The Design Symphony Experience

Three Traytop Laptops

When it comes to advertising, sometimes less is more.

On my USAir flight yesterday I was surprised when I lowered my tray table to find this:

That's pretty creative I thought.

The people on either side of me (yes, I was lucky enough at 6'2" to get the coveted "middle seat") seemed to think it was interesting too as I caught the furtive glances at my tray table.

When the passengers next to me lowered their tray tables and saw ads as well, I must admit it seemed a bit less creative.

To Panasonic's credit, the three ads were different - which was a plus.

What would have been better is to place one ad per row - with text that talked about letting the other people in the row see the ad too. This approach would encourage interaction (people on planes talk to each other anyway) and at the very least leave people curious. Placing an ad on every tray (a glance around the rest of the plane saw the same ads repeated on every tray table) makes it less unique, less creative, and less likely to get my attention.

They say it takes seven impressions to make an impact. That may be true - but don't do all seven at once okay?

Why Don't You Know?

If you're going to claim it will work, make sure it actually does.

Prior to my Bahamas trip last week I spent over three hours on the phone with various Verizon Wireless employees making sure my phone would work in the Bahamas.

I was told repeatedly that it was no problem and that for an additional $3.99/month I could sign up for a "value pack" that would reduce the costs of my calls while on the island by 86%. Needless to say I signed up and did all the necessary "reprogramming" and "updates" needed.

When I got off the plane in paradise, guess what?

My phone wouldn't work.

At all.

When I finally got through to Verizon in the U.S. (using a credit card call from a landline hotel phone) they explained that there was nothing I could do to make the phone work and that the various people I spoke to in the week leading up to my trip were wrong. Verizon phones just don't work in the Bahamas.

Why didn't any of the other employees know this?

I spoke to multiple people who assured me my phone would work in the Bahamas. If they would have told me it was impossible from the beginning I may have made other phone arrangements. At the very least, I wouldn't have wasted the many hours programming and reprogramming my phone.

I already thought of you as the "lesser of the evils" Verizon - now I trust you even less.

It's New to You

Last night I was riding around DC with some guests visiting from Massachusetts. I was on my phone trying to make a dinner reservation when one of the passengers said, "Is that really a phone?"

Before I could answer, another one said, "Can it do more than make calls?"

I explained that yes, it was a phone - a Treo to be specific - and that it could do lots of things including storing all the contact info in my entire Rolodex, surfing the web, emailing, taking photos, and even capturing short videos.

"Do you use it for all of those things?," the passenger asked.

"Not really," I replied, "but I do more with it every day."

Takeaways:
1) The Palm Treo phone has been around for five years and received a lot of media coverage. The Treo 650 (the model I have) was released in November 2004. To me, it's old news... Yet several of the passengers in the car (ranging in age from 18 to 56) had no idea what it was when they saw it. When they learned of its capabilities, they wanted to learn more. In short, just because it's "old to me" doesn't mean that everyone knows about it.

2) I've owned my Treo for over a year now and still don't have a handle on half of its capabilities - and I consider myself to be semi-tech savvy! Note to manufacturers: if you don't get me using features early on, you will be hard pressed to get me to start using them later.

The Cool New Phone - from Cingular?

I was having a conversation with the mother of a thirteen-year-old girl last night and she explained, "My daughter wants that new Cingular phone - you know the brand new one that is like an iPod?"

"The iPhone?" I inquired.

"Yeah - that's it!" she replied. "I told my daughter that $600 is really expensive for a phone, but if she will save the money, I'll help her get it."

The Cingular phone? I never thought I would hear that one! Sure there is debate (and lawsuits) over the iPhone name but the Cingular brand (which is actually AT&T now - but that's another story) got the plug in this conversation?

Not iPhone?

Not even Apple?

Wow...

Maybe Cingular wasn't such a bad choice for Apple to partner with on the new iPhone...

It's all about Mii

The new Nintendo Wii was the Christmas gift of the season. While the buzz on this product tended to focus primarily on the wireless controllers (and the "accidents" they were causing), an overlooked aspect of the gaming system was Mii.

Mii (pronounced "me") is the character you create for playing games on the system - your very own avatar. For all the non-gamers reading this, think of it as being able to watch yourself onscreen, playing inside a video game. Pretty cool stuff...

What I find fascinating about this is how personal identity is now invading the video game space. People have been able to create avatars in Second Life and other online worlds for years, but the Mii is the first to bring it truly mainstream, make is simple to create, and give it a funny and clever name. Not to mention that you can create characters for all of your friends so when they come over to play, they can use characters that look like the players look in real life...

In fact, if you check out Flickr you can see thousands of people posting their personal "Mii" and even creating celebrity Mii.

The possibilities are limitless...