As demos go, this one was pretty impressive: a virtual face on a large computer screen that can recognise people, listen to their requests and act upon them. If I was an office receptionist I’d be just a tiny bit worried.

Of course, the unemployment queues are not going to be swamped by out-of-work front-desk personnel any time soon. But the demo did provide a glimpse into the not-too-distant future of where advances in computing power are taking us.

Staged by Microsoft’s chief crystal ball gazer (and R&D strategy head) Graig Mundie at a recent emerging technology conference in California, it involved an application that’s designed to act as a virtual assistant.

Positioned in the reception area of an office or building, it can recognise people based on their clothes, listen to requests and do simple tasks like ordering transport or booking meeting rooms. It can’t make coffee or pick up the post, but that’ll probably appear in version 2.0.

While it’s still clearly early days for such technology, it’s also clear that Microsoft (and other companies) believe the future of human–computer interaction is not via a keyboard and mouse but through speech and image recognition.

Microsoft's Surface [Photo credit: Microsoft]
Microsoft is pouring millions of dollars into research in these areas, and the early results seem to indicate it’s money well spent.

As well as the virtual receptionist (which they’ve named Laura), Microsoft has also taken the wraps of its Surface computing technology. Housed in a coffee table-sized device, Surface allows users to interact with electronic data in the same way they would with physical objects.

Photos appearing on the flat screen can be moved and resized by ‘grabbing’ them in your fingers. Content can also be transferred from devices such as mobile phones simply by placing them on the screen.

I had the chance to play with a Surface device at Microsoft’s Seattle HQ, and I have to say it’s addictive. They’re slated to appear in hotels and clubs within the next six months, and home versions won’t be far behind.

You get the sense that we’re on the verge of a new era of computing – one that will change the way we use and interact with computers in both our work and home lives. As someone who spends far too much time tapping a keyboard each day, I say “bring it on!”.