Somatic Digital's eTouchBook

[igorsk]

The site sounds like they're almost desperate to sell the technology to anyone, but it does look interesting.

The TUI technology enables a reader to press the pictures and words on the regular printed ink and paper page and retrieve digital content or launch communication applications like email, IM, and VOIP from a digital appliance like a computer. This technology, in essence, turns the printed material into a remote control to digital content.

The technology is based upon a sensor-based system that is housed where the cardboard in a hardback book resides.

http://www.somaticdigital.com/products/tui/

[DixieGal]

I had something similar about 10 yrs ago. It connected with a wire, like a mouse, but it was "something cat." You could scan bar codes in magazines and things and it was supposed to take you to the product website. I never really got it to work right, but it was probably a user error.

[awi]

I think enhanced pdf's/texts on future ereaders/iphone/tablet PC's will be far more useful than this awkward contraption

[LeisureSuitLarry]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

I had something similar about 10 yrs ago. It connected with a wire, like a mouse, but it was "something cat." You could scan bar codes in magazines and things and it was supposed to take you to the product website. I never really got it to work right, but it was probably a user error.

Was this the Cue-Cat? I remember seeing ads for it on the Dallas Morning News around 2000 or so. As I recall, it was a complete and utter failure. Almost no one bought it and most people had never even heard of it. This is in spite of the fact that they talked about it every night on one of the local news shows and you couldn't buy a newspaper without seeing something about it. Oddly enough, one of the local radio stations there still uses it as the punchlines of jokes every so often.

[DixieGal]

Yes! Cue-Cat! Exactly!

[Donnageddon]

What a fascinating story... CueCat

[Donnageddon]

Originally Posted by igorsk

The site sounds like they're almost desperate to sell the technology to anyone, but it does look interesting.



http://www.somaticdigital.com/products/tui/

It is ironic that one of the last images in their video is money flying out of a wallet...

[DixieGal]

Originally Posted by Donnageddon

What a fascinating story... CueCat

From the other link: "...while Debbie Barham of the Evening Standard quipped that the CueCat 'fails to solve a problem which never existed.' "

That about sums it up.

[2bStealthy]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

From the other link: "...while Debbie Barham of the Evening Standard quipped that the CueCat 'fails to solve a problem which never existed.' "

That about sums it up.

From their website:

Mission: Simply put, our goal is to reinvigorate the print industry.

Vision: We intend to create an ecosystem of products and services around enabling regular printed pages to act as a touch screen user interface to the digital environment.