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Thanks to a glowing array of 115 individual OLED displays fitted under its keys, Art Lebedev’s Optimus Maximus is the first and only keyboard that literally morphs before your eyes. Pressing shift and watching all the letters beneath your fingers leap to caps gives you some idea what the Maximus is capable of, and why it’s become one of the most hyped-up, fawned-over and generally talked-about devices on the Web. While it delivers sheer novelty value in spades, we found that its princely pricetag, layout and reliability woes may threaten its practicality as a typing device.

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Computer visionaries have been preaching about grandiose visions of “cloud computing” for years. The concept: Offer basic computer functions - like office software - as subscription services provided through the Web, rather than software installed on a hard drive. The point is to hide it behind the scenes, allowing the guys running the cloud to upgrade, tweak and maintain the software, taking that load off the user. It’s a bit like going to the store for vegetables instead of planting your own garden. Everything you need is just magically there.

For computer-savvy types who like to play with different programs, keep them updated, and even write their own, this sounds like a bad case of control from Big Brother. B

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