By now, you’ve probably already heard of Microsoft’s former ‘top secret’ project, known as Surface, which is a table-shaped computer that boasts a 30″ touch screen for interactive ‘touch’ computing. It’s certainly a great idea, but everyone seems to be missing the fact that this technology has been done before, in a prototype known as Bumptop.

The YouTube video (shown above) of Bumptop was added just a little under 1 year ago, and has since become the #1 watched video with over 1.8 million views to date.

The Microsoft Surface video (shown above) looks exactly like Bumptop, despite being a bit more polished.

Microsoft claims its idea for Surface came about in 2001, but oddly enough, no one from Microsoft, or anywhere else for that matter had mentioned this technology in the past. The idea is being played off as a ‘top secret’ project from Microsoft, justifying the delay in the announcement.

So was Surface dreamed up after Bumptop? Would you put it past Microsoft to copy someone else’s technology, fabricate a history for it, and 1 year later release its ’future computing interface?’ 

I hate to make any assumptions, but the cards are on the table; you decide. 

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Entry was posted on Thursday, May 31st, 2007 at 5:06 am under Microsoft, Opinion, Technology.

Read more entries by George Gardner.
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