The Tablet PC
"Microsoft thinks it will revolutionize the world. No, it's not the latest version of Windows, it's a new type of computer-the Tablet PC. Imagine a notebook computer combined with a pad of paper. Take notes in a meeting with a pen, and then type on its stow-away keyboard in your office. Use it to read journals, email and newspapers. Use it to stay connected everywhere, including the executive washroom. Sound too good to be true? Will Tablet PC revolutionize business, or is it just another passing fad, like the GridPad, Eo and Momenta pen computers of the twentieth century?" So says Ziff Davis Media about an upcoming seminar on the self-same subject, sponsored by Fujitsu (57% of the world's tablet PC market).

Hmmm. Having spent several months this summer doing an ethnographic study of a Tablet PC system at a UK hospital, and having had discussions recently with various manufacturers and 'solution providers' (as they love to dub themselves) about vertical markets for held devices, I'm not convinced that any of these people know what they're talking about. These people have a buch of devices but don't know the markets, who might use them or how. Hence the demand for user studies from people like me. Back to the 'technology-driven' view of development? (cf. Manuel Castells, Harold Wilson and others)