A few comments on Microsoft's announcement of the Surface tablet computer...
When are they going to stop putting Steve Balmer on stage? He's a terrible presenter to the point that anything he announces seems less impressive and relevant than if he were not involved. I can't imagine that they don't recognize this, so maybe he strong arms his way into the presentations? At least cut him back to a brief introduction of "Thanks for coming, we think you're going to love what we have to show you today. Here's Steven Sinofsky to tell you about it".
Steven Sinofsky was ill prepared for the presentation – he could barely take his eyes off the teleprompter. I'll give him the benefit if the doubt and assume for now that the whole event was thrown together quickly.
Panos Panay was polished and likable. We'll probably never see him again.
The cover as keyboard is a great idea on first blush. For short bursts of writing it probably is faster to type on than a software keyboard. But for short bursts of writing I think I would just quickly pull up the on screen keyboard rather than set the tablet up on a table with cover keyboard laid out. For long form writing it would pull ahead.
The most humorous thing to me is the online discussions that say Microsoft has solved tablets, first by including full Windows on (some) of them and second by including a physical keyboard. So... ten years ago, the only thing holding back Microsoft tablets was the lack of a cover keyboard?
It does seem to be a mistake to hype a product that they weren't prepared to show software running on as part of the presentation, with very little solid information like true price, release date, or specs. Where was the competitive pressure that made them throw together a rushed presentation right now?
Overall, the admittedly cool cover keyboard stole the show. Maybe they should have just announced that.