Ged Carroll

Category: design | 設計 | 예술과 디자인 | デザイン

Design was something that was important to me from the start of this blog, over different incarnations of the blog, I featured interesting design related news. Design is defined as a plan or drawing produced to show the look and function or workings of a building, garment, interfaces or other object before it is made.

But none of the definition really talks about what design really is in the way that Dieter Rams principles of good design do. His principles are:

  1. It is innovative
  2. It makes a product useful
  3. It is aesthetic
  4. It makes a product understandable
  5. It is unobtrusive
  6. It is honest
  7. It is long-lasting
  8. It is thorough down to the last detail
  9. It is environmentally-friendly – it can and must maintain its contribution towards protecting and sustaining the environment.
  10. It is as little design as possible

Bitcoin isn’t long lasting as a network, which is why people found the need to fork the blockchain and build other cryptocurrencies.

Bitcoin uses 91 terawatts of energy annually or about the entire energy consumption of Finland.

The Bitcoin network relies on thousands of miners running energy intensive machines 24/7 to verify and add transactions to the blockchain. This system is known as “proof-of-work.” Bitcoin’s energy usage depends on how many miners are operating on its network at any given time. – So Bitcoin is environmentally unfriendly by design.

On the other hand, Apple products, which are often claimed to be also influenced by Dieter Rams also fail his principles. They aren’t necessarily environmentally friendly as some like AirPods are impossible to repair or recycle.

  • Platform utility

    Silicon Valley VC Andreessen Horowitz put togethers slides that cover platform utility and the role of network effects. The  presentation does a good job at providing a taxonomy on different products. It comes in handy when thinking about channel role / platform utility from a media planning perspective and also evaluating start-up ideas. They define platform in terms of development, but for advertisers we can think of it wider as we are likely to be making API calls in terms of data, targeting and ad placement. It is something that we are building demand or brand equity on.

    Key takeouts from the presentation

    • A network effect occurs when a product or service becomes more valuable to users as more people use it

    Network effect benefits

    • Create barriers to exit for existing users
    • Create barriers to entry for new companies
    • Protect from competitors eating away at margins
    • Creates a winner takes all style market

    Communications networks laws that provide indicators likely platform utility

    • Sarnoff’s law – the value of a network is proportional to the number of viewers
    • Metcalfe’s law – the value of a network is proportional to the square of number of connected users
    • Reed’s law – value of a group forming network is proportional to the number and ease with which groups form within it (subgroups grow faster than sheer number of P2P participants

    If it isn’t clear where they fall within these networks, it’s a warning flag for brands on whether to invest in the platform.

    User modes

    • Single ‘player’ mode – the product has immediate utility for a single user. Examples would be Flickr in the early days for photo storage, Foursquare in the early days to bookmark places you’d been to as a locative memory. Social bookmarking sites like Pinboard, or Delicious would have been in here had it not been retired
    • ‘Multiplayer’ mode – the product has no utility for a single user. This is particularly true for communications products. Examples would be Viber, Skype, Slack, Zoom etc.
    • Products can be both single player and multiplayer. So the community that built around Flickr for example.
    • Single player is more powerful when accompanied by an initial tactic to drive early network growth. Instagram photo filters was a way to post pictures on Twitter before there was enough critical mass. They help with adoption in the early days of a product when network effects aren’t sufficiently strong yet.
    • What’s the initial growth lever or tactic that will get it to scale?

    Case studies

    • Facebook found that connecting a new user to 10 friends within 14 days of sign-up was key to improving retention
    • Focus on daily usage (habit building) to help grow network. Focus on engagement rather than just overall number growth
    • Growth usage, even as user numbers grow is a sure sign of network effects at work
    • Facebook took a clustered approach: Harvard, then Stanford and eventually other universities in the US and abroad. Rather than focusing on growth. The immediate ‘single player’ utility they offered was an online school directory
    • WhatsApp had a different network type to Facebook. Each WhatsApp user had about 20 connections compared to approximately 980 friends on Facebook. Fewer connections also meant clustering around family, close friends of interest based WhatsApp groups with more engagement
    • AirBnB had two sides of their network. More hosts attract more guests and even become guests themselves. More guests means more business and money for hosts
    • Medium found that ‘single player mode’ can help get to ‘multiplayer mode’ through building sufficient critical mass.

  • Facebook messenger content + more

    Next Up: Facebook Messenger Content From Publishers? – will Facebook Messenger content as publishing platform happen? WeChat has already got a mature content platform offering. This provides a clear framework for how Facebook Messenger content could look and feel. A bigger challenge for publishers and Facebook is how to monetise it

    SMARTPHONES: Dakele Becomes First Smartphone Victim – Bottom line: The closure of small smartphone maker Dakele marks the latest distress signal from the sector, with one or more larger, more familiar brands likely to close shop within the next 6 months. Component makers have already gone under

    BMW Group THE NEXT 100 YEARS | BMW Pressclub Global – intersting concepts and ideas

    Facebook pulls demand-side platform from Atlas – Business Insider – bots and bad quality adverts

    Why “Go Viral” Is Not An Effective Content Marketing Strategy | Marketingland – bookmark this article, share it with colleagues, peers and clients

    WPP Reports 5.3% 2015 Organic Revenue Growth | MediaPost – By comparison, Interpublic reported 6.1% organic revenue growth for 2015, while Omnicom Group reported 5.3% and Publicis Groupe reported 1.5%

    How China’s rich shape national policymaking | The Japan Times – Prime Minister Li Keqiang, as part of his report on the government’s plans and activities, announced the launch of an “Internet Plus” strategy. Insiders immediately realized who had coined that term. It was none other than Pony Ma, who had started to use that phrase beginning in 2013, based on the concepts developed by his company’s own research institute. Even though Ma is not a member of the CPC, the “paternity” of the “Internet Plus” is undeniable

    Mutual Funds Sour on Startup Investments – WSJ – feels eerily like the end of the original dot com bust

    ‘Features-as-a-service’ is changing the game for app makers – looks and feels like mash-ups did during the height of web 2.0

    Capturing the Productivity Impact of the ‘Free’ Apps and Other Online Media By Leonard Nakamura and Rachel Soloveichik – or apps haven’t driven productivity any further in the 2000s. it is especially shocking when the product gains from internet connectivity from 1995 – 2000 are considered (PDF)

    Huawei MateBook shipments expected to reach 400,000 units in 2016 | Digitises – Huawei’s MateBook 2-in-1 is expected to achieve annual shipments of 400,000 units, a lot lower than market watchers’ expectations of 1-2 million units as Huawei is mainly pushing the device in the high-end enterprise market instead of consumer segment

    UK newspaper industry: Rewriting the story – FT.com – “The Internet is very tabloid-y,” says one Fleet Street executive. “Facebook is effectively a tabloid – short, attention-grabbing pieces of information.” – (paywall)

  • Holly Herndon + more things

    Holly Herndon

    Holly Herndon and Jace Clayton in conversation. Holly and Jace are interesting characters. They are academics, at least one published book author and artists. They have explored areas such as sampling themselves and the use of machine learning in composition and sound creation.

    Holly Herndon on process is fascinating. I think this has wider implications for creative industries. It does raise question about the nature of creation itself in terms of intellectual property.

    James Lavelle

    James Lavelle on the history of Mo’Wax. These films by FACT magazine are nice. Although they miss a few things.

    Lavelle’s impact goes beyond music:

    • James Lavelle has been a taste maker, he helped popularise a lot of Japanese clothing including A Bathing Ape (BAPE) in the UK and Europe
    • Lavelle’s Unkle was more than a music brand. There was a strong focus on merchandise and clothing including the Surrender streetwear brand. The merchandise was a great product as you can see in Lavelle’s archive. You only see Surrender items come up on eBay every so often because they are so valued and highly prized by owners. The big issue seems to have been one of distribution and hype. There is no interest on the likes of StockX for these items despite the heat behind designers Futura and manufacturers Mediacom and BAPE – again distribution would have been so important for awareness

    Lavelle has managed to self destruct and reinvent himself, which is only obliquely touched upon in this footage.

    More on the history of Mo’Wax. There is more serendipity in this than this video lets on. Also Japan’s Major Force Records needs more kudos than seems to happen in this video. If you liked this it is well worthwhile checking out the

    Sleep app pivot

    How J&J Research Led From Bath-Time to a Mobile Sleep App | Digital – AdAge – fascinating story how consumer insights can dramatically shake up product development and or service design

  • Come to Singapore + more

    Come to Singapore

    Come to Singapore! The Sights (And Branding) Are Lovely | WIRED – it feels very Monocle-esque in terms of editorial style. Come to Singpore! is very different to the Conde Naste Traveller type editorial. Singapore is aiming at developing a start-up culture so targetingWired (US) readers make a good deal of sense. More Singapore related posts here.

    Decline of cyberspace

    William Gibson on the decline of cyberspace. It is fascinating in terms of how Gibson’s inspiration has evolved over time. He was reacting against genres that he didn’t want to write as much as ideas he wanted to convey. The ability to say no, is a very interesting creative process and it reminds me of an interview I saw with an Apple executive talking about why the iPod didn’t have an FM radio.

    Renault Alpine Vision

    Interesting to see Renault going back to Alpine’s sports roots with the Vision sports coupe. It is made to a similar formula to the original 1960s cars that made Alpine famous. A light, small car, a rear-mid engine placement with a highly tuned small capacity engine. Performance is viewed by the Alpine team in much more holistically with an equal focus on handling and breaking.

    Tesla Model X

    I am a sucker for well done manufacturing and process films. The first one up is from Tesla, highlighting robots working in a manufacturing cell on their X model vehicle. Tesla has had problems around areas like panel fit. I am not sure if they have resolved those quality issues, but robots should provide them with a very consistent process and higher throughput.

  • Monster Hunt & more news

    Monster Hunt

    China’s highest-grossing film of all time Monster Hunt flops in US, takes in $21,000 during opening weekend: Shanghaiist – interesting that they didn’t bother to put some marketing wallop behind Monster Hunt, they had enough time to do a good English dub (great way to get Asian Americans on board) and push it out to a more general audience in the US. It would have been a great China soft power vehicle. Instead a China soft power opportunity was lost.

    Then there is the other view, that Monster Hunt performed to expectations. There is a possibility that its Chinese ticket sales were inflated. I and others that I know have gone to see a western film on more than one occasion in a Chinese cinema. The ticket is rang out as a local film and then the screen number is crossed out and the western movie screen number written on by the assistant.

    Secondly, Monster Hunt didn’t spawn a Toy Story-esque merchandise avalanche in China and other Asian markets. Which indicates it wasn’t that much of a cultural moment and ergo, not as successful as one would believe. More China related posts here.

    Consumer behaviour

    Blu-ray Isn’t Going Anywhere – Park Associates – interesting demographic pattern of ownership – “Owners have higher incomes than the overall broadband household population as well as a strong preference for the highest-quality video.“

    Hillary Clinton is losing young voters to Bernie Sanders. | Slate – not scientific but interesting. It also gives an interesting viewpoint on Corbyn’s political chances.

    Design

    Arriving at San Francisco – interesting delve into Apple’s new system font. Unfortunately I can’t download it in a format to use it in documents

    Gadgets

    StarTech Unveils Dual-Display Thunderbolt 2 Docking Station with 12 Ports – AnandTech – this looks like all my peripheral prayers were answered. I ended up with two of these. They work well for handling by two Apple Cinema displays

    Ideas

    Who Killed Nokia? Nokia Did | INSEAD Alumni Magazine – Despite being an exemplar of strategic agility, the fearful emotional climate prevailing at Nokia during the rise of the iPhone froze coordination between top and middle managers

    Why Yahoo Couldn’t Adapt to the Smartphone Era – The New Yorker – the irony is that they got on mobile services early. Yahoo! Go had been launched when I was there at the beginning of 2006. It was a one stop shop to search, access email, share photos on Flickr, get news and access Yahoo! Finance. Christian Lindholm was at Yahoo! back then. He was the director in charge of the S60 operating system interface at Nokia prior to

    Innovation

    LLVM Patches Confirm Google Has Its Own In-House Processor – Phoronix – interesting that they have a custom processor, it is related to their internal network infrastructure

    Media

    Why Jeep’s $10M Super Bowl Ad Only Used a Third of the Screen | WIRED – interesting example of online considerations driving TV creative decisions – mobile devices

    Telemundo to Build New $250 Million Miami Headquarters – The Wrap – which indicates how big the Latin media market is

    On the hypothetical eventuality of no more free internet – FT – interesting discussion of Internet economics and how it relates to  the commons (paywall)

    CBS Says Super Bowl 50 Broke Streaming Records With 3.96 Million Unique Viewers | TechCrunch – which is still relatively small compared to broadcast TV audiences for major events such as this

    Online

    Akamai earnings call hints at Apple CDN – Business Insider – not terribly surprising, Akamai has strategic partnerships with Apple rivals as well. Akamai earnings hint at the service’s ubiquity

    Security

    US intelligence chief: we might use the internet of things to spy on you | Technology | The Guardian – not terribly surprising, each technological frontier represents opportunities and IoT won’t be any different in that respect. The very pervasiveness of IoT is what makes it such a security risk

    Singapore

    Come to Singapore! The Sights (And Branding) Are Lovely | WIRED – it feels very Monocle-esque content on Singapore

    Web of no web

    This Google app could forever change the way you travel – Google’s translation app has a new feature that will come in handy for travelers. You point your smartphone’s camera at a sign printed in a foreign language, and Google’s translation technology