Researchers use distributed computing and robots to create programmable matter

Http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9140729/Intel_says_shape_shifting_robots_closer_to_reality

Imagine a day when you can make your cell phone smaller to fit into your pocket easier, or take it out and make it bigger to text more easily. Maybe you want to make it into a headset for hands free talking, or turn it into a bracelet for quick jog. Accordiing to researchers at intel and carnegie mellon university, the dreams could soon become a reality. Scientists are earning to make shapeshifting a reality by using distributed computing and robotics. They take millions of millimeter sized robots, and through software and electromagnetic forces, enable them to take on varios shapes and sizes. The programable matter is called claytronics and the tiny robots are called catoms. These catoms have incredible technology. For instance, each cotom will have its own processor, and will the ablitity to store and share information, they are miniature computers. there are endless possibilities for these incredible little robots. Take for example someone living in very limited space in a small apartment. They could turn their dinner table into a poker table for poker night, and then into their bed at the end of the day! Instead of gamers watching a tv, they could have animated figures running around their houses. Or if you needed to speak to a co-worker on the other side of the world about some figures, you could have a 3d facsimile of him or her sitting right in your office.

I think this is absolutely fantastic technology that, when perfected, will bocome an everyday part of our lives. I do not see this kind of technology being cheap, but i do see enough people wanting to get their hands on it, that it wont matter whether it is cheap or not.