“Here in Korea, LG’s just given me a quick look inside one of their factories,” Joe M. reports for Stuff.tv in a breif article formong the basis for conjecture around the “Mac Web” today.
“LG is working on a full multitouch display for computers. Now that might sound so so, but seeing as the Korean giant makes the panels for iMacs, it actually points to something far bigger – a multitouch Mac,” Joe M. reports.
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Sounds a bit specious to us. Carl Lewis would have dificulty making the leap from LG producing touchscreens to Apple using them in iMacs. We need more evidence than what we see here. Deploy the salt.
FYI: The results of out MacBook-centric online poll “Where should Multi-Touch be located?” taken last week were:
• On screen only when trackpad is not present on device – 32%
• On both, but I prefer trackpad – 32%
• On both, but I prefer screen – 13%
• On docked iPhone and iPod touch (in place of removable MacBook trackpad) – 8%
• Not sure – 7%
• Nowhere, I prefer a mouse or other single-touch input device – 6%
• On screens only, never on trackpads – 2%
1,118 total votes
Of course they are going to make them. They will be needed by Windows 7.
Doesn’t prove a thing as it regards Apple.
The more I think about this, the more I am convinced that Apple will do this and it will completely reshape the way we use computers, exactly as they did with the introduction of the mouse in the 80’s. And Apple is the only company that will do it right.
Let me explain this (as I have done before in these forums, when the subject came up). Throughout the history of (hu)mankind, we were conditioned to work directly with the object of our work. To hold it, touch it, press it, cut it, write on it. We interacted directly with the object of our work (using hands or tools), and the result occured directly on that object.
Sometime around mid- 20th century, a new, completely bizarre concept was invented. Our work was displayed on a vertical surface, about 0.5 – 1m away from our face, while we were forced to use an awkward interface comprising a flat board with a bunch of buttons. Since it resembled standard typewriters, it wasn’t that difficult to learn to use, however, we had to figure out how a seemingly unrelated action on the device lying flat on our desk produced an event on a display about 1m away. Somehow, we learned to use this counter-intuitive and unusual interface and a generation or two grew up learning and using this concept.
Until iPhone, the same concept continued to be used on many different computing devices. Then came the iPhone, where the concept returned to the most intuitive and logical: you touch, pinch, swipe, the device (object of your work) reacts right where you interacted with it. The intuitiveness of this was easily proved when the iPhone was given to small children: they were able, much faster, to navigate through iPhone’s features (compared to any other phone, BlackBerry or WinMobile).
If Apple were to implement this on the Mac line, it will radically change the ergonomics of computing. Instead of a vertical screen, we will again have a horisontal working surface (perhaps slightly tilted towards the user). The arm comfortably rests on the working surface (such as a desk, or a drafting table), and hand does the necessary work (writing, moving objects, leafing through pages, squeezing, pinching, etc). I am sure Apple will figure out a way to ignore any accidental non-relevant input (such as resting arms, or hands, or palms) and only interpret finger (or stylus) thouches. Obviously, heavy typists will be able to use their (ergonomic or standard) physical keyboards, but for the rest of us, full-size virtual keyboard that slides out at the bottom of the screen would be plenty good.
Mac OS would have to be redesigned (slightly) to accomodate for the new input paradigm. I am convinced that this would work and that Apple would be the company to bring it.
@Predrag:
You mean something like a laptop?
Two things about Steve Jobs…
First off he doesn’t eat meat, therefore his skin doesn’t produce enough human oils that create fingerprints.
So touchscreens and lots of glass on everything is “in”.
Second, Steve Jobs is near-sighted, he can’t see far unless he wears glasses. So staring at a computer screen just inches way doesn’t bother him, neither if the display is GLOSSY AND REFLECTIVE TO ALL HELL.
Plus he’s totally into GLASS.
Glass at the NY Store, Glass steps, glass computers, glass everything.
I imagine Windex makes a nice killing off of Apple.
Glass touchscreen computers are designed for one thing in mind, reducing the cost of packaging a mouse and keyboard.
Apple will do it. You can bet on it.
@Predrag
So, you mean a Tablet PC? Yeah, been there, done that. HP added the multi-touch aspect to it last week.
Jordan,
Well, HP pretty much botched the job, since they put Windows on it.
Just like there were so many smartphones out there before iPhone, even ones with touch screen (Palm, WinMob); yet, iPhone was THE paradigm-shifter.
Tablet PC was the closest the concept came to what I’m talking about. However, nobody has come nowhere near where it needs to be in order to truly convince people that mouse and physical keyboard are slow, clunky and unintuitive.
This CAN be done. I’m hoping to see Apple do it.
Apple will never put a touchscreen on a standard configuration desktop or laptop. That is a terrible way to operate a computer.
Apple will eventually release a touchscreen computer, but it will have more in common with the iPhone and iPod touch than a Mac. Actually, the iPhone and iPod touch are already here and they are touchscreen computers.
What’s interesting about all this talk is that when Microsoft does a vertical touchscreen, you guys lambast it. IF Apple were to do the same thing (I’m only saying IF), you guys would love it and eat all Jobs’s words up. Of course you’d justify it by saying that Apple did it the right way, and what’s why we’re changing our mind.
Checkout what HP is shipping for $1199…
Nice job HP on releasing multi-touch before Windows 7 is released. IE, the OS, and Office 2007 fully supported now. Not bad for a PC.
Imagine what the next generation Apple stuff may do!
And the link, sorry: http://www.hp.com/united-states/campaigns/touchsmart/notebook/buy.html
step 1: turn on isight camera
step 2: step out of frame
Step 3: choose “gestures on” from menu set screen to 6 inches
Step 4: use hand gestures IN FRONT of screen to manipulate data pictures etc without having to touch screen at all.
Jordan:
What you are saying is essentially correct. However, one minor thing needs to be corrected: Apple never does the ‘same thing’. And that is the point.
Touchscreen smartphones existed before the iPhone. We all have ‘lambasted’ them as no better than keyboard-based devices. Then Apple released the ‘same thing’ — the iPhone. Clearly, you will appreciate the difference between a Palm (or WinMobile) device and an iPhone.
Microsoft has been trying to make the tablet computing going for many, many years, without any significant success. If Apple were to execute a “tablet” device, they’d do it exactly the same way they did with the iPhone, and we’d all be eating Jobs’s words up, not because he’s the “high commander” of the mother ship, but because, if Apple remains consistent, he’d be bringing a new revolutionary computing device.
We will have to wait and see if I’m right. I am fairly convinced, the touch computing has the potential, in the hands of the proper creative team, to completely transform the way we interact with desktop and portable computers.
Have you guys ever used a spell checker before publishing your articles?
Gary,
Some of us are forced to suffer under Windows in our offices — no Safari, no spelcheck… therefore, sorry for the typos (if any).
It would be nice if the iMac turned out to be a tablet verson!
HP sucks because now Apple will be forced to make touch screen desktops.
Because HP has it, all future PCs and Macs will be measured against it, it will be like, “but Macs don’t have touch screens”
And even though nobody will use them, it will be one of those things that people use to make their decision.
I can remember back to the IBM Thinkpad based on a 386sx, tablet system that with an extended battery had 1hr of battery life, and ran Windows for Pen 1.0 (based on Windows 3.1) 1 1/2 decades later the “tablet” pc is still a niche player, and woooo a touch screen on my laptop… its bad enough to have to move hands from keyboard to trackpad or mouse, arm length to the monitor so you can smudge the screen… SWEET! (ugh)
U guys don´t seem to get it, do you?
You whine about getting fingerprints on your screen and it not being the best surface for typing etc.
OF COURSE it´s not the perfect surface for EVERYTHING you do on a computer BUT it will be far superior to a mouse or keyboard for MANY uses.
This sounds exactly the same as when pcs didn´t use mice yet. The mouse was ridiculed by ms-dos id**ts, stating that mice will never be needed for any serious work…
Using the computer with iChat, iPhoto etc – ESPECIALLY for people who are NOT computer savvy – small kids, grandma, etc. this is so much more intuitive to use than the look-one-way-work-in-another-place mouse.
Boo hoo boo hoo, they took away the floppy drive… don´t touch the firewire, noooothing can replace the mouse/scratchpad.
Instead of trying to resist evolution, how about trying to embrace it instead???
Touch screens DO have several advantages. Use the functionality IF you want it and for the functions you want to. And who said you can´t use both a mouse and a touchscreen?
@Predrag
“I am sure Apple will figure out a way to ignore any accidental non-relevant input (such as resting arms, or hands, or palms) and only interpret finger (or stylus) thouches. “
It’s already done! Play around with the new glass touchpads, you’l find they completely ignore your wrists while typing (improving on the prev. gen. touchpads which do a pretty good job too)
ALSO, working in a busy electronics store, I have yet to see an HP TouchSmart computer capture anyones interest beyond the gimmicky Chess game… Nevermind inspire someone to dish out $1200+ for it. GAH it’s a HORRID device.
Apple will continue to do touch-screen RIGHT, and myriads will cheer.
does anyone know when the release date is for the MBP quad?