Post 3

I read the following article from the 2010 CHI conference:
 http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/redmond/groups/cue/publications/harrisonskinputchi2010.pdf

It is entitled: Skinput: Appropriating the Body as an Input Surface. The article describes an input system for mobile devices that uses the skin as an input surface. The purported advantages of this system are that it is very compact/mobile, since the skin itself is always carried around anyway, and it allows for very intuitive use, since people have a natural spacial sense of their own body.

The system utilizes "bioacoustics". The user wears an armband on the upper arm containing an array of vibration sensors. When the user touches different parts of their arms, the sensors can detect, through vibrations in the skin and bones, where the user touched their fingers, hand, wrist, or arm. The researchers tested this input system by pairing it with projections on the arm in order to create keypads, scrolling menus, and other UI's.

I was surprised by the accuracy of the sensors in the system. The mobility, ease of use, and aesthetics of the Skinput system strike me as a natural next step in the progression of mobile technology.