A visual browsing delight

Here's an interesting visual interface that manages to be useful, surprise and delight, all at once. It feels like you are rummaging around in someone's garage.

The designer, Jim Bumgardner of Krazydad, calls them CoverPops.

Mad magazine explorer
Science fiction cover explorer
1,001 best-selling graphic novels from Amazon
Mysteries
Horror
More science fiction

I think the interface implications go far beyond book and magazine covers and extend into other kinds of complex data sets. Spreading things out is a natural way to navigate complex information. You clean your desk by "dumping" the contents onto the floor or desk and sorting it into piles.

Imagine if this kind of visual search interface could be coupled with a "sort" component. What might the possibilities be for the computer desktop? As always I would enjoy hearing your thoughts on the subject.

Via singer.to.