OK, I changed my mind. This is my last and final post today about multi-touch today.
Are Apple users more enthusiastic about multi-touch?
After scanning through various blog posts on multi-touch, I’m begining to wonder if the Apple community is vocally more interested in the technology than lets say those from Microsoft. A quick check using Google’s Blog Search makes it look like this is so. This may be a byproduct of the fact that Apple was the first to demonstrate multi-touch in a mass-shipping product: The iPhone.
I think, however, that the Windows world is also keenly interested in multi-touch too–whether standing up at a multi-touch whiteboard/display, or sitting down at a Microsoft Surface computer, or potentially sharing and sifting through content on a slate Tablet PC.
So far, Google (because of TouchLib) and Apple (because of the iPhone SDK) are early leaders in multi-touch when it comes to giving developers multi-touch tools.
Is multi-touch more slate friendly?
Is it just a coincidence that Apple launched its multi-touch technology on essentially a slate–the iPhone–rather than one of its notebooks? I don’t think so. In fact, I think that multi-touch is more natural and more compelling on a slate-type device. (I’m defining a slate as anything here where there isn’t a predominant, keyboard built-in.)
What does this mean for Tablet PCs? It means that Tablets as they have evolved in the Microsoft sphere (as notebooks with handwriting and touch) are vulnerable to an attack by slates–if and only if slates prove to work well with multi-touch. Take multi-touch away and maybe the Tablet PC convertibles will be safe for awhile.
On the other hand, if multi-touch proves out to be as freeing as I think it might–especially for “slate” surfaces–it could mean a resurgence in slates. This might begin for small handhelds, such as MIDs, as well as large displays and then slowly encroach into the notebook space.
It also might mean that if Apple were to sell a slate (as many rumors have indicated) with multi-touch (supporting native rotating windows and the like, which are very multi-touch friendly), that they could ignite a firestorm of interest in “Tablets.” Nah.
What might a multi-touch slate mean for keyboards that are so important to us now? I’m not sure. Maybe we’ll see them working more side by side with convertibles. At this point I wouldn’t see multi-touch being the key, but rather the interconnectivity between the various computers.