Dr Pangloss

In an age where the phone in your pocket is smarter than the computer that put men on the Moon, have you ever paused to wonder why one aspect of computing—physical interfaces—is so startlingly static? The keyboards we type on are essentially identical not only to those used on the very first home computers, but to 19th-century typewriters. It's a bit like using reins to drive an F1 car. Even the mouse has hardly changed in 25 years.

Keyboards and mice are still with us because they work, of course. If you know how to use them, they're quick and easy. Moreover, like the arrangement of letters on a keyboard, they have become too familiar simply to sweep away—attempts to transform or replace them in the past have invariably foundered. Yet, gradually, the possibility of a very different interface revolution is arising.

Today, $200 could buy you a device known as a NeuroSky headset: the first generation of computer interfaces to operate entirely via brainwaves. It sounds like science fiction, yet it works off the shelf, using dry sensors to measure brain activity. In the earliest demonstration of its potential, users can pop it on and then manipulate a (real) ball in a tube hooked up to a computer just by thinking about it. Or, for $190, you can pick up a Novint Falcon controller—which replaces your mouse with a ping-pong ball-sized device attached at its base to sensors and motors. This allows users to feel and interact with various textures, such as slippery surfaces or liquids, and experience the weight of objects. Couple this to the burgeoning fields of motion-sensitivity (you don't even need to hold Microsoft's latest device, the Natal: you just move your hands in front of it) and advanced voice recognition software, and taste is the only sense left out.



The possibilities are vast, not least for those less able to use the traditional keyboard and mouse combo, either due to inexperience, age, infirmity or disability. Beyond this, though, lies a notion of interacting with machines and virtual worlds that's quite different to anything we've seen before. And it's happening faster than you'd think.