gizmodo.com — Microsoft's near-mythical Surface table just appeared at five AT&T Stores across the country, and we were happy to have a go with it this morning. As you'll see in the video, this one is programmed for mobile phone sales pitches, and doesn't have all of the fun apps we've heard about, but even here, Surface's massive, beautiful potential is obvious
Apr 17, 2008 View in Crawl 4
cvrefugeeApr 18, 2008
No, but I have a Surface.
webworkerApr 18, 2008
What are you new?
webworkerApr 18, 2008
You know.. I hate tequila.. but that and you fanboys are making me want to quit digg so good...
webworkerApr 18, 2008
Yes you fvcking moron.. because they will obviously let the social security sucking vampires fvck around with their $10,000 table without having a soul sucking salesman come over to pitch them their money svcking line!
webworkerApr 18, 2008
WTF a55hole.. i thinked your were cool earlier two replies ago, but then you fvcking replied with the same link twice, and both times i was hopign it was rick rolled, but it was the same fvcking thing that only made me laugh and say that it was funny the first time.. .watching it second time didn't have same FX!!!
xerexes1Apr 18, 2008
I don't know why superkendall is being dug down. Those are all valid points. I wasn't "wowed" by that demo; it was just a simulation of moving paper around a table. I appreciate the technology but I would have expected a more dynamic experience.
fkr3Apr 18, 2008
That first link is weird.... the guy starts by saying he didn't want to develop it on Windows because he wanted it to be "available on all platforms" so he developed it on / for OS X with the Core Animation framework instead??
accelleronApr 18, 2008
comment of the day.
celsdoggApr 18, 2008
thats a negative. i did because i saw his demo at the ted conference. then a year later i heard about the surface from bill gates at D.additionally, gates and staff have other ideas like swinging actual bats and rackets to simulate playing sports and implementing it using cameras and crap. heard that on D too. Microsoft is late with all ideas and implement them poorly.dont assume what I do and do not know.
zebbApr 19, 2008
superkendall,I think you have some valid points, but I also think you are thinking to narrowly. (if narrowly is a word)1) You can certainly print off info onto some paper brochures, or tags to display under each phone, but you have to realize this is very expensive to do. If AT&T has lets say 1000 stores each with 50 - 100 different spec sheets for the phones they carry that cost of designing each item, sending them to a printer, shipping them to all the stores, plus all the waste of unused documents when phones get replaced by newer versions and such. That cost of priting documents adds up very very quickly.But, having a table which is software driven, sure there are some expenses with buying the table and operating costs. But those are pretty minimal compared to printing a document every month. Secondly, now they can have a couple programmers and designers sitting in some corporate office designing new content, updating content and creating new experiences which can then be piped out to every store with a table through the internet is pretty efficient and quite cheap.2) this is probably very simple functionalty to add in if they wanted, and maybe they already have it and it just wasn't on the video? You also have to figure this is the first version they are releasing and probably focused on getting it out into public to see what new features people request and want and then they can build upon that. They have done this with the Zune, Silverlight and countless other products. Apple even did this with the Iphone.3) Maybe not all accessories are in all the stores, or maybe this will allow the stores to show less accessories on the walls and keep the actual stock in the back room saving space for more phones. Maybe they can show multiple colors, or items they can get ordered in at a lower cost if the customer is willing to wait a couple days for their hardware. Same could hold true for Phones as well, you could now have 50 different colors for one phone, but thereis now way you could have a display of all 50 colors on the shelves, that would be ridiculous.4) Again this goes back to the fact it's version one, they are in no doubt looking at new features and experiences that are more exciting and or useful.Prices will come down, and I think they will come down pretty quickly, people can see so many cool apps that could be built ontop of this that they will drive demand to make it more consumer friendly, plus MS took it's time to get this thing right from the start so now it's just a matter of getting it out to developers.