Earlybird Andrew Thompson called our attention to the 8pen — a gestural interface for data entry on a mobile device. The application is available for free on the Android Marketplace. Although our attempts to use it did not entirely corroborate the company’s claim that 8pen greatly reduces the problem of mistyping, we appreciate the attention it brings to the less than perfect process of inputting text on a small screen.

…a big take away from all these other concepts coming about is simply that the Small keyboards on mobile devices are a pain point for users. Seems that so many people wouldn’t be spending so much time thinking about this if it wasn’t an issue. -Andrew

Onwards and upwards. Or even outwards into ambient space as proposed by the Mozilla Seabird, a concept phone from Mozilla labs. Earlybird is excited to see elegant UI solutions in development that address this potentially problematic experience.