Holosphere: With a sigh Pauline plucked one data plaque from a jumble of the wide wafer-thin reading devices. This one was dialled to the latest issue of Nature...
For a long time, the paperless office has been beckoning us with the prospect of an uncluttered workplace.
However, such a prospect has to work hard to overcome the sheer convenience of a sheet of paper!
The data plaques in the novel appear to be an attempt to reconcile the two: a paper like web interface that is as cheap to produce, and which results in the same level of clutter!
Plus ca change...!
Status
Likely. However, I suspect there would be one or two per person: you can stack windows on a *virtual* desktop as well as a real one, can't you?
Reality
The technology is already available. The real concept under discussion here is a portable and convenient web interface. PalmPilots, blackberry notepads and the like are a start but are still rather primitive compared with what Brin describes.
Prototype 'flexible' screen technology has existed for some time. Couple this with touch sensitive technology to allow annotations, and what more do you need?
The favourite contender for this idea is currently LED. However, Organic LEDs (OLED) are also showing promise. A better match to what was depicted in the novel may be electronic ink, which has low power requirements, but which is also very slow to refresh.
References
- OLED's: The Future of Light? - Jeremy Faludi
- Electronic Ink - How Stuff Works
- A discussion of Graphics Tablets
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