Gesture activated interfaces are already available and will grow in 
sophistication. Right now, most people think of the Wii or the  Kinect 
when they think of gesture interfaces, but motion capture can be 
obtained a lot of ways. Already, one company uses a single-channel 
Theramin to detect gestures from your hand while driving, and, in 
theory, you could use THAT strategy to  understand finger-spelling or  a 
full blown sign language, if you worked out the details (multi-channel 
theramin aren't common yet, last I checked, which is why I wasn't first 
to market with the idea -that, and the fact that you couldn't lug a 
tower machine around with you to do the AI which is what was required, 
even for a one channel recognizer, when I first came up with the idea). 
Eventually, such systems will detect verbal/gesture commands, comments, 
and even your emotional state.

And "mind reading" (via EEG) is already being used as the control 
interface for Second Life for therapy with totally paralyzed  people and 
you can get a home gaming version as well.

Lawson

On 3/29/12 9:48 AM, Craig Latta wrote:
> Hi Chris--
>
>> Most obviously, the power of pointing is gone.  *Pointing* at
>> something provides a non-mutative way to interact with another entity
>> (person or computer).  You can't do that with an iPad -- you can only
>> "click" (e.g., agitate the interface).
>       Well, you can also press and hold. I think that's the current touch
> equivalent to hovering.
>
>> Also, with touch-screen interfaces, the back of my hand is constantly
>> occluding the UI itself and the screen gets finger prints.  This
>> reduces immersive effectiveness by reminding you that you're just
>> looking and interacting with a *screen*, not the world of objects
>> rendered on that screen..
>       True, but in my own use I think the tradeoffs are a net win.
>
>
>       cheers,
>
> -C
>
> --
> Craig Latta
> www.netjam.org/resume
> +31   6 2757 7177
> + 1 415  287 3547
> + 1 510  282 7468
>
>
>
>