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179 points joelkesler | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.201s | source
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AndrewKemendo ◴[] No.46257861[source]
The computer form factor hasn’t changed since the mainframe: look into a screen for where to give input, select visual icons via a pointer, type text via keyboard into a text entry box, hit an action button, recieve result, repeat

it’s just all gotten miniaturized

Humans have outright rejected all other possible computer form factors presented to them to date including:

Purely NLP with no screen

head worn augmented reality

contact lenses,

head worn virtual reality

implanted touch sensors

etc…

Every other possible form factor gets shit on, on this website and in every other technology newspaper.

This is despite almost a century of a attempts at doing all those and making zero progress in sustained consumer penetration.

Had people liked those form factors they would’ve been invested in them early on, such that they would develop the same way the laptops and iPads and iPhones and desktops have evolved.

However nobody’s even interested at any type of scale in the early days of AR for example.

I have a litany of augmented and virtual reality devices scattered around my home and work that are incredibly compelling technology - but are totally seen as straight up dogshit from the consumer perspective.

Like everything it’s not a machine problem, it’s a human people in society problem

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1. AnimalMuppet ◴[] No.46258251[source]
I do not see laptop computers as the same form factor as mainframes. At. All.

Even more, I don't see phones as the same form factor as mainframes.