3D display could soon bring touch to the digital world

colorado.edu

42 points·curiousObject··8 comments

This seems extremely rudimentary. I was hoping for at least some sort of high resolution pinscreen [1] technology with actuators, with a pixel at the top of each pin.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuir24PLt-8

Seems lower resolution than the MIT Media Lab Inform project from years and years ago.

https://tangible.media.mit.edu/project/inform/

From the paper [1]:

> However, these existing approaches typically face multiple drawbacks which limit their proposed applications, including (i) surface discontinuities

Which cites the MIT inFORM project (3 in the references).

[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-39842-2

These articles should really just come out and say the obvious: these could be used to augment sexual experiences.

Is our future AI generated visuals and audio via VR goggles while under “3D touch” blankets?

UnderCover: “Bringing the Digital to the Digital”

… I mean, unlikely. For some people, perhaps, but I’d imagine it would always be very niche. Most people would presumably just, well, have sex.

Saw similar tech at Microsoft a decade ago. Use case I saw was to raise buttons on software keyboards. Here’s an article on the patent from 2010: https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/microsoft-patents-bumpy-...

Clippy: "Are you excited to see me?"

[Button raises]

. . .

Still could be worth implementing, for switching major modes in apps. E.g. when browsing one may not need the alphanumeric keys, until a textfield is highlighted.

Easier alternative is manipulate the nervous system, i.e. extremely low power shocks, like how real life works. Or pneumatics.

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