The worst of it is even the Pictures Under Glass have got worse. They used to be designed to look like things, so you’d see something that looked pushable and push (tap) it.<p>So even if there was no tactile engagement there was visual engagement communicating tactile interaction.<p>Now even that’s gone. Our Pictures Under Glass are bland and flat and look like translucent acrylic and, well, glass.
I like this perspective and I share it. It frustrates me to watch the initial Demo of Apple's concept of a touch oriented computer, seeing multi touch demonstrated, moving objects around, and to sit here typing this on something like it, except it's one finger at a time and multitouch was dumbed down into pinch to zoom and little else. I can't stand the fact that almost all computer interfaces outside smartphones are interacted with using only the right wrist and index finger. The future is what we have now but transparent, what we have now with no bezels, what we have now but made of disposable paper, what we have now but the size of a table. It's just not compelling to me.<p>And it's because it's hard imagining a completely new way of interacting with computing technology. People that are able to do that don't get paid script writers salaries, they get paid Steve Jobs salaries. And they are worth billions to organizations capable of making them a reality.
Related:<p><i>A brief rant on the future of interaction design (2011)</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31511361">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31511361</a> - May 2022 (132 comments)<p><i>A brief rant on the future of interaction design (2011)</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21116948">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21116948</a> - Sept 2019 (153 comments)<p><i>A Brief Rant on the Future of Interaction Design (2011)</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6325996">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6325996</a> - Sept 2013 (35 comments)<p><i>A Brief Rant on the Future of Interaction Design</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212949">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212949</a> - Nov 2011 (150 comments)
When I am forced to use a phone or tablet of a brand and size I'm not used to, everything seems wonky and out of place. Yet I can adapt to a different brand and size of car in a few minutes. Replacing tactile memory with skeuomorphism, is like a prosthetic arm that can extend 10m to replace your sickly feely biological one. I'm always up for advocating for more arts & crafts as part of interaction design.
I had the privilege to work with one of the best Interaction Design teams around (DDO). It really opened my eyes to the process.<p>I enjoyed this rant. I know it's old, but this is the first time I've seen it.
This is incredible work, thanks for sharing. That said, does anyone know what kind of technology they’re gesturing to? Maybe I’m really stuck in the present, but short of tangible holograms I’m not sure how we’d make tactile computing devices.<p>The keyboard is tactile, and I’ve long dreamed of augmenting Alexa by covering my house in purpose-specific buttons, but that seems like a short road. Even the most advanced HCI device I’ve ever seen proposed by a consumer company—Meta’s Orion wristbands that read hand movements by measuring the electrical signals in your wrist—aren’t tangible in the slightest.<p>What am I missing? Can any fellow futurists point me in the right direction? I don’t need “doable today” or even “the technology is worked out”, but ideally I’m looking for something more doable than tangible holograms. See <a href="https://xkcd.com/678/" rel="nofollow">https://xkcd.com/678/</a><p>EDIT; the VR suits from the Three Body Problem books come to mind, using tiny actuators and temperature controls (thermal actuators?) to simulate touch. I could see that in a glove for sure, and that’s probably the most futuristic tactility gets at this point, but I doubt it’ll ever see fully-body usage, both for technical feasibility and user convenience reasons. There’s a reason the TV show replaced them with brain-modulating headsets… I guess <i>that’s</i> really the end dream.<p>What is a tangible hologram (or any interface, really) other than an illusion, at the end of the day?