Microsoft has released Seadragon for the iPhone. Seadragon is the core technology behind Microsoft's Photosynth application, which allows users to construct clouds of imagery and other data and then navigate them much like Google Maps. The iPhone app basically applies the same concept in a mobile environment, leveraging the multitouch screen.

 

There's a video here showing it in action:

http://livelabs.com/blog/seadragon-goes-mobile/

 

It's an interesting idea, and it's also making waves in the Microsoft community because it's an awkward acknowledgment that the Windows Mobile OS isn't up to this sort of thing.

I think it might be because of the dependency on multitouch, which isn't available for Windows Mobile devices.

 

This is the same application Microsoft had originally demonstrated on the Surface, which also uses multitouch.

Oh that's right -- good memory. From what I understand they plan to include multitouch in Windows 7 (due out next year, which as everyone knows is the year 2014), so I guess they're planning ahead.

Late to the thread but I have to say that multitouch on a computer is completely pointless. I saw a demo of it on a laptop and thought "why the hell would you want that on your laptop?" The reason it works so well on the iPhone is because of the size of the thing. I don't want to be dragging my fingers all over my considerably larger laptop screen.

 

Surface will supposedly have its uses in shops and soforth, but really I'm quite happy with my keyboard and mouse for my computing needs.