|
|
|
|
|
|
by scottishcow
2643 days ago
|
|
|
Brings back memories of tangible interface research around the year 2000, these ideas seemed to have so much potential back then. Unfortunately nobody has come up with a convincing argument as to exactly why we need tangibles, aside from some philosophical musings that fetishize the supposed "richness" of real-world interaction. The value proposition of tangibles took an especially hard blow when smartphones hit the market — multi-touch direct input achieves much of what tangibles promise to offer (e.g., intuitiveness) while retaining all of the benefits of digital computation (e.g., portability of data, negligible marginal cost of production) that are sacrificed in systems like Dynamicland. |
|
|
i am not sure i understand how appealing to human experience is a fetishization.
> multi-touch direct input achieves much of what tangibles promise to offer (e.g., intuitiveness)
i fully disagree about the intuitiveness of multi-touch inputs which tend to have a hidden gesture language. simply trying every possible permutation of touches and gestures, which is what most people do when presented with a new touch interface, does not represent intuitiveness. buttons, sliders, switches, etc. always yield much more efficient and intuitive interfaces.
also, humans are not digital computers, and we struggle to think like them. humans really like the physical world we're born into, and our senses respond positively to things that trigger them. our senses are dulled when interacting with digital computers. look at the synthesizer world. it's a common fact that software synthesizers are extremely flexible and convenient (in some ways, not so in others) but are monotonous to interact with. people often (almost always?) augment them with tangible external interfaces such as knobs, buttons, and keyboards. people tend to much prefer hardware synths (digital or analog based) that they can touch, feel, smell, see, etc. it creates a tangible environment that is much more enjoyable.