If you've ever seen "the dreaded blue screen of death" on your PC, had trouble installing or upgrading software, waited endlessly for your computer to boot up, or punched through five levels of voice mail hell trying to find a real person to help you, then this book's for you. "The Unfinished Revolution" is subtitled "Human-Centered Computers and What They Can Do for Us." And that's the unfinished revolution.

Michael Dertouzos is the director of the Laboratory for Computer Science at MIT and is the author of "What Will Be," another of my recommended books. As he clearly points out in this book, we have complicated things far too much. We have had to adapt to technology, rather than having the technology adapt to us. Human-centered computing as described by Dertouzos involves five key technologies that will dramatically amplify human capabilities: natural interaction, automation, individualized information access, collaboration, and customization. He believes that we can start now and that we can make remarkable progress toward implementing human-centered computing in a relatively few years.

As an example, the author points out that we need to replace the low-level controls of computers with the equivalents of the steering wheel, gas pedal and brake. This will happen sooner than we think!

"The Unfinished Revolution" is a first-rate book. It should be required reading for every software and hardware engineer in the world. That's a good start toward achieving the goal of human-centered computing. But it should also be read by anyone else who touches or is touched by technology today. This means you!