Nearly 150,000 people swarmed the Las Vegas Convention Center for their annual pilgrimage to one of the largest electronics showcases on earth, The Consumer Electronics Show. CES features all of the latest and greatest innovations in the industry and is where the major, and not so major, players come to display their goods. I am the least tech-savvy of the Sinner team. I don’t tweet, I don’t have cable, I ride my bike, and even though I’m typing this on a fancy Mac, I do everything in my sketch book. I may not be an expert on advances in the digital world, but I can recognize trends and how they relate to basic human sensibilities.

The massive amount of poorly designed junk available can be overwhelming, especially to a first timer. Among the clutter and noise, however, there were a few things that stood out and a couple of trends that seemed to dominate the atmosphere. User accessibility and interactivity is the future, at least for 2012.

The Intel Booth featured floating bubble creatures, made by hand movements across a touch surface which float across a giant screen.

Interactivity in technology has become paramount to the user experience. We use our smart phones to tweet about our day, to check the weather outside or simply to play a game to pass the time. Our personal devices are becoming extensions of ourselves. It was interesting to see how interactivity was used to differentiate brands on the convention floor and how it was used to bring the human aspect back into technology.

The Nikon Booth Babes try not to look bored as they pose for hours on end.

The huge convention floor was abuzz and full of stimulation; every booth was competing for attention. They all had some new concept to display or sell. So how does a company stand out in this ocean of consumer goods? Through years of experience, the major players have learned how to do it big. Intel brought interactive sensor stations that projected an abstract array of shapes and colors on their overhead awning based on the position and movement of observers’ hands. LG had a giant 3D wall that put participants in the middle of a projected scene. At Nikon, consumers could become fashion photographers as two models posed with the featured camera. These were all great examples of impactful and interactive displays, but that’s easy with a hefty budget.

Smaller companies on the floor can easily get lost among all the commotion, but a few of them managed to catch our attention. Speck, a phone case business, found a way to differentiate themselves with an old gimmick. In an industry with fierce competition and small profit margins, sometimes all you need to stand out is a good, old-fashioned Zoltar machine. The classic, turban clad fortune teller was free standing in the North Hall of the convention. Maybe it was nostalgia or perhaps just human curiosity, but my colleague and I rushed over to receive our fortune. The card instructed us to go all the way to the South Hall and find the main booth in order to receive a free phone case. We diligently followed his instructions. It doesn’t matter what level it’s at, interactivity plays a vital role in standing out from the herd.

The masturbation chair and Zoltar.

Flashy 3D screens and nostalgic gimmicks are fun, but what was more interesting was how machines reciprocated human interaction. Some of the best examples of this were in the field of gaming. Kinetic gaming has been around for a bit and it’s playing a vital role in redefining what the game experience should be. However, it only goes so far. The user is still confined to a screen. A fresh take on gaming was the presence of flying robots that were controlled from a user’s mobile device. This felt like an instance of a physical manifestation of the gaming experience because the gamer is able to digitally control something that reacts in the real world.

The levels of interaction are definitely being pushed and some of this can be a bit scary. We came upon a booth that sold computer chairs, well more like Darth Vader’s workstation. The piece of furniture resembled something that came straight from “The Matrix.” As the participants sat into the chair, a keyboard came down to strap them in. The chair reclined and three large monitors were lowered into eyesight. It was a bit eerie to see people eagerly jump in and sink into an electro euphoria. I kept imagining a cord coming out and plugging directly into the user’s spinal column.

The second theme present at the convention was accessibility. It’s great to see technology become available to the average consumer, particularly advances that weren’t available ten years ago. Examples of this range from 3D television to professional quality hand held cameras. The technology world has been striving to get the fastest and newest gadgets into as many hands as possible. What is changing is the variety of goods becoming available.

One of the more unique items was a personal sleep-monitoring device created by Zoe. The user wears the headband to sleep and the device records readings of brain activity throughout the night. In the morning the user can see their sleep patterns. Although this is a novelty item, it speaks to technology’s growing accessibility. What once had to be done in a hospital sleep lab can now be done at your nightstand.

With the end of this year’s CES, the same questions come up. What’s next? What will the future bring? Perhaps it will be full of home EEG machines, or flying cars controlled by your phone, or TVs you can talk to, or human docking stations disguised as recliners. Who knows? One thing is for certain; there is an overall emphasis on the interaction of human and machine, and that is a beautiful thing.