Nokia and the emotional phone
Nokia's latest patent extends the sensors of a phone beyond the confines of the touchscreen and out into the 3D space surrounding the phone itself. This lets phone track the physical hand movement of the user, and respond to those accordingly.
What type of movements? Well, how about the following:
Select: - Picking up gesture - Finger 1 at a display corner or some reserved area, Finger 2 moves slowly under a displayed object to be selected
Copy: - when selected, click by single finger on the object
Paste: - fast double click by a single finger
Move: - move slowly two fingers located on moving objects
Delete: - double (fast) click by two fingers on previously selected object
Switch: - switching (on/off) is based on change in directions of fingers movement or, alternatively, on a change in finger acceleration
Select object attributed to the pointer position: Open/closed hand
Forward/Backward Browsing: anticlockwise/clockwise cyclic rotation by a single finger
Zoom in/Out: expand/close two fingers
Run/Execute pre-selected icon/command: make a circle with your thumb and pointing finger (an OK sign)
In other words, Nokia foresees the time when we'll interact with our phones using some variant of sign language!
As UnwiredView points out, this is just a patent application, and doesn't necessarily represent reality. Personally, I can't see a phone being developed that requires this degree of hand gestures to control it, as it's far from intuitive. You need to learn a whole new set of gestures to control the phone, which is no different from having to learn a new set of commands or new series of menu items to select.
The whole point of gesture-based interfaces is to make the user interface more intuitive, not less. And let's not even mention the letters R, S and I!
However, this is still a powerful way of getting a phone to interact with its environment, and even if Nokia doesn't use the ideas contained within this patent for a phone's user interface, you could still create some pretty amazing applications with it.
Imagine interacting with a Nintendogs-like game with this interface, where you actually make the gestures to stroke your virtual pet, rather than just rubbing its head with a stylus.
Equally, deleting the contact details of your ex-girlfriend simply by the flick of a dismissive finger would certainly be more satisfying than pressing the delete key! And just think of the joy it would give to chavs, who could end an argumentative phone call by flashing their palm at the phone and shouting a withering "whatever!"
People like expressing themselves using gestures, and the more emotional we get, the more expressive our gestures become. Having a phone that responds to these emotional gestures would make it much more a part of us than any technology we've had before, and would certainly compel us to treat the phone as a personal item, like a favourite pair of shoes, rather than as yet another faceless hi-tech gadget that we change twice a year.
The first generation of the Nokia S60 touch most likely won't feature this technology - but with this new patent, you can bet the second generation will. If you thought the iPhone's interface was great, just wait until you use an emotional phone!
For more details, visit http://mobilementalism.com/2008/01/10/nokias-new-emotional-phone-technology/
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