How close are we to the gesture-driven data of Minority Report, where computers interact so seamlessly with the experiences of our day-to-day lives that they become completely integral to the way one walks around in the developed world? Closer than you think.

If you haven’t yet seen Pattie Maes and Pranav Mystry’s presentation at TED, treat yourself.

This is the computer as buddy, as assistant, as advisor, as teacher. Remember the animal Daemons in “The Golden Compass”? It’s about using the computer a little like that — as a companion that connects us seamlessly to information while we simply go about our daily activities. No Google searches. It just “knows”. And so we know.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/v/5alYLJS4OrE&hl=en&fs=1]
Like it or not, we are well on the way to this utopian vision, as anyone who owns an iPhone or a Blackberry knows only too well. But Maes and Mystry (don’t you love that name?) are taking this to the next step. And they seem to be taking us along with them.