RSS Feeds
Computers
Microsoft Surface Predicts the Election with McCain and Obama Bobbleheads
Posted by Gizmodo US Edition at 7:40 AM on September 9, 2008
MSNBC had an impromptu demonstration of its new Microsoft Surface table this morning, and gave political analyst Chuck Todd a chance to play with his dollies. At first, the goateed Todd moved states around, zooming, colouring and highlighting with his finger. Though he didn't really have a full handle on all the features himself, the demo was pretty much Surface as usual, until he brought out his bobbleheads.
MSNBC had an impromptu demonstration of its new Microsoft Surface table this morning, and gave political analyst Chuck Todd a chance to play with his dollies. At first, the goateed Todd moved states around, zooming, colouring and highlighting with his finger. Though he didn't really have a full handle on all the features himself, the demo was pretty much Surface as usual, until he brought out his bobbleheads.
When Todd placed McCain and Obama bobblehead dolls on the Surface, the national map would change colours to show each candidate's specific chances. Put on the Obama bobblehead, and the map turns varying shades of blue. Use McCain, and it turns red. Then he turned Dark Helmet and made the bobbleheads fight each other, revealing the true reason he ordered them up in the first place. The off-screen newswoman didn't seem too impressed, quipping, "Now the five-year-olds are glued to the television," but I'm 22, so the joke's on her! [MSNBC]
Comments (AU Comments · US Comments)
There are currently no AU comments for this post.
vasha
Posted 8:03 AM 9/9/08
msnbc is so liberal they don't need this technology.
vasha
MagnoliaBoy
Posted 7:55 AM 9/9/08
That's like the 3rd Dark Helmet reference today. Weird.
MagnoliaBoy
wax.
Posted 7:52 AM 9/9/08
The design shop behind the app has a blog with another video posted: [www.vectorform.com]
wax.
Sean Robertson
Posted 7:51 AM 9/9/08
LAME. That's really not a good use of the possibilities of that technology, IMO. More gimicky than revolutionary.
Sean Robertson
praevalesco
Posted 7:47 AM 9/9/08
Irrelevant article Dan... we all know the country is going to be engulfed in a BSoD sooner rather than later.
praevalesco
G-Ram
Posted 7:44 AM 9/9/08
The five year old comment was in reference to him banging dolls up and down.
G-Ram
zanella
Posted 7:43 AM 9/9/08
"Red vs. Blue" would be a very good political campaign indeed. Somebody call the folks from Rooster Teeth!
zanella
m4ximusprim3
Posted 8:38 AM 9/9/08
@WEGGLES90: bah.
m4ximusprim3
m4ximusprim3
Posted 8:38 AM 9/9/08
@zanella: They've got RvB political stuff plastered all over xbox live right now. I never really took the time to watch it, but they're politicizing somehow.
m4ximusprim3
WEGGLES90
Posted 8:36 AM 9/9/08
@zanella:
Sounds like it'd go great with Xbox Live's campaign to get more voters by allowing registration to vote on the 360.
WEGGLES90
fotoplasma
Posted 8:32 AM 9/9/08
Wow, congrats on finally catching up to CNN in terms of bullshit, flashy tech. John King's multitouch screen was pretty impressive in the primary season when it was really useful, and all Chuck Todd had to work with was leftovers from the NFL in the mid 90s. And after the November election, they won't have too much use for this screen until 2012... I would have expected a little more from Microsoft...
fotoplasma
knome
Posted 8:30 AM 9/9/08
@thegriefer:
Has more states but they have less votes than the blue states. Generally they are about even in count right now.
knome
Zomb
Posted 8:20 AM 9/9/08
If they weren't there the scale would flip upside down because of fox's ridiculous amount of conservatism. Hiring Karl Rove come on.
Zomb
thegriefer
Posted 8:17 AM 9/9/08
it looked like mccain had more states
thegriefer
Renegade05
Posted 8:45 AM 9/9/08
John King Laughs at MSNBC
Renegade05
vgart
Posted 9:16 AM 9/9/08
Wow, another useless thing to do on Surface.
vgart
Jon B.
Posted 9:35 AM 9/9/08
@fotoplasma: honestly? You really think that this video from MSNBC justifies the potential of Microsoft Surface?
Go back to Pre-school kiddo
Jon B.
UofITom
Posted 11:58 AM 9/9/08
I saw it...dumb as hell.
UofITom
Faxmonkey
Posted 5:17 PM 9/9/08
@vasha:
MSNBC has more conservative hosts than "liberal" hosts. Scarborough is bad enough, but just to be completely insane they let Pat Buchanan have a show (or two, or 3, who knows, they keep moving him around and sometimes he's just a commentator) and even, for a while, gave Michael Savage his own show (and he's a complete lunatic -- I don't just mean his political views are strange, I mean he's strange from head to toe).
Somehow, though, it takes all of these people to balance out Keith Olberman and to a far, far, far lesser extent Chris Matthews (who admits having voted for George W. Bush).
I'm not quite sure, honestly, what MSNBC's philosophy is -- it seems to be that every time someone criticizes them for being too liberal, they hire another Conservative commentator -- and they just keep on collecting more and more, somehow. Of course that just causes hilarity like we had during the Republican convention when Olberman started to go off on Buchanan.
Faxmonkey
SewerShark
Posted 10:26 PM 9/9/08
@fotoplasma: What does microsoft have to do on how MSNBC uses the surface?
SewerShark