people you want to send the message to – up to 2000 people. They will then receive an SMS that you have left them a voice recording and can call a local number to receive it. The best thing about Pinger is that you can send messages internationally while only paying local fees (right now they only have about 20 countries – not including China, but plan on expanding).

In a podcast interview with Mashable, Pinger founder Greg Wook talked about some potential uses of Pinger that came out of the beta testing. He said that it could be used as a sort of public broadcasting system and can also be used to do large scale marketing. A company can send out a message to tens of thousands of people and Pinger not only will send the message, but will be able to find out how many people have listened to the message and who they are.

He also said they are now looking into developing various widgets to use with Pinger. I’m looking forward to seeing what comes out of it.

I’m not sure if this is something that could become popular in China, considering that SMS is so much cheaper than making a local call. But surely it will be helpful for international business and possibly fun for creative web.

Take a look at their site for some simple videos on how it works.

[via: Mashable]

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