Recently, Microsoft unveiled its latest and greatest revolutionary innovation. Although at first glance, it is a table with an embedded flat screen, Microsoft Surface is the result of several years of hard and secret work and many brilliant innovations. Surface breaks away from the norm, in that it does not use a mouse or a keyboard. It instead relies on touch sensors, as well as a combination of five cameras beneath the projection screen that can recognize various shapes on the surface and wirelessly connect to them, bringing a whole new meaning to click and drag: the user could physically drag files to a device.

The hardware for a Microsoft Surface is going to be unique, as Microsoft will finally begin making their own, as they sense incredible market potential in this very innovative niche. The CEO of Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, has said publicly that this could possibly become a multi-billion dollar industry, with applications ranging from tabletops, to interactive mirrors. It is possible that this will eventually be built into the doors of refrigerators, or embedded into walls, pervading many aspects of everyday life.

Microsoft Surface will be available to Microsoft’s partners, such as T-Mobile, by the end of this year. T-Mobile hopes to use the camera technology to allow a customer at a kiosk to place phones side by side on the table, and have a technical overview appear, certainly a creative application of this incredible platform. This technology should not be long in coming to the rest of the world; a spokesman said that Microsoft hopes to make its products more prevalent in the home, especially in the next three to five years.