Grounded In Reality

The Web is largely hands-off. You click, view, and scroll through information – but you don’t actually feel the content. It’s distant, which is why people often comment about the benefits of print media and say things like “nothing beats holding an actual photo or flipping through a glossy magazine.”

Multi-touch technology like Perceptive Pixel and Microsoft Surface provide a glimpse into how digital media is becoming more tactile. Minority Report provided inspiration. Apple’s iPhone made it a mainstream reality. Now imagine multi-touch applied to the Web and real-world environments. Instead of clicking, you interact by flipping through pages, grabbing pictures, and diving into maps. While multi-touch isn’t exactly new, check out these demos to get a sense of the possibilities.

Does touching and maneuvering digital content make it more real, or is the screen still a barrier? Can people adapt to a 100% screen-based media environment? Before answering no, consider how mp3s have changed the way people purchase, consume, and share music. Also take a look at the latest e-book readers, like Amazon’s Kindle. As user interfaces improve, our perceptions about the differences between “tangible media” vs. digital media will change.