Monday, July 18, 2005 |
11:37 - Tickle these ivories
http://www.artlebedev.com/portfolio/optimus/
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Wow. Seems high-tech capitalism has really started to take hold in Russia.
Check it out: a keyboard where every single key is a miniature, individual full-color OLED array, with programmable labels. It's platform-agnostic, low-cost, and designed by some fun-loving geeks working in the shadow of the Kremlin. (Just take a look at the column of information down the right side of the page. These guys remind me of nobody so much as Panic.)
They've managed to out-Apple Apple, as said Chris who forwarded me this link. This is the solution to the age-old stupidity of Mac keyboards that refer to the modifier keys (Shift, Option, Ctrl, Command) using symbols, and yet don't print those symbols on the keys. This would be a possible solution. (And surely one they've thought of, given the place of prominence the iTunes icon has in the programmable function key bar.)
You can program the key caps for European or Dvorak layouts, Photoshop tools, Quake actions—I'm sure these images are all mock-ups, but assuming it works, the possibilities are literally endless, and one wonders why this has been so long in coming.
'Course, if it's from Russia, does that mean it comes with a built-in key logger...?
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