Microsoft erects a giant Surface tablet in the center of London

By Omoyele Olatunji on October 24, 2013 06:00 am Email : engineertunji@outlook.com

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Microsoft has a fascination with big screens. The software giant has demonstrated Windows 8 on its 82-inch Perceptive Pixel PC and created giant displays with Kinect built in. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates even uses a giant 80-inch Windows 8 display occasionally. Today, however, Microsoft is going one step further. At one of London’s biggest tourist attractions, Trafalgar Square, the company has created a 383-inch Surface tablet.

Sitting right next to Nelson’s Column, the giant Surface dwarfs all the other historic statues at Trafalgar Square. Microsoft built the structure in around 12 hours, and it's 27 feet wide and 17 feet high, making it a roughly 383-inch display. A purple Type Cover 2 has been recreated, with keys that feed back to a Surface Pro 2 nearby. Microsoft is letting nearby school kids play on the keyboard with a spelling game. It’s all connected via USB and Micro HDMI and you can jump on the keys to control the input. The company has even built space around the keys so you can walk around them before you select the correct key to jump on. We tried the keyboard with the Twitter app for Windows 8, and it worked surprisingly well.

It’s all a publicity stunt in the center of London, designed to market Microsoft’s recently released Surface 2. Thousands of tourists and workers pass through Trafalgar Square each day, so Microsoft has clearly picked an ideal location for its giant Surface tablet. It might not be a giant Windows Phone or a giant Surface cake, but it’s just as impressive. Fox News must be jealous.

Hint: Use the 's' and 'd' keys to navigate

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  Trafalgar Square plays host to a giant Surface.
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  The giant Surface 2 dwarfs other statues in the area.
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  Microsoft also has a Surface keyboard.
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  You jump on the keys to activate them.
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  It's all powered by a Surface Pro 2.
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  383-inch Windows 8.1 Start Screen.
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  Big vs. small.
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  Microsoft workers demonstrate Surface 2.
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If you were CEO of Microsoft, what would you change?

• By Olatunji Omoyele

Microsoft is actively looking for a new CEO to replace Steve Ballmer, and one of the potential candidates is Stephen Elop. In an interesting story published earlier today, Bloomberg, citing several unnamed sources, claims that the former boss of Nokia would introduce sweeping changes to Microsoft should he get picked for the top job.
Just what sort of changes? Bloomberg says Elop would release Microsoft Office on the iPad and Android tablets, consider killing off Bing and even potentially offload the Xbox division, in an effort to give the software giant more focus.
Making Office available on competing devices and platforms would be a bold move, but one that actually makes a lot of sense. Office is still one of the brightest jewels in Microsoft’s crown, and making it as widely available as possible would ensure that remains the case. At the moment Office is being leveraged to sell Surface, and that could continue if the suite was still included for free on Microsoft hardware, but sold and/or licensed on other platforms.
Bing, while a very decent search engine, and Google’s only real rival, is a costly endeavor and one that Microsoft doesn’t need to pursue. The Xbox division is healthy, but as Bloomberg says it could be sold if not considered critical to the company’s long term strategy.
There’s no question that Microsoft has a lot of fingers in a lot of pies, but diversity is no bad thing. While rival Apple is more focused, Google has a similarly varied portfolio, and it’s that approach which has seen it grow from a free search engine to a billion dollar juggernaut.
There’s no way of knowing how accurate Bloomberg’s claims are, or how reliable the unnamed sources might be. Elop himself hasn’t said anything to suggest he plans to make such sweeping changes, and of course, he may well not get the job. Ford’s CEO Alan Mulally would be a better choice than Elop, in my opinion.
But imagine if neither of those candidates were picked for the role and Microsoft’s board decided instead to hire you as the new CEO. What changes would you look to make to the company?