Plenty have already covered the OceanGate Titan implosion in more detail. I will not repeat that work but wanted to bring to wider attention how marketers have jumped on the bandwagon. The following advert appeared in the print edition of the Financial Times, placed by Omega watches promoting their Omega Seamaster Planet Ocean Ultra Deep series of watches.
‘Seamaster – Precision at every level’ next to a scale going beyond 6,000 metres.
Omega
I personally thought that the advert was too soon after the implosion for good taste. Although the watch community has seen a renewed interest in deep diving capable watches after the OceanGate Titan incident.
Young Japanese are craving fast fashion. What happened? | Vogue Business – it’s the economy stupid, luxury is less accessible. Secondly, much of the youth looks like Gyaru peaked in the early 2000s due to financial issues and things haven’t improved since. Shibuya subcultures were as dependent on the ability to spend as on youth creativity.
I haven’t been a car owner since 1998. Back then driving a car was a very analogue experience and had been for decades. I grew up reading Car Magazine and was excited to get behind the wheel and drive when I was old enough. The reality of driving was rather underwhelming. The Opel Corsa was also known as the Vauxhall Nova at the time, now it’s also known as the Vauxhall Corsa. The Opel Corsa of the time was known as a good first car for new drivers. This was back when joyriding was a crime wave sweeping the UK and Ireland and vehicles leasing or finance wasn’t as commonplace as it is now.
Consequently insurance companies penalised car owners with punishing insurance premiums, to the point that my car usually cost less than the annual price to insure it.
Last car standing
I owned or driven a number of the competitors to the original Opel Corsa including the Fiat Uno, the Ford Fiesta and the Rover Metro. Rover went bankrupt, Fiat now makes a retro-futurism of the Fiat 500 rather than a modernised version of the Fiat Uno and finally Ford sunset the Fiesta. So the Opel Corsa remains the last car standing.
Convoluted product DNA
However, that belies the fact that GM Europe including their Vauxhall and Opel brands were sold to the PSA Group and then became part of Stellantis in 2021. Stellantis is the result of a merger between the PSA Group (Peugeot, Citröen, DS, Opel and Vauxhall) with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (Abarth, Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Dodge, Fiat, Jeep, Lancia, Maserati and Ram Trucks.
This generation of the Corsa relied on PSA underpinnings rather than previous generations based on General Motors designs.
Modern Opel Corsa versus its ancestors
The modern Opel Corsa has a wedge shape with more overhangs that gives it a pleasant look. In the driver’s seat is when the experience starts to change from the original car. The wedge shape and high doors with obligatory side impact protection means that you have significant blind spots in the drivers chair.
The original Corsa was a three door car, but four and five door versions came along later. The modern Opel Corsa allows a little more leg room in the back. The boot would hold two carry on cases and a couple of tote bags, which from memory was a little larger than the late 1990s capability of the Opel Corsa.
Back to the interior. As a super mini, the Opel Corsa’s seats were one of its better features. The modern car had seats that felt weirdly similar to previous generations of Corsa, even down to the lack of lumbar support and a manual knob to dial in the seat back angle.
Because of the smaller windows and higher doors the interior also felt darker, rather than the light airy driving experience that I remembered.
Dashboard
The most apparent change in the latest version of the Opel Corsa compared to its ancestors is the dashboard. Digital car systems go back to the likes of Clarion’s Auto PC from 1998. There is no voice recognition, but there is a touch screen. This controls some of the car’s settings such as having the lights come on automatically, the radio and mapping. The digital experience was limited compared to systems from the likes of Mercedes Benz, but that’s no bad thing, as there was less technology to master. This was particularly important given that it was a hire car, that I wanted to get into and drive away with minimum fuss.
I found its reversing camera invaluable, mainly because of the narrow view provided by the the rear window.
My car was rented from Hertz. While Opel claims that the car is compatible with Apple CarPlay, I couldn’t get it to work so both navigation and media options were limited. This meant that the car’s information screen was of limited use and a smartphone holder became a must purchase item in order to use a mapping app.
On the plus side, what was there was intuitive to navigate, which is important to the hire car experience. Maybe the system was restricted at the request of Hertz? I don’t know.
The button controls for lighting off the screen would be hard to reach for drivers with smaller arms.
Driving
The 1.2 litre engine is fine for either motorway driving or in urban conditions. At no point did I feel that I would have preferred more power, to paraphrase Rolls Royce the acceleration and speed were adequate. I managed to get about 50 miles / gallon out of the car through a mix of driving, which surprised me.
The car was skittish, yet unengaging in terms of its handling, with a steering wheel that was oddly shaped for using during longer journeys. The clutch was very progressive, but the brakes weren’t.
The Opel Corsa isn’t a desirable car, but it is a perfectly adequate one.
The North America semiconductor corridor looks at Mexico, the US and Canada as a potential production capacity eco-system for the semiconductor industry. The North America semiconductor corridor is framed in terms of increasing resilience in security. At the moment the semiconductor industry for reasons of cost and supply chain ecosystem is focused on the US Pacific coast and Asian countries from Singapore to Korea that face on to the Pacific.
In the North America semiconductor corridor also has a political advantage bringing back more high value jobs across Canada, the US and Mexico. There are considerable challenges to the North American semiconductor corridor from talent to energy and water requirements. The US CHIPS and Science Act has looked to catalyse some of the change required.
Ancient monuments to the dead
The summer solstice on Wednesday reminded me of Ireland’s stone monuments. Some like Newgrange have a calendar type element, but most of them are solely monuments to the dead. The megaliths continue to guard their secrets well despite the educated deductive reasoning of archaeologists.
Wilkie Collins radio dramas
Wilkie Collins along with Arthur Conan Doyle invented what we now know as the detective genre. This stream of Wilkie Collins dramas is better than modern productions on BBC Radio 4.
Technics SL-DZ1200
Techmoan did a review of the Technics SL-DZ1200. I am a big fan of the DZ1200 over Pioneer’s CDJ devices and they did a good rundown of the device. Hopefully, the DZ1200 will come back in a new and improved form if Technics relaunch of the SL-1200 is sufficiently successful?
Microsoft Auto PC
Auto PC
Back when I worked agency side on Microsoft I never heard about the Microsoft Auto PC experiment which seems to be Microsoft’s abortive move into in-car entertainment and information systems. This seems to be alongside the more successful personal digital assistant and nascent smartphones. It’s fascinating to see technologies like voice recognition, iRDA, compact flash (but not as a music media) and USB being incorporated because these capabilities were being put into future PDA and smartphone products.
CES launch
It was launched at CES in 1998 according to the Microsoft corporate website. It’s interesting, I still have similar problems with voice recognition.
Directions
The rudimentary directions software was similar to the turn-by-turn direction print outs that I ordered from The AA Route Planner service. during the mid-to-late 1990s for long journeys – but on your stereo screen. A similar approach was also taken by Palm app Vindigo for pedestrians about the same time. Disclosure: I worked agency side on the launch of the Vindigo London guide alongside the work I was doing on Palm PDAs at the time.
(The AA Route Planner service still exists, but it is now online rather than something you ordered over the phone and received via the mail. However you can still print out turn-by-turn directions. It’s also likely to not send you on some of the interesting routes that modern navigation apps seem to manage.)
Clarion
I feel sorry for Clarion who were Microsoft’s only hardware partner. Clarion is now owned by Faurecia SE, a French headquartered auto parts manufacturer with Chinese car manufacturer DongFeng Motor Corporation who were the local partner to Peugeot, Nissan and Honda’s efforts in the Chinese market as a key minority shareholder.
I was sparked to lead this post based on footage that I watched about a priest in South India with regards a robotic elephant. Robots in religion have taken off in both Shinto and Hindu ceremonies.
Japan
Academics have widely talked about how the Shinto-based belief system have aided Japanese societal acceptance of robots, in comparison to western society. Secondly, Japanese authors have been exploring what it means to be human and what kind of dilemmas and opportunities do robots and AI bring in a future society. Robots in religion are a natural extension of robots in society.
Buddhism leads the way
What’s less commented on is that Japan’s buddhist temples have been leading robots in religion. The reality is that many Japanese see Shinto and Buddhism as complementary in nature and get involved in both beliefs.
Japan has some unique religious challenges that are interlinked. Temples are struggling as less people are active in their religious practice, the factors for this decline is multi-factorial in nature.
A second challenge that as the population shrinks roles need to be automated. What started in factories is now impacting the food and beverage sector (vending machines and restaurant robo-serving staff), so it was only a matter of time that robots in religion would supplement the clergy.
India
In India robots in religion is about kindness and de-risking religious ceremonies. In South India elephants take part in religious ceremonies. However the conditions that elephants are kept in can be cruel in nature and even result in death. Secondly, elephants can unintentionally kill or injure people involved in a religious celebration. This report on NHK World shows how robots in religion have been adapted to Hindu needs.
Finally, the elephant robot is used in celebrations over a large geographic area and is easily transported around. Robots in religion are likely to make even more sense as India urbanises even further, as the benefits are amplified in the denser environment.
How confucianism, communism (in particular Stalin’s take on Leninism) and an accident of history has led to the nationalistic, fragile, insecure Chinese state with imperial ambitions we know today.
China’s ‘trinket town’ at heart of push for renminbi trade | Financial Times – Yiwu was one of the first cities in China to allow individual merchants to settle larger cross-border deals in renminbi. Most cities have an annual cap of $50,000. Given Yiwu’s reputation for cheap goods and flexible terms, helped by the fact that wholesalers do not pay either corporate tax or market rent, exporters have sufficient bargaining power to request settlement in renminbi. “When you have only one place to go to purchase something, the seller sets the terms on how transactions are settled,” said James Wu, a Yiwu-based furniture exporter who began demanding renminbi payments from Middle Eastern clients last year – the last quote is a great example of
Interesting video from NHK World on how temples are adapting to a lack of new attendees and priests. I am not sure whether this is down to demographic change or the secularisation of society
A Pokémon-Card Crime Spree Jolts Japan – WSJ – Japan has been staggered by a Pokémon crime spree. Stores are now paying for banklike security to ward off villains who go to extraordinary lengths, even rappelling down the side of buildings, to plunder Pokémon. Hosaka was working in senior care when he had the idea of opening a cozy card shop in the suburb of Machida where customers could mingle at tables. Instead, he says, the little cards, “have become like Rolex watches, gold, silver, platinum or used cars.” – It makes sense when you think of the cards being ‘real life NFTs’
Criminal Rolex Gangs and Traveling with Watches, Part I – WOE – crime affecting luxury consumption. Interesting that London is a crime centre is prominently name checked alongside Johannesburg, South Africa. This will impact luxury retailers, luxury travel and hospitality and auction houses
Luxury
Bay Area Lawsuit Alleges Man Spent $220,000 To Get A Watch He Never Got – there’s also the added complexity of Shreve recently losing its status as a Patek AD. The lawsuit brings some ten causes of action against Shreve, including breach of contract, intentional and negligent misrepresentation, fraudulent concealment, false promise, and unfair business practices, pursuant to California’s Unfair Competition Law – this was only a matter of time. Its the same in the UK
Ad agencies and clients clash: tension over transparency in fees, services | Ad Age – a talent shortage has left agencies without enough senior executives to service accounts. Combined, such factors contribute to what marketers see as an increasing lack of transparency. One executive who leads procurement across marketing and content for a major consumer goods company said the discounts and rebates that media agencies, in particular, get from a media buy have always been “murky,” but one area agencies have always been transparent in is breaking down their fees. The brand executive said auditors, working on behalf of the marketers, have previously been able to get agencies to disclose their margins, overheads and salaries without protest—it’s standard practice and allows clients to know they are being charged a fair price. But that’s starting to change, they said, having run into issues with getting shops to break down their fees in the recent agency review their company underwent
Media
This Year Next Year: 2023 Global Mid-Year Forecast – GroupM – calls the end of radio’s global growth story. Even taking into account streaming, WPP says that, globally, ad-supported audio has peaked. It will grow just 0.3% this year, says GroupM then “remain roughly flat over the next five years”. It’s about to join newspapers, magazines and broadcast television in a downward trajectory. GroupM also tackles the impact of AI on the industry. It reckons that within five years, the portion of “AI-enabled” advertising revenue globally will be worth $800bn. What is impossible to quantify is whether any of that is new money. Most likely, none of it. What is also impossible to quantify is just how dramatic the AI-driven reductions in cost of production will be. That sounds a relatively benign question until one realises that all those reduced costs are human jobs. GroupM identifies five key themes: Regulation (particularly around data privacy); connected TV (and an annualised 10%+ growth in the segment)’; AI “is likely to inform, or touch in some way, at least half of all advertising revenue by the end of 2023”; retail media to overtake TV by 2028; and “new business growth” (which sounds like the sort of thing an agency person would put in their predictions). Most importantly though, the GroupM outlook points to a more more significant factor. We’re at the end of a cycle that was defined by shifts between advertising channels, and then the disruption of Covid. “We are at an inflection point where the secular drivers of advertising growth above and beyond GDP growth are maturing, the pandemic upheaval is receding and the dynamic rise of digital advertising has slowed. This is the basis of our underlying forecast of mid-single-digit advertising growth over the next five years. However, the pervasive impact of AI on the world of advertising could change that.”
AI at Work: What People Are Saying | BCG – leaders love it, workers don’t. Businesses have only addressed the needs of leaders, which probably dialled up the anxiety with a sense that AI is something that happens to you and your career rather like a bad car accident
Beeper — All your chats in one app. Yes, really. – clients like Adium became less useful as Google and other services went away from common protocols and the IM giants AOL, MSN and Yahoo! disappeared. Beeper are trying to address this
Vintage Obscura Radio – back when I used to work at Yahoo! we had an editorial team who surfaced great websites like the Liveplasma, which allowed you to discover new artists and authors based on what you liked. Or The Cloud Appreciation Society. We used to package up the best of these sites in an event called The Finds of The Year. Vintage Obscura Radio would have definitely made the cut. What is Vintage Obscura Radio? It is web radio channel that surfaces songs from YouTube that have less than 30,000 views on YouTube at the time of discovery and were released before 1996.
It’s not powered by a machine learning algorithm, but by 70,000 music obsessed Redditors looking to surface nearly forgotten music. This takes us back to the best parts of the pre-social platform web, where there was more room for the weird and the wonderful. Vintage Obscura Radio is a pleasant distraction from doom scrolling.
Blind Spot Monitor
Ogilvy South Africa put together some clever in-dealership installations to bring the dangers of a vehicle blind spot to light for Volkswagen. Volkswagen were looking to promote the benefits of their IQ DRIVE system which eliminates blind spots for drivers, rather than eliminating other road users.
Gordon Murray’s five favourite cars
Gordon Murray designed some of the most iconic formula one cars for the Brabham and McLaren teams. He went on to design the McLaren F1 road car that preceded the current range of road cars, setting the bar for their looks, performance and handling.
Like Lotus founder Colin Chapman, Murray likes his cars small and light. I understand why, the most dangerous and most fun car I ever owned was a Fiat 126.
Gordon Murray’s five favourites are:
Lotus Elite / Lotus Type 14
DeTomaso Vallelunga
Lancia Appia with a Zagato designed and coach-built body
Abarth 1000GT Bialbero – a car I used to have on the wall of my bedroom as a teen. Bialbero means twin-cam
Alfa Romeo 1600 Junior Zagato
Murray admits that his collection skews towards the 1960s, which was when engineers often had to work with very little.
If
After a particularly trying week, one of our colleagues sent around the poem If by Rudyard Kipling. I found this version recited by Dennis Hopper from sometime in what I guess is some time in 1969 through to 1971.
Dami Lee on Studio Ghibli
Dami talks about the world building in Studio Ghibli films and how its creativity couldn’t have come out of ‘AI’.
Vending machine museum
Back when I first started work, we had a single Klix coffee machine which could just about vend cups of hot or cold water dolloped into a pre-filled plastic cup of coffee mix or powdered orange. These decades old Japanese vending machines put modern western machines to shame and are mechanical wonders.
