Designed by Trans|alpin, Wood.e is essentially electrified wood, pressed with two integrated conducting layers which allow to add electrical conduct. 12V power is fed to the metal layers via one connector, and elements (lamps, spotlights, fans etc.) can be connected via another. NO cable needed.
(from We Make Money Not Art )
I'm glad to see people developing technologies like this which have very little to do with advancing electronic functionality and everything about making it easier for furniture designers to include technology into their furniture. I would like to see them go beyond including a single circuit--currently just power--in the laminate and to include data lines that terminate in standard connectors (maybe elegant small ones).
On the heated furniture note: at the Milan Furniture Fair last year I saw this sofa thing:
http://www.orangecone.com/gallery/2004_milan_furn_fair/2004_milan_furn_fair_078
It's cast out of concrete, with heating elements (normally used for driveways and sidewalks) embedded in it. I don't think it would be particularly comfortable to have a concrete desk, but it's a nice idea.
Seems that it would be relatively easy to create a desk/furniture from a sandwich of plywood layers, with voids cut in the inner layer(s) for routing cables and such. Connectors could be mounted flush with the surface. [Plywood also representative of a very modern, user-configurable material.]
What I'd really like to see is a heated desk, since mine always seems to get cold (and cold hands = typing difficulty). I'd be VERY hesitant to run any heating element through wood myself however.
I had run across something/somewhere once that mentioned Japanese heated furniture (though I've never verified this). The idea, i believe, is to heat the room from the individual outward. Seemed interesting.