Sorry Steve Jobs, but Merlin the Bottlenose Dolphin prefers the rugged Toughbook over your “magical” iPad.
According to SpeakDolphin.com president Jack Kassewitz, Merlin feels much “more comfortable” with the Panasonic Touchbook “experience,” which seems to offer greater screen visibility and sensitivity.
“We were able to hold the Toughbook notebooks closer to the water and our bodies, which makes the dolphin more comfortable and willing to interact and learn,” said Kassewitz.
“From a field research standpoint, the Toughbook 19 and 30 are great because their screens are clearly viewable in direct sunlight, they work well in extreme temperature conditions, they are very water resistant and durable, and we were able to multitask with the devices.”
Kassewitz also noted that the Toughbook helped Merlin learn how to use touchscreens, which encouraged him to make a mental connection between symbols and real-life objects.
“Following this phase, the team will add symbols for actions and dolphin sounds associated with each of the symbols – [in an effort] to build a human-cetacean language interface,” he added.
