Seminar on Dangerous Ideas - Harry Potter's next wand

Sounds like a good talk. They should work on getting lighting to shoot out of the wand.

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Harry Potter
Dangerous Ideas Seminar Series Fall 2005
Speaker: Larry Rudolph
Speaker Affiliation: MIT CSAIL
Host: Metin Sezgin
Host Affiliation: MIT CSAIL

Date: 10-25-2005
Time: 1:00 PM - 2:00 AM
Refreshments: 12:45 PM
Location: D449 Kiva

Title: Harry Potter's Next Wand: Should it be digital?


Harry Potter and other wizards preferred input-output device is a wand rather than a laptop, PDA, or cell phone.
This informal presentation will discuss the merits of a portable computer that looks more like a wand or walking stick rather than the current pack of playing cards.

A stick or cylindrical tube can be held in the hand and carried around.
It allows many arrays of sensors to be placed along the length at
precise, equally spaced locations. It seems ideally suited for many
input/output functions.

Many people have strong opinions about form factors, and this proposal oppears to challenge them. Must we continue to make interfaces smaller and smaller?
Must we continue to make them rectangular? Must they all be approved for use on an airplane? Come to the seminar and express your opinion.