The challenge for London was, "What's going to be the 'wow factor, '" said Michael Payne, the former marketing director of the International Olympic Committee and chairman of the international division of Crystal CG, a Beijing-based company that made the people-pixel graphics.

WSJ: Social Media

He believes this sort of approach will have far wider appeal than today's windows and mouse-based systems, and he has founded a start-up, called Perceptive Pixel, to commercialise the technology.

ECONOMIST: Computer interfaces