June 2002
"Touch typing made easy. Introducing the TACTUS™ Keyboard…
Arguably the most important innovation since the typewriter was invented"

San Antonio, Texas - June 2002 - Tactus Keyboard Corporation has released a new keyboard which greatly facilitates the task of touch typing. The product was presented at the NECC2002 in San Antonio, Texas, and is available directly from the company.

"Given the universal benefit that the TACTUS keyboard offers and the fact that the keyboard works for touch typists as well as two finger typists, there is no reason" said Alberto Sabato, inventor and founder of Tactus Keyboard Corporation, "why from now on, all computer keyboards should not be designed like TACTUS".

The computer revolution has placed a computer in virtually every office and most homes. There are over 400 million computers in use worldwide. But most people cannot use the keyboard efficiently, that is, they cannot "touch type", in typist's language. They use the keyboard with the "hunt and peck" method, that is, they look at the keyboard, searching for the key they need and then "peck" on the required key. The hunt-and-peck method is inefficient and tasks can take well over four times the time that they should.

Programs to teach people to touch type exist and touch typing is taught in elementary schools. However, in spite of this, most people cannot touch type. The reason? "The computer keyboard is too difficult to use", says Sabato, noting that touch typing was already a difficult skill to learn on the manual typewriter and is virtually impossible on the computer keyboard.

The fact that most computer users cannot touch type has resulted in a huge loss of productivity which, because decision-makers generally do not know about the benefits of touch typing, has, so far, gone unnoticed.

Yet, the gain in productivity, if all computer users could touch type, would be enormous and would easily surpass gains from any upgrade of software or hardware. "In the U. S. alone, the productivity gain could be as large as $6 billion/year for each minute saved," said Sabato, noting that it could be achieved with minimal cost. "The TACTUS keyboard requires no more material to manufacture than a standard keyboard and thus the production cost of TACTUS is virtually the same as for a standard keyboard. Therefore, the investment required to achieve the productivity gain is almost nil. And because computers have an average life of 3-5 years, it would take just this long to have a TACTUS keyboard in front of every user, adult and child, and the productivity gain would follow".

The TACTUS keyboard is the subject of several studies in schools and universities. In a recent study with 8-year old students of an elementary school in Sydney, Australia, the improvement in the touch typing skills of the children who used the TACTUS keyboard was more than twice as large as the improvement in the control group, who used a standard keyboard.

"We need to accept the fact," said Sabato, "that a new way to design the computer keyboard has been invented and that the old keyboard is gone".

The Tactus keyboard retails for only $49 and can be purchased from the company's website.

Tactus Keyboard Corporation is a privately owned company based in Sydney, Australia. The company owns the world rights to the DigiGuide™ Key System for computer keyboards.
The DigiGuide Key System is a method of designing the keys of computer keyboards and other data entry devices and is the subject of international patents.