Microsoft Faculty Summit

Microsoft chief research and strategy officer Craig Mundie says future computers will do more work for people autonomously with less reliance on human input. "I've lately taken to talking about computing more as going from a world where today they work at our command to where they work on our behalf," Mundie says. At Microsoft's recent annual Faculty Summit, Mundie addressed a group of university professors and government officials. He emphasized that computers are still only tools, and that unless users have done an apprenticeship to learn how to master the tool they are unlikely to use computers to their full capabilities. Microsoft's shift in focus to more autonomous computers comes after 10 to 15 years of working to enhance human-computer interfaces, including handwriting, gesture, voice, and touch interaction. "The question is, Can't we change the way in which people interact with machines such that they are much better to anticipate what you want to do and provide a richer form of interaction?" Mundie asks. He compares the current shift in computing technology to when people realized they could use video cameras to piece together pieces of film to create a movie, instead of just recording entire plays. In one demonstration, Mundie used gestures to move documents and files around wall surfaces in the office of the future, where any surface is part of a virtual world, and used a virtual keyboard on the screen in his desk.