gizmodo.com — It feels like the whole world is holding its breath for the Apple tablet. But maybe we've all been dreaming about the wrong device. This is Courier, Microsoft's astonishing take on the tablet. - The UI is freakishly Apple, is it real or a heads up fud attack?
Sep 22, 2009 View in Crawl 4
gelftheelfSep 23, 2009
I think "Verdana" sounds more vapor-ware-ish and would make an awesome name.
gregrSep 24, 2009
"... corners the market"Um... reality check - there is no product, at least not yet.
Closed AccountSep 25, 2009
If you're a big fan of concept videos, perhaps you would like to watch the WinFS concept video. Despite years of promises, (Microsoft has been promising file storage in a structured database since the Cairo project of 1991!) it never became a real shipping product, but the video is cool.<a class="user" href="http://download.microsoft.com/download/c/e/2/ce28874c-4f44-4dbd-babb-727685e2be96/WinFS_IWish_720x486_2mbs.wmv" rel="nofollow">http://download.microsoft.com/download/c/e/2/ce288 ...</a>
twinnieSep 25, 2009
Somehow I got my dates completely f**ked up in this, and I think MWeather makes a fair point, but I think MS had been going that way for a while now. I think MS and Apple just crossed swords at some point.@gurp13Sort of, real human beings actually see it I mean. They're both for sale but everyone's heard of the iPhone and no one's heard of Surface.
tylerlaviteSep 25, 2009
I personally hated the Zune UI.
Closed AccountSep 26, 2009
Yet concepts from the Knowledge Navigator video are reality now.20 years ago, Knowledge Navigator used a video camera to monitor it's user and respond to hand gestures and movements the user made. Sound anything like Project Natal? Why yes, it does.Microsoft Research acknowledges the role of Knowledge Navigator in their concept video for Courier's predecessor, Codex. In a video less than five minutes long, they make a point of showing Codex playing the beginning of the Knowledge Navigator video.<a class="user" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=049_U-0C9qU" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=049_U-0C9qU</a> You may not see the link between Knowledge Navigator and Courier, but Microsoft Research does. Try to learn the difference between pointless fiction and forward-looking thinking
theindigoskySep 27, 2009
You continue to deflect the point. Let me put it in a simple logical progression...1) You criticize Courier on the basis that it's not as imaginative as Knowledge Navigator2) Knowledge Navigator was pure fiction, a concept video of the future3) Courier's video is one of a product in later stages of development4) The two videos have two very different objectives. Knowledge Navigator's video was intended to show technology that *could* happen, but wasn't in development as a commercial possibility. Courier's video, on the other hand, is of a product being developed right here and now; thus, its capabilities as shown represent features that are feasible and quite possibly already developed.Therefore:The criticism is misguided, since you're judging one video (Courier's, made to represent a product right here and now) based upon the criteria of a video with an entirely different purpose (Navigator's, made to represent visions of the *future* of technology).Knowledge Navigator was never a product Apple was considering launching. The features shown in its videos were meant to be fictional visions of the future. Courier *is* a product in development; they're not showing technologies possible 20 years from now because they're attempting to render what they're working on in the here and now, as a commercially viable product in late stages of development.
js281Oct 12, 2009
Um, I'm not sure why you are getting dugg down, every Microsoft product I own (and even one Dell, and one Toshiba one) has either the windows logo, or "Microsoft" on it somewhere...and to be fair I didn't see a MS logo on that tablet.
js281Oct 12, 2009
Can we stop using dollar signs yet when we write MS?