Revisiting the Multi-touch Parody of CNN's Magic Map, by Fred Armisen on Saturday Night Live Weekend Update

Photo via engadget

About four years ago I almost rolled out on the floor laughing at Fred Armisen's parody of CNN's Magic Map Wall during the Weekend Update segment of Saturday Night Live.  When I came across the video clip, I couldn't resist sharing it on my blog, and thought I'd share the video clip once again in honor of Election Day:



Video clip via Hulu


My 10/25/08 post,  Multi-touch Parody of CNN's Magic Map Wall by Fred Armisen on SNL's MegaPixel Giant Touch-map, was written when large touch-screen displays were beginning to gain steam in a variety of markets.  At the time, not all of the kinks had been worked out, and there were few people around who knew much about developing programs for use on these displays.  Since then, there have been many improvements in both hardware and software.   

Jeff Han, of Perceptive Pixel, provided the multi-touch screen system for CNN and the SNL parody.  He recently sold Perceptive Pixel to Microsoft and now works as a general manager for Microsoft Office. He's spreading the word about Microsoft's venture into large multi-touch displays- (55 and 82 inches), powered by Windows 8.  

For more information about Jeff Han and Microsoft Office, take a look at my blog post featuring  a recent video of Jeff Han's presentation about Windows 8 for large displays, Microsoft's new multi-touch, pen, and ink technology. The video also includes a presentation about experience design considerations for large displays, by Nathan Fish.

Musings about NUI, Perceptive Pixel and Microsoft, Rapid Creative Prototyping (Lots of video and links) Revised

It just might be the right time for everyone to brush up on 21st century tech skills. iPads and touch-phones are ubiquitous. Touch-enabled interactive whiteboards and displays are in schools and boardrooms.  With Microsoft's Windows 8 and the news that the company recently acquired Jeff Han's company, Perspective Pixel, I think that there will be good support - and more opportunities- for designers and developers interested in moving from GUI to NUI.    


In the video below, from CES 2012, Jeff Han provides a good overview of where things are moving in the future.  We are in a post-WIMP world and there is a lot of catching up to do!

CES 2012  Perceptive Pixel and the Future of Multitouch (IEEE Spectrum YouTube Channel)



During the video clip, Jeff explains how far things have come during the past few years:

 "Five and 1/2 years ago I had to explain to everybody what multi-touch was and meant. And then, frankly, we've seen some great products from folks like Apple, and really have executed so brilliantly, that everyone really sees what a good implementation can be, and have come to expect it.  I also think though, that the explosion of NUI is less about just multi-touch, but an awareness that finally people have that you don't have to use a keyboard and mouse, you can demand something else beside that.  People are now willing to say, "Oh, this is something I can try, you know, touch is something I can try as my friendlier interface"."

Who wouldn't want to interact with a friendlier interface?  Steve Ballmer doesn't curb his enthusiasm about Windows 8 and Perceptive Pixel.  Jeff Han is happy how designs created in Windows 8 scales for use on screens large and small. He explains how Windows 8 can support collaboration. The Story Board application (7:58) on the large touchscreen display looks interesting.

I continue to be frustrated by the poor usability of many web-based and desk-top applications.  I like my iPad, but only because so many dedicated souls have given some thought to the user experience when creating their apps.  I often meet with disappointment when I encounter interactive displays when I'm out and about during the day.  It is 2012, and it seems that there are a lot of application designers and developers who have never read Don Norman's The Design of Everyday Things!

I enjoy making working prototypes and demo apps, but my skill set is stuck in 2008, the last year I took a graduate-level computer course.  I was thinking about taking a class next semester, something hands-on, creative, and also practical, to move me forward. I can only do so much when I'm in the DIY mode alone in my "lab" at home.  I need to explore new tools, alongside like-minded others.  


There ARE many more tools available to designers and developers than there were just four years ago.  Some of them are available online, free, or for a modest fee.  I was inspired by a link posted by my former HCI professor, Celine Latulipe, to her updated webpage devoted to Rapid Prototyping tools. The resources on her website look like a good place to start for people who are interested in creating applications for the "NUI" era.  (Celine has worked many interesting projects that explore how technology can support new and creative interaction, such as Dance.Draw.) Below is her description of her updated HCI resources:

"New HCI resource to share: I have created a few pages on my web site devoted to Rapid Prototyping tools, books, and methods. These pages contain reviews of various digital tools, including 7 different desktop prototyping apps, and including 8 different iPad apps for wireframing/prototyping. I hope it's useful to others. Feel free to share... and please send me comments and suggestions if you find anything inaccurate, or if you think there is stuff that I should be adding. I will be continuing to update this resource." -http://www.celinelatulipe.com (click on the rapid prototyping link at the top)

IDEAS
Below are just a few of my ideas that I'd like to implement in some way. I can't claim ownership to these ideas- they are mash-ups of what comes to me in my dreams, usually after reading scholarly publications from ACM or IEEE, or attending tech conferences. 

• An interactive timeline, (multi-dimensional, multi-modal, multimedia) for off-the-desktop interaction, collaboration, data/info analysis exploration.  It might be useful for medical researchers, historians, genealogists, or people who are into the "history of ideas".  Big Data folks would love it, too. It would handle data from a variety of sources, including sensor networks. It would be beautiful to use.
• A web-based system of delivering seamless interactive, multi-modal, immersive experiences, across devices, displays, and surfaces. The system would support multi-user, collaborative interaction.  The system would provide an option for tangible interaction.
• A visual/auditory display interface that presents network activity, including potential intrusions, malfunctions, or anything that needs immediate attention that would be likely to be missed under present monitoring methods. 
• Interactive video tools for creation, collaboration, storytelling.  (No bad remote controllers needed.)
• A "wearable" that provides new ways for people to express and communicate creatively, through art, music, dance, with wireless capability. (It can interact with wireless sensor networks.)*
• An public health application designed to provide information useful in understanding and sepsis prevention efforts. This application would utilize the timeline concept describe at the top of this list. This concept could also be useful in analyzing other medical puzzles, such as autism.

Most of these ideas could translate nicely to educational settings, and the focus on natural user interaction and multi-modal i/o aligns with the principles of Universal Design for Learning, something that is important to consider, given the number of "at-risk" learners and young people who have disabilities.

I welcome comments from readers who are working on similar projects, or who know of similar projects.  I also encourage graduate students and researchers who are interested in natural user interfaces to and move forward with an off-the-desktop NUI project.  I hope that my efforts can play a part in helping people make the move from GUI to NUI!  



Below are a few videos of some interesting projects, along with a list of a few references and links.

SMALLab (Multi-modal embodied immersive learning)

PUPPET PARADE: Interactive Kinect Puppets(CineKid 2011)



MEDIA FACADES: When Buildings Start to Twitter

HUMANAQUARIUM (CHI 2012)

 

NANOSCIENCE NRC Cambridge (Nokia's Morph project)






 
Examples: YouTube Playlists
POST WIMP EXPLORERS' CLUB
POST-WIMP EXPLORER'S CLUB II

Web Resources
Celine Latulipe's Rapid Prototyping Resources 
Creative Applications
NUI Group: Natural User Interface Group
OpenFrameworks and Interactive Multimedia: Funky Forest Installation for CineKid
SMALLab Learning

Microsoft Research Natural User Interface 

OpenExhibits: Free multi-touch + multiuser software initiative for museums, education, nonprofits, and students.
OpenSense Wiki 
CINEKID 2012 Website 
Multitouch Systems I Have Known and Loved (Bill Buxton)
Windows 8
Perceptive Pixel
Books
Natural User Interfaces in .NET  WPF 4, Surface2, and Kinect (Josh Blake, Manning Publications)
Chapter 1 pdf (Free)
Brave NUI World: Designing Natural User Interfaces for Touch and Gesture (Daniel Wigdor and Dennis Wixon)
Designing Gestural Interfaces (Dan Saffer)
Posts

Microsoft's"Magic Wall" Tech on Windows 8 Laptops and Tablets by Next Year

Bill Snyder, ReadWrite Web, 7/20/12

I noticed some interesting tools on the Chrome web store - I plan to devote a few more posts to NUI tools in the future.

Quick Link: 3M Invests in Perceptive Pixel, Jeff Han's Multitouch Tech Company

3M Invests in Perceptive Pixel

"3M, through its 3M New Ventures business, has invested in Perceptive Pixel Inc., a developer of advanced multi-touch solutions based in New York City. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.Founded by multi-touch pioneer Jeff Han in 2006, Perceptive Pixel is dedicated to the research, development and production of multi-touch interfaces for the knowledge worker. The company's hardware and software products enable users to manipulate complex datasets through a new class of intuitive, powerful and visually rich interface techniques. The combination of its technologies with those of 3M will create incredible new opportunities for both companies."

"To see Perceptive Pixel multi-touch solutions in action on 3M Projected Capacitive Technology, see the video at http://www.3m.com/touchPPI. For more information about 3M MicroTouch products, visit www.3M.com/touch. For an overview of popular touch technologies and terminology, visit www.touchtopics.com."

RELATED
3M Touchscreen Products and Systems

Catching up with multitouch pioneer Jef Han Ina Fried, Cnet 10/22/10

Jeff Han's 2006 Ted Talk



Jeff Han, 2007



Thanks to Seth Sandler for the link!

Osmosis: Multi-touch systems for... everywhere!

Not long ago I had the opportunity to chat with Stuart McLean, the founder of Osmosis, a company that delivers customized multi-touch systems of hardware and software that support human-centered natural user interaction.   Stuart has many years of experience working in more traditional IT/business roles, and knows from this experience that there is  better way to support  human computer interaction, including interaction between people.

Like many of us in the "NUI" community, Stuart was impressed by the video of Jeff Han's 2006 TED Talk, which demonstrated a variety of awesome multi-touch, multi-user applications on a high-resolution drafting table.  Stuart saw the importance of natural user interfaces and interaction and became involved with the NUI Group, a "global research community focused on the open discovery of natural user interfaces". 

Unlike traditional tech companies, Osmosis is a collaboration between a global network of engineers, designers, and developers who share the "NUI" vision. This collaboration enables the company to provide solutions for clients across a range of countries, cultures, and domains.


Below is a photo-gallery of some of the applications and systems developed by Osmosis:


Multi-touch by Osmosis

GALLERY

As you can see from the gallery photos, Osmosis provides a range of possibilities for their clients and potential clients.  All of the displays are high-definition.  Some are projection-systems, and others are displays with multi-touch sensing technology.  Since the construction is modular, a variety of form factors are available.  High-quality surround and domed sound systems are available.  Applications include information kiosks, point of sale/digital signage, hospitality, presentation and training, education, and audio-visual performance and production.  Osmosis also provides applications that support interaction with tangible objects.

Below are two videos that give a taste of what Osmosis is all about:

OSMOSIS DEMO REEL

Demo Reel from Osmosis on Vimeo.

MULTI-TOUCH EVERYWHERE

MT Everywhere from Osmosis on Vimeo.

I can see where some of these applications would be great in K-12 educational settings.  Just look at the joy on the faces of the kids in the Multi-Touch Everywhere video!

(Short video clips of the Osmosis applications in action can be found in the showcase page of the company's website.)

Good news about the San Jose Interactive Displays Conference (that I couldn't attend)

Sadly, I was unable to attend the Interactive Displays conference that was held last week in San Jose, California. Jeff Han, the guy in the video clip in my sidebar, was one of the keynote presenters. I really wish I could have seen - and touched - the action!

Update (4/27/09) from Thomas Hansen, a member of NUI Group, who attended IDC:

"..It was certainly an interesting event. I got to talk (albeit briefly) to both Andy Wilson and Jeff Han. Both of whom produce very inspiring and world class UI/HCI research on a consistent basis. Further, it was a great honor to meet some of the other members of the nuigroup community in person, some of whom where inspiring not only because of their amazing intellect and artistic talents, but especially due to their friendliness, benevolence, and maturity."

Here are a few excerpts from people who were fortunate to attend and then write about the experience:

Putting our arms around the future of touch Ina Fried , CNET 4/23/09

"..if you used one of the interactive displays here to show a heat map of this industry, it would glow red hot. That's because touch displays, for years relegated to kiosks and industrial uses, are quickly becoming mainstream. Hewlett-Packard and Dell already have touch-capable machines, while Microsoft is set to make gesture input standard with Windows 7...For his own part, Han said he was inspired by seeing a PBS documentary in the early 1980s that showed Microsoft researcher Bill Buxton, then at the University of Toronto, using multitouch to compose music on a computer. The computer itself was a green screen with an ancient processor and little memory, but the key underlying concept was already there..

"Sometimes it takes that long for these things to marinate and gestate," Han said....And while things are now taking off, Han urged the crowd not to forsake quality in the rush to take advantage of a hot market. "That will ruin it and mess it up for all of us, and that would be a real shame," Han said."

Interactive Displays Conference Highlights Kevin Arthur, Touch Usability 4/22/09

"...He (Jeff Han) showed a great clip from an early 80s TV show called Bits and Bytes that featured a young Bill Buxton demonstrating some of his tablet work at the University of Toronto...Jeff Han's point in showing this clip was not just to share what inspired him as a kid to pursue computer science as a career. He also wanted to make the point that none of this stuff is really new. He urged the audience not to jump on whatever tech is cool this week, but to be aware of the history and to do the research. Be thoughtful and careful about what you're making. He said one of his fears with the multitouch craze is that the waters will be poisoned by bad and poorly conceived implementations. He said "don't add noise" to the ecosystem by using terms sloppily -- like "multitouch"...

The importance of being more thoughtful and mindful of prior work are not exactly new to most of us with design, HCI, or CS backgrounds, but the audience here is largely made up of marketing or other business types, I believe, who sometimes tend to get a bit carried away, you might say. I mean no disrespect to my friends in marketing..."

Interactive Displays Conference San Jose Harry van der Veen, 4/25/09
" Big thumbs up for Pira tech for managing to get so many multi-touch industry professionals (Wacom, Mindstorm, NextWindow, 3M, Jeff Han (Perceptive Pixel), LG, Tyco Electronics, Stantum and more) and hobbyists together."

Interactive Displays 2009: Listen to a podcast interview each day leading up to the conference.

The following people were on the podcast on 4/13/09:
Steven Bathiche- Microsoft
Jerry Bertrand- Microscent, LLC
Henry Kaufman- Tactable

Interactive Displays 2009

Note: Jeff Han will be one of the presenters.

More info to come...

Interactive Displays 2009 Conference: Tuesday, April 21 -Thursday April 23, Hilton San Jose, California

The Interactive Displays Conference, sponsored by Intertech Pira, will highlight an interesting mix of existing and emerging interactive display technologies and applications. The conference will be held at the Hilton in San Jose, California, from Tuesday, April 21st through Thursday, April 23rd.

The pre-conference seminar will feature Sakuya Morimoto, of CANESTA, who will present his company's innovative single-chip 3D image sensor technology that supports gesture interaction.
Keynote speakers will be Jeff Han, of Perceptive Pixel, and Steven Bathiche, of Microsoft US.

Some Highlights:

Pre-conference Seminar: Gesture Navigation in the World of Digital Contents, Enabled by a Single-Chip 3D Image Sensor Presenter: Sakuya Morimoto, Senior Director, Business Development in Asia, CANESTA, Japan

Related:
Hitachi at CES 2009: Use of Canesta's 3D sensor to control television and home systems using hand gestures.


"With the wave of a hand, with the shake of a hand, you can control volume, you can actually change the channels, watch your favorite program...the most exciting thing, I think, is that you can actually control your temperature and the lighting in the room, the environmental lighting. So..it is very unique technology that is out there.."

Another demonstration of Hitachi's gesture interaction using the Canesta's 3=D Depth camera:



When a TV Remote is Just Too Much Effort, Wave -Jennifer Bergen, PC Magazine
CANESTA Corporate Fact Sheet (pdf)

How does Canesta's Electronic Perception Technology Work?
"Canesta’s electronic perception technology forms 3-D, real time moving images in a single chip through patented methods which use light photons to “range” the image, similar to radar. The silicon sensor chip develops 3-D depth maps at a rate in excess of 30 frames per second, and then performs additional processing on these depth maps to resolve the images into application specific information that can easily be processed by embedded processor(s) in the end-use device or machine. Since Canesta’s software starts with a three-dimensional view of the world, provided immediately by the hardware, it has a substantial advantage over classical image processing software that struggles to construct three-dimensional representations using complex mathematics, and images from multiple cameras or points of view. This dramatic reduction in complexity makes it possible to embed the processing software directly into the chips themselves so they may be used in the most cost-conscious applications."


I will highlight some of the featured presentations in future blog posts:

Steven Bathiche, Director of Research, Applied Sciences Group, Entertainment and Devices Division MICROSOFT, US
Guillaume Largillier, Chief Strategy Officer and Co-Founder, STANTUM, France
Jeff Han, PERCEPTIVE PIXEL, US
Mark Fihn, Publisher, VERITAS ET VISUS, US
Derek Mitchell, Conference Producer, INTERTECHPIRA, US
Vinita Jakhanwal, Principal Analyst, Small/Medium Displays, ISUPPLI CORPORATION, US
Joseph Carsanaro, President and CEO F-ORIGIN, US
Tommi Ilmonen, CEO MULTITOUCH OY, Finland
Stephen Sedaker, Director of Component Sales WACOM TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION, US
Brad Gleeson, Managing Director, Business Development TARGETPATH GLOBAL LLC., US
Henry Kaufman, President and Founder, TACTABLE, US
Christophe Ramstein, Chief Technology Officer, IMMERSION CORPORATION, US
Mary Lou Jepsen, CEO, PIXEL QI, US
John Newton, Chief Technology Officer, NEXTWINDOW, New Zealand
Herve Martin, CEO, SENSITIVE OBJECT, France
Scott Hagermoser, Gaming Business Unit Manager 3M TOUCH SYSTEMS, US
Bob Cooney, Vice President, Business Development, ECAST, US
Brent Bushnell, Chief Technology Officer UWINK, US
Stephan Durach, Head, Technology Office, BMW GROUP, US
Jeff Doerr, Senior Manager, Business Development Self Service Solutions Group, FLEXTRONICS, US
Andy Wilson, Senior Researcher, Adaptive Systems and Interaction Group, MICROSOFT, US
Mats W. Johansson, Chief Executive Officer, EON REALITY, US
Lenny Engelhardt, Vice President for Business Development, N-TRIG, Israel
Dr Paul Diefenbach, Director, RePlay Lab, DREXEL UNIVERSITY, US
Andrew Hsu, Technical Marketing and Strategic Partnerships Manager, SYNAPTICS, US
Dean LaCoe, Business Development Manager, GESTURETEK, Canada
Keith Pradhan, Global Director of Product Management, TYCO ELECTRONICS, ELO TOUCHSYSTEMS, US
Jerry Bertrand, Managing Member/Acting CEO, MICROSCENT, LLC, US
Frederic Kaplan, CEO and Co-Founder, OZWE, Switzerland

Related

Visionary Jeff Han and Microsoft's Steven Bathiche to Keynote at Interactive Displays 2009

Need for Multi-touch, Multi-user Interactive Multimedia Applications, and the Miracle Question

Last week I received a few comments on my post, "Multi-touch and Flash: Links to Resources; Revisiting Jeff Han's Presentation". I started to respond to a thoughtful comment by Spencer, of TeacherLED, and I wanted to share it as a post:

Spencer is a teacher and instructional technology consultant who develops web-based interactive applications for use on interactive whiteboards (IWB's). He's interested in multi-touch applications for education and has some good insights into what HCI researchers call the "problem space".

Here are Spencer's comments:

..."I agree that Flash could have a very important role to play here. I chose Flash as my development tool because it allows quick development of ideas and then easy distribution of the product. The importance of this is that it allows people who have a profession other than software developer to create software with the insight of their main role. In my case, as a teacher, I can identify things I wish I had and then make them. Often I find that other teachers had the same wish and they then appreciate the product."

"The unfortunate thing with multi-touch is that it is far from the technology most of us outside the industry/research areas have to work with. An app created in Flash for single touch follows the mouse and pointer method so it can be developed easily. When done it can be easily tested on a standard IWB for the feel (which is often surprisingly different on the IWB compared to using a mouse)."

"The Flash developer community has a very experimental and creative characteristic and I’m sure would be a great driving force for multi-touch but first there needs to come a reason for more people to have some sort of multi-touch display for general use, beyond facilitating experiments. When the various operating systems support it and have the apps to make having a supporting display viable then the experimentation and ideas will really flow."

"In addition, the display makers need to recognize the benefits of Flash and ensure they address them. At the moment it seems to be too often an afterthought if considered at all. SDKs and APIs make no reference to Flash or they remain indefinitely in beta for older versions of Flash only."

"It is a pity that all of this will take time. The more time that passes the more single touch IWBs are bought and installed which will delay the uptake of the eventual multi-touch ones. Meanwhile children continue to have to keep reminding themselves that they can only touch the board in one place when it is clear that every bit of their brain is telling them to interact with the board in a much more natural multi-touch way."

My response to Spencer's comment:

Spencer,

You make good points regarding the barriers to getting the multi-touch approach adopted by the "mainstream". You're right about what the commercial display makers need to do. If they want to market displays that will have more appeal, they must think about the different sorts of applications and programming environments that the displays should support.

Display makers also need to think more about the bigger picture - in what sort of environments will the displays be located? Indoors? Outdoors? Near bright sunlight? What about people with disabilities, children, or the elderly?

I can see that in the future, multi-touch displays and other devices would operate within an embedded systems environment and support mobile computing activities as well. There are existing examples of this concept, of course, but there is much room for creative improvement. An embedded systems approach is complex, and would need to handle input from sensors, support multi-modal signal process, and also provide users with a range of connectivity modes, including RFID. (Data management and storage needs would have to be addressed, along with privacy and security concerns.)

Most importantly, in my opinion, these systems would need to have the flexibility required to support human activities and interactions that have not yet emerged! Certainly this will need to take a multidisciplinary approach.

There are many unanswered questions....How does this fit in with mobile computing and "cloud" computing? What sort of middleware needs to be developed?

Even if we don't have solutions to the bigger problems, there are many smaller problems that I think could be somewhat easily solved.

As you mentioned, many applications that are designed for single-touch screens don't fully support the way people identify, select, and move items around the screen. Although educators access websites every day for use on interactive whiteboards, they are hungry for more. There are not enough websites that are optimized for single-touch interaction, or touch-screen interaction in 3-D "space".

Teachers who are successful users of interactive whiteboards know exactly what we are talking about. They spend quite a bit of time searching for new on-line resources they can use with their students. They know how much the students want to interact with the screen at the same time and would be so excited to have capability at their fingertips!

Optimizing websites for touch-screen applications is possible, but this idea hasn't occurred to web developers. Their jobs don't require it, so there is no incentive. Google is developing FlareBrowser, that can support multi-touch interactions, but according to information on the website, it runs on Mac Leopard 1.5, and nothing else. The present version is bare-bones. I haven't yet tested the FlareBrowser.

I think that another barrier to getting multi-touch off the ground is that the people who might have the knack for multi-touch application development simply don't know it! We've mentioned that Flash developers have the potential to create good multi-touch applications. I also think that game developers and designers could make good contributions to the multi-touch movement. Just think about what thought goes into programming interactions and event handling for 3-D web-based multi-player games!

Yet another barrier is that people who work in lower-tech fields could benefit from collaborative multi-touch applications, but they don't know it, either. The research I've reviewed tells me that multi-touch applications can support a wide range of human endeavors- work, creativity, data analysis, education, collaboration, planning, and so forth.

What is missing is the input of potential end users from a variety of fields. No specific discipline "owns" multi-touch, so it is hard to figure out how we can make this happen.

Could we set up multi-touch technology playgrounds at professional and trade conferences? What about airports and hospital lobbies? Libraries and museums? Shopping centers? Sports events and rock concerts?

This leads me to my next idea, which is jumping ahead a bit:

One of the barriers to the development of multi-touch applications is that it is not easy to gather user requirements when the users are not familiar with the technology.
That is when my "Miracle Question" technique comes into play. I learned this technique when I studied brief solution-focused counseling and found that if modified, can be useful when figuring out user requirements. (The process still needs some fleshing out.)
Why the Miracle Question?
The questions that a developer uses to guide the client during the initial planning stages are very important. Keep in mind that people want to use technology because it meets a need and also solves a problem, which is the similar to the reason a person might seek counseling.
The Miracle Question technique (actually, a series of questions) might help to tease things out. The goal of this type of questioning is to help the client use their own creativity, resources, and problem-solving skills so they can become effective partners throughout the development cycle.
(People with human-computer interaction training might have an easier time understanding how this technique might be modified and applied to different fields.)

FYI
A good example the Miracle Question process, as used in therapy and counseling, can be found on the Network of Social Construction Therapies website in an article written by the late Steve de Shazer:

http://brianmft.talkspot.com/aspx/templates/topmenuclassical.aspx/msgid/366482

There aren't many resources about the use of the Miracle Question in IT or business. Here are a couple:

Solution Focused Management of Unplanned IT Outages (Read pages 132 and the references.)http://conferences.vu.edu.au/web2006/images/CDProceedings06.pdf
Proceedings of 7th International We-B (Working for E-Business) Conference, 2006Katherine O'CallaghanSugumar Mariappandar, Ph.D.School of Business and InformaticsAustralian Catholic University

Miracle Question in Executive Coaching
http://www.1to1coachingschool.com/Coaching_Miracle_Question.htm

CNN's Magic Wall Conspiracy Thriller on the Daily Show: John Oliver, Jeff Han, John King and a cast of TouchScreens and Windows...

"I needed to find a screen-free environment!" -John Oliver

"It's good to be King." - John King, after disposing of John Oliver...

I just took a look at a hilarious episode about interactive multi-touch screens and a conspiracy theory on the Daily Show. The episode features Jeff Han, the creator of CNN's Magic Wall, John Oliver, John King, and others from CNN.

Enjoy!



Via John Herrman and Gizmodo


If you are interested in multi-touch technology, feel free to do a search for additional information on this blog. The following post includes Jeff Han's demonstration of his multi-touch applications from TED 2006, along with resources and links:

Multi-touch and Flash: Links to Resources, Revisiting Jeff Han's TED 2006 Presentation

Note: If you are a parent, please screen the video clip before deciding if it is OK for your child to view.

Multi-touch and Flash: Links to resources, revisiting Jeff Han's TED 2006 presentation

Despite the increase in interest in systems that support multi-touch, multi-user multimedia interaction, there is a need for creative, tech-savvy types to develop innovative applications. Why? This technology has the potential to make a powerful impact on how people learn, communicate, solve "big picture" problems, and do their various jobs.

CNN's Magic Wall was one of the first applications to gain the attention of the masses, as it was used as an interactive map during the US presidential election process. Touch-screen interaction gained even more notice after the recent SNL parody by Fred Amisen.

If you think about it, the multi-touch applications you see on the news aren't much different than what you'd get from a "single-touch" program.

Fancy, yes. Truly innovative, no.

Just imagine a 3D multi-touch, multi-user, multimedia version of Google Search. I did. I put my sketches in my idea book and hurt my brain thinking about how it could be coded.

Jeff Han, the man behind Perceptive Pixel and CNN's magic wall, had much more up his sleeve when he demonstrated his work at TED 2006. Even if you've previously seen this video, it is worth looking at again. (I've provided a link to the transcript below.)



Transcript of Jeff Han's TED 2006 Presentation

This video presentation had a transformational effect on me as I watched for the first time. Jeff Han brought to life ideas that were similar to my own as a beginning computer student thinking about collaborative educational games and multimedia applications that could be played on interactive whiteboards.

Here are some selected quotes from the video:

"I really really think this is gonna change- really change the way we interact with the machines from this point on."

"Again, the interface just disappears here. There's no manual. This is exactly what you kind of expect, especially if you haven't interacted with a computer before."

"Now, when you have initiatives like the hundred dollar laptop, I kind of cringe at the idea that we're gonna introduce a whole new generation of people to computing with kind of this standard mouse-and-windows pointer interface. This is something that I think is really the way we should be interacting with the machines from this point on. (applause)"

"Now this is going to be really important as we start getting to things like data visualization. For instance, I think we all really enjoyed Hans Rosling's talk, and he really emphasized the fact that I've been thinking about for a long time too, we have all this great data, but for some reason, it's just sitting there. We're not really accessing it. And one of the reasons why I think that is, is because of things like graphics- will be helped by things like graphics and visualization and inference tools. But I also think a big part of it is gonna be- starting to be able to have better interfaces, to be able to drill down into this kind of data, while still thinking about the big picture here."

So now what?

A recent post by "Alex", on the AFlex World blog discusses a few solutions. Alex had a chance to meet with Harry van der Veen and Pradeep George from the NUI Group, and Georg Kaindl, a multi-touch interaction designer from the Technical University of Vienna. The focus of the discussion was to come up with ideas to encourage Adobe/Flash designers and developers to learn more about multi-touch technology and interaction, and take steps to create innovative applications.

I especially like the following quote from the post:

"...A quick quote from our conversations: “When our children will walk up to a display, they will touch it and expect to do something.”

As a techie and a school psychologist, I see an immediate need for innovative applications. I know that there is a built-in market in the schools, at least for low-cost applications. Despite economic constraints, many school districts continue to invest in interactive whiteboards (IWB's). They are cropping up in preschool and K-12 settings, and teachers are searching for more than what's currently available.

Interactive, collaborative applications are needed in fields such as health care, patient education, finance & economics, urban planning, civil engineering, travel & tourism, museums & exhibitions, special events, entertainment, and more.

Smart Technologies, the company behind SmartBoards, has a new interactive multi-touch, multi-user table designed for K-6 education, the Smart Table. Hewlett Packard has several versions of the TouchSmart PC, which can support at least duo-touch, if not multi-touch, multi-user applications. There are numerous all-in-one large screen displays on the market that support multi-touch and multi-user interaction.

Quotes from Harry van der Veen, of Multitouch NL:

"In 10 years from now when a child walks up to a screen he expects it to be a multi-touch screen with which he can interact with by using gestures."

"...multi-touch screens will be as common as for children is the internet nowadays, as common as mobile phones are for us."


Here is a quote from a conversation I had with Spencer, who blogs at TeacherLED.

"It was interesting this week as I was in a classroom with a teacher who I've not worked with before... he had 2 students using the whiteboard who kept touching it together by mistake. The teacher, exasperated, said to himself, "Why can't they make these things to accept 2 touches without going crazy!"

Proof of the demand! I think you are right when teachers spot the limitations and then see the technology on visits to museums, that might stimulate demand."

Spencer creates cool interactive mini-applications, mostly for math, using Flash, that teachers (and students) love to use on interactive whiteboards. (He's interested in multi-touch, too.)


So what are we waiting for?!

Related:
Natural User Interface Europe AB meets Adobe
Georg's Touche Framework
NUI Group
TeacherLED
Interactive Touch-Screen Technology, Participatory Design, and "Getting It".
Hans Rosling's 2007 TED talk