AllThingsD » large screen

Multitouch Pioneer Jeff Han Starts to Think Small (Devices)

Ina Fried — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 14:00:35 +0000

For years now, Jeff Han has been working on large-screen multitouch displays.

Han and his company, Perceptive Pixel, are best known for creating the giant touch wall that John King and others at CNN use to break down elections.

While Apple, Microsoft and others have targeted consumers, Perceptive Pixel has focused on niche professional markets, especially the defense and government sector.

But, after years of watching the small touchscreen device market from the sidelines, Han said he thinks he is pretty close to creating his first products that will run on those devices.

“Mobile is interesting,” he said in an interview last month at his New York offices (in the Manhattan building that Google is buying, with the amazing roof view seen below). “How can you ignore a billion devices being sold every year?”

Han said there is a reason he has stayed focused on the high end of the market.

“I have a personal bias,” he told Mobilized. “I want computers to be functional, not just playful.”

The modern tablet, he said, is the first consumer device that has enough pixels and the precision sensors to potentially be of interest to Perceptive Pixel. In particular, Han said he is intrigued by the idea of using tablets to allow meeting participants to interact with a nearby larger touchscreen that might be in use by someone leading a meeting.

“We’re looking at mobile and slate devices as a way to tie into this family of collaboration [products],” he said, noting that’s where Perceptive Pixel is spending its energy when it comes to mobile, as opposed to coming up with some killer app that works only on smaller screens. “There are a lot of smart people creating mobile apps.”

Han said his first mobile efforts should come out early next year–in the first quarter or early in the second quarter, though he wouldn’t give more specifics.

Whatever Perceptive Pixel ends up doing in the tablet space, Han said his plan is to eventually have it support multiple operating systems, though Han said the company will probably only qualify certain devices. So far, he said, Apple’s iOS and the iPad seem best suited to the applications he has in mind, while the real-time touch performance on Android has certain issues.

“We’re not going to just let it run on anything out there,” he said. “Some of them just can’t guarantee a good user interface.”

Here is the video interview Mobilized did with Han:

[ See post to watch video ]

YouTube Offers a Diet Option for Pudgy PCs: "Feather"

Peter Kafka — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 18:17:49 +0000

Stuck with a slow computer or lousy broadband access, but still want your fill of dogs on skateboards? Check out YouTube Feather, a lightweight version of Google’s (GOOG) video site.

YouTube is rolling out the option today, via its TestTube collection of beta trials. The idea is straightforward: Make the site work better for people who lack high-powered PCs or robust broadband.

Feather users get the same clips, but with fewer options; Feather doesn’t appear to offer the “high-quality” large-screen option, for instance, and many commenting and sharing options have been removed or stripped down.

But if you’re just interested in watching YouTube, none of that is going to matter to you, and you may very well not notice the difference anyway. I might try it whenever I have to use my slow and unreliable Sprint (S) wireless modem.

I don’t think you’ll be able to tell the difference by watching this embedded clip–pretty sure you have to opt-in to the beta for this to work–but worst-case, you get to see Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson chew up the furniture for the umpteenth time.

Boy, Apple’s Design Aesthetic Really Didn’t Rub Off on Kindle 1.0 at All, Did It?

John Paczkowski — Wed, 06 May 2009 10:45:37 +0000

What propitious timing. At a press conference in New York later this morning, Amazon (AMZN) is expected to announce a new large-screen Kindle designed for reading periodicals and textbooks. And yesterday, on the eve of the announcement, came word that the company had been awarded a patent on the original Kindle design. The patent, #D591,741, is entitled “Electronic media reader” and it makes just a single claim:

“The ornamental design for an electronic media reader, as shown and described.”

About as exciting as the original Kindle design it describes, but this isn’t a utility patent, so you can’t really expect much from it. That said, the reference citations it contains are interesting. Among the devices included: the iRex iLiad, the NUUTbook an early prototype of the One Laptop Per Child Foundation’s XO laptop and Apple’s MacBook Pro.

Note: Be sure to see the liveblog of the Amazon announcement in New York by MediaMemo’s Peter Kafka, starting at 10:30 a.m. EDT.

Amazon's Big Book

John Paczkowski — Mon, 04 May 2009 22:58:57 +0000

[ See post to watch video ]

Amazon's Big Book

John Paczkowski — Mon, 04 May 2009 22:58:57 +0000

[ See post to watch video ]