When Microsoft announced the Surface computer weeks ago, anti-Microsoft trolls were quick to frame Microsoft as uninnovative and a copycat. Their arguments included several examples of prior touch computing interfaces including the practical and modest desk shown in the blockbuster movie, “The Island” directed by Michael Bay. Well as it turns out, the interactive desk used by Dr. Merrick was actually a Surface computer, all the way back in 2005.

For those of you who haven’t watched “The Island” (check it out) or forgot this particular scene, it depicts an office environment of the future where a traditional desk, equipment and documents are all replaced by a single interactive desk. In the movie, the desk is shown to be touch-sensitive – responding to both hands and objects like a pen or a ‘control diamond’. The entire table is lit with information and one could open, close documents with the control object.

The main actor is also shown sketching on the table inside a ‘Paint’ application with a pen, later it is dragged across the table and rotated so the other person could see. Both people can interact with the desk at once. In itself, a pretty amazing but believable piece of technology for a science-fiction film. Who would have known it was a real product?

I had a chat with Michael Nguyen who assisted in the production of “The Island”, working on the interior set design, witnessing the Surface first-hand in production.

So how did the Surface fit in? How did you get to acquire such technologies, and how did Microsoft know about the film?

At that time, when Microsoft approached the production team, what was The Surface like? Was it just a beige box with a screen? How much has it been developed and how much did you have to ‘improve’?

In terms of the interface how much of it was functional?

It begs me to ask then, since Surface came later during the production of the movie, what did the script originally have? A wooden desk with pencils and paper notes?

So there you have it, Microsoft did not copy “The Island”. In fact, that might have been the first ever public demonstration of the Surface technology hiding right under our noses and no one knew any better. I wonder then how many other product placements are actually Microsoft developments? Could the time-machine in “Deja Vu” be one too?

Update: A video of the scene has now been uploaded.

I know, you’re probably saying “so what”. But it just blows me away sometimes how they managed to pull off something like this. I mean wouldn’t it have been easier to just use a native application, so they didn’t have to composite a Mac application onto the Windows desktop? And whilst I’m over-analyzing, if you look closely, you’d notice they’re running Windows Vista Beta 2 with the ‘old’ icons and Media Player mini-player. Just a bit of extra useless information for the weekend.

Unless, this is the secret Leopard feature. Kind of like ‘reverse Parallels‘, I’ll call it “Divergence”. 😀

Update: After heavy discussions in the comments, several conclusions can be made about this increasingly stranger commercial.

• Is not Vista: Cut-off Start orb which is a known problem with XP Vista-lookalike themes.
• Is Vista: Taskbar icons are separated. Only Vista separates system icons from third-party icons.
• Is not Vista: Desktop icons have the “My” prefix (ex. “My Documents”). Vista removed this.
• Is Vista: Application button on the taskbar seems to be “Welcome Center”, which is a Vista applicaton.
• Is not a real operating system: Taskbar disappears in another scene.

Somewhere in the list of features ‘cut‘ from Longhorn lies Cariadings – a decorative font that was suppose to ship with Longhorn as the next-generation dingbats. Probably because it’s only a font, and a font you can’t read either, no one really paid any attention to its sudden disappearance compared to whatever that WinFS thing was. Except me of course.

Besides the trademark and patents, all other evidence of Cariadings, the little if any, has been destroyed. Which strikes me as extremely odd since now it appears that Ascender, a company which develops and licenses typefaces has started selling Cariadings together with the rest of the Microsoft ClearType Font Collection. Why didn’t Microsoft ship Cariadings with Windows Vista? Who knows and it’s obviously not going to change.

Designed by Microsoft’s Geraldine Wade, “Cariadings is a decorative symbol font based on simple lines, symmetry and reference to nature. The images are intended as typographic ornaments that can be used as watermarks, border enhancements or icons.”

For $20, you can now buy license Cariadings to get in on a piece of the ornaments and symbols action. The license allows you to use it on up to 5 computers, yeah, like that’s stopped anyone. No details on whether or not this is a royalty-free license – allowing creatives to use the fonts in their work without paying for per eye-ball royalties, potential buyers will have to contact Ascender themselves.

If you’re in a spending mood, you can also buy the entire ClearType collection for $299 if you really love fonts, and I mean really love fonts. Cause I heard, although just an unconfirmed rumor, you can find them in the “C:\Windows\Fonts\” folder. Keep it quiet, just a secret between us okay?

Thanks to Simon from the Microsoft Typography team for the heads up.

You think everything you read about Microsoft is real, but it’s not. They are all apart of a computer simulation, an illusion, called The Microtrix. This is a story about a rebellious group of Microsoft bloggers who wants to find the truth, and won’t let anything get in their way.

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Microsoft Downloads can never keep a good secret, always spilling the beans no matter how many times you point at it (keep it up team!). After all the lies Microsoft had to endure to keep Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (otherwise known as the Second Coming) a forbidden secret, it has been officially confirmed (again) by no other than Microsoft itself. Take that Sinofsky.

A download published only a few hours ago, “Windows Automated Installation Kit Documentation (Windows Server code named “Longhorn” & Windows Vista SP1 Beta 3)“, clearly describes the existence of SP1 not only once, but twice. Here’s proof, just in case it is taken down just as fast as it was published.

However don’t let the “Beta 3” fool you, SP1 is not in Beta 3. The correct name for the download should be, “Windows Automated Installation Kit Documentation (… Windows Vista SP1) Beta 3” to indicate this is the third beta for the WAIK documentation.

Interestingly enough the Word document has a publish date of February 2007. It could be mislabeled, or it indicates SP1 has been in long in development hiding under our radars – although to no surprise.

Looking through the documentation itself presents no new information which might suggest what features SP1 will bring if any. At least for unattended installs, SP1 seems to be much like if not exactly the same as the current version.

Update: I don’t read WinBeta, but they deserve some credit for finding this first.

If you’re thinking of taking a picture of yourself exposing some parts of your lower back region in-front of famous landmarks in Britain with the intentions to see it on national TV, then you might have better chances entering in the BBC London 2012 Olympics logo competition.

When Microsoft Live Labs first showcased the Photosynth software back in July of 2006, everybody knew exactly where they were going with this technology. That is, photo-tourism – the ability to browse a vast virtual 3D space of photographs and other visual materials to recreate the effects of being at the location itself. And the second thing that comes to mind is, where can I submit my photos? Well, you couldn’t, until now.

On top of the BBC’s existing “Your Britain in Pictures” Photosynth galleries, Microsoft has just announced the ability for camera-happy amateurs and enthusiasts like you and me to submit photographs to expand their collection. Although don’t go jumping outside taking pictures of your neighbors just yet, its only limited for a few historical locations. Currently, and for a limited time, tourists of the Ely Cathedral, Burghley House, the Royal Crescent, Bath, the Scottish Parliament buildings and Blackpool Tower Ballroom can have their photo submitted to specially-marked BBC buses for the opportunity for their work to show up in the Photosynth collections or even national TV. Photos will be manually screened. In addition, no words on whether or not photos from the BBC Flickr group will also be allowed.

Historical and user-submitted images will be integrated into the synths to contrast how people interacted with the locations in the past and present. “This opportunity with the BBC allowed us to test the limits of the Photosynth technology by integrating photographs from decades ago of the UK’s historic sites along with those of the general public today.” said Adam Sheppard, group product manager for Microsoft Live Labs.

Hopefully this is just another small step before the giant leap to open up Photosynth for everyone and anyone to contribute with photographs from anywhere.

Photograph by Andrew OBrien
• For anyone who appreciates pictures – imagine being able to wander around entire cities not just from the street-level in the middle of the road looking for obnoxious behavior, but from roof-tops, office windows or even in the air from planes.
• For shutter-bugs – the difference between uploading your photo and have it appear in the Photosynth world can be just 10 seconds – that’s how long it takes for the software to optimize the parameters for each new photograph. With Flickr‘s amazing storage, tagging and mapping capabilities, similar photos can help expand each other’s meta information with rich information on where the picture was taken and what the picture is of.

But if you’ve already traveled the world and photo-tourism doesn’t interest you one bit, then imagine a real-estate house tour with Photosynth. It would be light years ahead of slide-shows or even more complicated Quicktime VR presentations. No more, “hey that door wasn’t there in the picture” or “this kitchen feels smaller”.