Microsoft a Step Ahead of Apple For a Change?

At 12:01 this morning (5/30/07), Microsoft announced a new product they're calling "Surface".  It might be best described as the morning-after result of a coffee table, a computer, and a touch screen monitor on a drunken bender.  Five years in the making, Surface is a computer inside a table where the table top is the display and input device.  There are no mice or keyboards.  Gizmodo has some great footage of Bill Gates demonstrating Surface on the Today show this morning. 

 From the video it's apparent that it recognizes multiple touches simultaneously as you see Bill arranging photos on the tabletop with both hands, which may be the most intuitive interface I've ever seen.  It does seem to be a little slow to respond in that video, especially during the painting segment; hopefully they'll work on that before its official release.  Initial release will unfortunately be for businesses only, but at the $10,000 price tag, it's probably just as well since I can't afford one at the moment.  For the time being I guess I'm just stuck drooling over it.

 Apple's always been on the cutting edge of user interface design, and I'm still in a state of shock that Microsoft has beat them to the punch with this one.  It is being put out by the same design team who worked on the Zune, so I guess there's still a possibility they could fall flat on their face and execute it as poorly as the Zune.  Time will tell.

[tags]Microsoft,Surface,touch screen, user interface, UI, intuitive, Microsoft ahead of Apple?,coffee table, awesome, design, Zune, failure that is the Zune, drool[/tags]