Here comes Sphere: Microsoft debuts computing in round

Published on July 29th, 2008

Posted by John C Dvorak in Technology, Video

Here comes Sphere: Microsoft debuts computing in round
Flat-panel displays might be all the rage, but at least in some situations, Microsoft thinks the shape of things to come might be a sphere.

After months of rumors, Microsoft researchers are taking the wraps off a prototype that uses an internal projection and vision system to bring a spherical computer display to life. People can touch the surface with multiple fingers and hands to manipulate photos, play games, spin a virtual globe, or watch 360-degree videos.

Sphere, as its known, is expected to be shown publicly for the first time Tuesday at Microsofts Faculty Summit in Redmond. For now, its purely a research project. The company says it doesnt have plans to offer it as a product. The idea is to see what the technology can do and how people will use it.

27 users responded in " Here comes Sphere: Microsoft debuts computing in round "

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# 1 Ah_Yea said, on July 29th, 2008 at 2:14 pm

A niche product, at best. A very cool niche product, though.

# 2 Don said, on July 29th, 2008 at 2:22 pm

Yea, very cool.

It will first be used at trade shows but who knows what applications will be dreamed up in a few years.

It would be really amazing if MS would sink a ton of money into basic R&D. Hire groups of smart people all around the world, link them up, and just let them dream. Without the pressure of churning out a profitable widget next year. They could be the BELL LABS of the IT world. Churn out a bunch of inovative ideas, and cheaply liscense them out for commercial development.

It will never happen, but is sure fun to dream sometimes.

Don

# 3 pedro said, on July 29th, 2008 at 2:25 pm

This is old. At mac headquarters, they implanted something like this to Steve’s personal assistant. That way, whenever he wants to show his ideas on a meeting, he puts his hands over his assistence’s head to make the presentation.

# 4 pedro said, on July 29th, 2008 at 2:31 pm

Then again, it could have been Redmond and Ballmer’s head. These companies are so alike these days that I get confused.

# 5 GregAllen said, on July 29th, 2008 at 2:32 pm

The coffee table screen seemed more useful but I’ve never seen one of them in use, yet.

What I have been seeing are floor pads in malls that are “foot sensitive” on which a screen is projected.

I’ve only seen it used for ads but it seem like it could be used for information in museums or similar.

# 6 Ed Roberts said, on July 29th, 2008 at 2:32 pm

How come every touch surface has to demo with dragging and resizing pictures? How does this help me in my EVERY DAY computing environment?

# 7 Mister Mustard said, on July 29th, 2008 at 2:40 pm

Aw jeez. Fuck this shit. Howzabout they spend some money finally making an operating system that’s not a piece of shit.

That would go a long way towards restoring their credibility. Maybe their stock could break $30.

MSFT may dream about being Bell Labs, but it’s more likely that Wal*Mart will become the next Bell Labs than that MSFT will be.

Hacks.

# 8 FirstTimeCaller said, on July 29th, 2008 at 2:45 pm

Hmmm… if I had to demo a spherical display to someone at the Seattle Post Intelligencer. I wonder what I would put on it???

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/facts/piglobe.shtml

# 9 Breetai said, on July 29th, 2008 at 2:47 pm

Looks fantastic! Unfortunately it’s totally useless.

# 10 hhopper said, on July 29th, 2008 at 3:03 pm

It would be cool with Google Earth on it.

# 11 adogg4629 said, on July 29th, 2008 at 3:16 pm

I hope they mount this on the coffee table and combine the two, so we could have one really kick ass game of pong. Other then that I’m at a loss as to its use.

# 12 shenzhov said, on July 29th, 2008 at 3:27 pm

@#7

Agree, but the less they spend on making a stable OS, the more time Apple and Linux have to eat their falling market share.

# 13 jccalhoun said, on July 29th, 2008 at 3:30 pm

ummmm… why? When I heard about spherical I imagined that it would be a screen that wrapped around you not a ball.

# 14 Alex said, on July 29th, 2008 at 3:38 pm

GREAT! Now you can see the viruses invade Vista in 3D!!! WOOHOO!!! Way to go Microsoft! Once again proving how out of touch, (pun), Microsoft is. Get it together guys. The only use for this would be at a museum. That would be the only organization that would pay for this boat anchor. It will never underwrite the R&D for this. And by the way…. this ball and the table thing that they have shown really lags, when you touch it. I guess Ballmer is going to go right from the Zune to a hand-held ball phone…. (insert product name here “zBall” or somthing). And we all know were he can stick that….

# 15 TThor said, on July 29th, 2008 at 3:55 pm

And what the hell is this to be used for. Just as fun as the tabletop they released a year or two ago… but where is the business model for this one. 10 hotels in Las Vegas, and 23 Freudian analysts??? You guys have to come up with something better… this is simply LAME!!!

# 16 admfubar said, on July 29th, 2008 at 4:17 pm

wow bill gates retires and the company fiinally gets some balls….

# 17 Jägermeister said, on July 29th, 2008 at 4:36 pm

#6 – Ed Roberts – How come every touch surface has to demo with dragging and resizing pictures?

I’m sure it’s to get the early adopters going. I’m sure there are a lot of people out there with 10s of thousands of *cough* porn *cough* images that needs to be sorted. This tool would help them.

# 18 TomB said, on July 29th, 2008 at 4:41 pm

Personally, I think it is useless. It wouldn’t be much good except for displaying globes. And then you have the problem of zooming. Scale would be totally screwed up.

I would much rather have a big flat screen pushed by a powerful video card. Then I could simulate a globe and scale and do everything I would like to do.

Perhaps someone will come up with a neat use for it, but I don’t see it. Seriously, I can only see one side at a time anyhow.

# 19 Greg Allen said, on July 29th, 2008 at 5:10 pm

How about for fortune tellers? The crystal ball is so early 20th Century.

Try as I might, I can’ think of a porn use for it.

# 20 Greg Allen said, on July 29th, 2008 at 5:16 pm

oh… I forgot.

The one I think I saw somewhere that seemed useful was cubicle/office walls that were computer monitors.

When I worked in media and publishing we’d have print outs pinned up all over the walls and even on the floors — and on THOSE we had post it notes plastered all over.

It would be so cool to have them digitally on my walls and then moved around with laser pointer or something similar. Then, as other staff are working on them, they would be updated in all locations at once.

I would imagine there are lot of projects who could use something like this — anywhere you have tons and tons of details that all need to be brought together.

In between projects, I could have cool surf scenes or classic paintings.

# 21 James Hill said, on July 29th, 2008 at 7:41 pm

This is nothing more than a sign of impending doom: All other once-great tech companies came out with cool shit right before they fell apart.

# 22 Glenn E. said, on July 29th, 2008 at 8:42 pm

It might be more useful as a bowl shape. As in toilet or sink. Complete with the hole zone, in the middle, for deleting content. How are you suppose to delete stuff on a globe, drop it on the pacific ocean (that garbage vortex)? Anyway.

A globe is about as useful at displaying general information as the food pyramid is at telling us what to eat. But for displaying large scale geographic info, it will probably be ideal. And maybe other “round” things, like the human head. But is it really that practical, to go running around the other side of the display, to see all of it. Or simply using 3D software, on a flat display, and rotating the image, as we do now? This will be another rich man’s toy. We’ll see a giant version of it in a James Bond movie, someday. The evil tycoon will have half a dozen of, displaying all that he owns, or plans to own. Which reminds me, we’ve seen that already in, “The Spy Who Loved Me”. And a flat project of the oceans would have worked just as well, if not better. Because who could have seen the northern pacific on that huge round thing? Did it revolve to face the operator? I doubt it.

# 23 Hmeyers said, on July 29th, 2008 at 8:43 pm

#21 for the win

Vista’s big “feature” was the default theme it came with it.

A THEME! The Aero _theme_

7 years of development for a theme.

# 24 the answer said, on July 30th, 2008 at 4:54 am

Somebody’s been watching too many sci fi movies. Obviously inspired by poor thought. Only application I can see is true 3d imaging for a few things like heart transplants, but what else?

#19 you can rotate the couple doing it 360 in real time.

# 25 JimD said, on July 30th, 2008 at 6:20 am

M$ seems to be trotting out a lot of “New Technology” – this sphere, the surface, but they seem to have skipped over the Point and the Line, geometrically speaking. Too bad they can’t seem to perfect their other “New Technology” – NT, or is it XP, or Vista !!! They seem to have brought their “Cash Cow” in for the SLAUGHTER, while they spend BILLIONS chasing the Illusive Butterfly of Internet Advertising and compete with Google !!! Does M$ need NEW MANAGEMENT ???

# 26 Brian said, on July 30th, 2008 at 9:06 am

Listen to the pathetic apple fanboys calling foul on this, when, if it was apple, we’d be hearing from these same losers how revolutionary it is.

# 27 huh said, on July 31st, 2008 at 11:44 am

I was waiting to see the evil witch and her monkeys!!

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