In the words of George Carlin, "We are a war-like people".

"That's what she said"

HockeyPuck this is exactly the essence of the idea that sparked my initial question. Besides the technical aspects, is it possible to have more of a connection with the system you are interfacing with? What are the implications of this? By using controls that have a finer resolution, tactile response, and break the mold of what we are used to, perhaps they would lead us to new discoveries within our applications that we might not have made otherwise. Discoveries that would occur because we are interfacing with our systems on a new level. Often painters will look at their works in the mirror or upside down to see the work from a new perspective. Perhaps finding ways to interact with technology other than keyboard / mouse can give us a new perspective as developers.

Arduino looks a lot like what I had in mind thanks for the tip, I'll definitely be checking it out.

@kiwimate thanks for the response. I will definitely check those stories out. My thoughts about this are general in the sense that as developers we often only use keyboard / mice. If you think of AV professionals though they often use mixing boards to get work done more quickly and finely tuned. So why are generic components not more readily available for general development purposes? Surely by using a potentiometer it could provide much more precise resolution than a mouse, faster and easier than typing in decimal numbers. In a sense you answered your own question. Using physical input devices other than a keyboard and mouse could be expanded to many different industries. I'm not really looking to commercialize this, most of my work is for personal interest. As far as my website, I am working on bringing a blog online for my technical non-artistic interests. I considered combining them however art people usually don't get technology and vice versa. It's a turn-off for people visiting a single website with diverse interests. My opinion is that its better to specialize when presenting information. It's an idea and this is my starting point, to get input on possibilities. Perhaps I could hire someone to do it, but I enjoy the process of learning and adhere to the old adage that "if you want something done right do it yourself".