…new gadgets in the Clayton household to play with. The all new Arc Touch Mouse.

Oh and the countdown to Kinect is in full effect here in Redmond – this is one of the huge interactive LED screens, this one in Studio B.

have a great weekend!

Some more glimpses of how the future may look, courtesy of Freescale Semiconductor. There are some consistent themes in here from the Office 2019 video around computers becoming more of an aide and screen technology showing significant advances. I think the tablet metaphor is somewhat overused in these videos as people are more likely to use phones for many of the tasks. I do like the look of the transparent laptop in their networking video though

They also have an automotive version and industrial and the idea of self parking car appeals to me. In all seriousness, I love seeing this type of video as it helps to paint the vision of the future and gives more credence to the work that is going on in research to create this future. The question is whether that’s the future people want?

cool video from an Open Innovation experiment from The Astonishing Tribe.

What we think of as a screen or display is set to change a lot in the coming years. Only last week Engadget posted about LG showing off a 9.7-inch color e-paper display and a 19-inch flexible e-paper display with speculation that we’ll see them in mass production by the end of the year. I’m not sure about that but we’re definitely moving in that direction where we think less about sitting in front of a screen and more about any surface having display capability. It starts to open up all sorts of possibilities – lots of which are in this video and more you can see in the Office 2019 video.

Our own Envisioning Lab here at Microsoft shows the potential of large touchscreens and the Microsoft Home which is right around the corner from it, augments our life with screens on all manner of surfaces. They're both simulated environments so the 2019 video and the one above I think are great examples of how this stuff really comes to life.

Here’s one experiment you can try to see how screen size opens more potential. I was sat in an office last week that had very comfy seats and great sound system and projector. It’s the kind of space I wished I had at home and I did something I’m surprised I’d not really done before. I hooked up my laptop to the projector which turned a wall in to my screen. The real estate that gave me to visualize what I was working on was incredible. It was a dramatically different experience.

Give it a try…see what you think.

Young Kim talks about the design process behind the Arc Touch Mouse that we announced today. I mentioned earlier this week the design culture we have here at Microsoft and I think some of that comes through in this video. I got to spend time in the model shop you see in this video where a bunch of artisans create models and prototypes by hand and it’s inspiring stuff.

The other thing I love about this video is what it’s not. It’s now a Windows 7 House Party video. It’s a guy who is clearly passionate about what he does and talking about it in pretty much plain English. We have lots more folks around like that and hopefully we’ll see more of this type of content in the future. II hope it shows there is a beating heart around Microsoft, not a cultural void.

Okay, this is hardly a surprise now given all the leaks and peeks but I thought I’d give you my impressions of the Arc Touch Mouse having played with one of these a few weeks back. Todd Bishop nails is pretty well in his summary – this isn’t an Apple Magic Mouse competitor and though there is some funky touch tech in the “scroll wheel” the really interesting part of this mouse is it’s ability to fold flat. The current Arc mouse is a lovely design IMHO and folds down pretty small but this thing has some funky engineering that makes the rear of the mouse fold in what I can only describe as a concertina effect. I spent more time folding and unfolding – marvelling at the engineering and design effort. When folded, it’s less than 15mm thick – basically the thickness of the batteries inside which become the limiting factor.

The rodent itself is available for pre-order now from Amazon, Bestbuy and Buy.com for $69.99 and yes, I will be getting one  

Tonnes more info at http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/arctouchmouse/ and the MS hardware blog