By Evan Ackerman
It’s not often that the keyboard gets revolutionized (Dvorak, anyone?), but Zacod is giving it a shot with an innovative new type of keyboard for mobile devices. The Zacod MK-100 concept keyboard condenses a full size keyboard into almost an effective tenth of the size by making each key into a little joystick. When you push a key, rocking it on it’s axis allows you to select up 9 different characters. It works with both physical keypads and touchscreens, and Zacod claims (“claims” being the key word here) that you can input faster on a Zacod keyboard than on a conventional QWERTY.
The obvious downside here is that in order to take advantage of the Zacod keyboard, you’ll have to retrain yourself out of QWERTY mode, which is self perpetuating due to its ubiquity. It’s kinda like the Windows vs. Linux debacle: Linux may be a better OS, but Windows is already everywhere, and by the time you’re competent enough to make the (right?) decision, it’s too late and you’re too lazy to switch. Your only other option would be to dual boot your fingers, but that’s unhealthy.
And dang it if I’m not happy I managed to make it through this article without accidentally typing “Zaphod.”
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