During the Starfire project, I became interested in carrying their work one step further by revisiting the assumptions that have led to our current planar designs. Today's real-world desktop surfaces are invariably flat and level. Certainly not to make it easier for us to access every inch of their surface. When we sit at our desks, we typically have a prime area within the sweep of our arms, with diminishing real estate values toward the back and sides of our desks. Items shoved into the far corners are likely to remain in residence, unread for days, if not decades.
Desks are level because gravity tends to make paper slide down hill.
Drafting tables are not level, they're tilted, but require their users to tape, clamp, or hook their paper and tools. The pay-off for this decrease in document mobility is a large increase in draftsperson mobility. Draftspersons typically trade off between pacing the length of their drafting tables and wheeling back and forth on mobile high stools . In either case, they fluidly command the entire surface of their table, even if they must still reach for the extremities. Cyberspace has no inherent gravity.