Posts filed under 'technology'
Cultural values, design, and global production
Eleanor Cooksey writes:
I recently read WPP’s annual journal of marketing insights, Atticus, and noted an interesting point towards the end of an article called ‘Getting the little things right’, by a team at the digital agency Digit, in London. [Not currently online, unfortunately].
They discuss how product and service design, in particular for electronic media, tends to reflect ‘Californian’ values, which include ‘pragmatism (a can-do attitude and belief in prototyping), audacity (focus on innovation and the pioneering spirit) and a certain lightness of touch (playfulness and optimism)’. Perhaps not surprising, they say, since so many user interface principles came out of Silicon Valley in the ’80s and ’90s. When one thinks of Apple, for example, it’s easy to see how these values translate into product experience.
But users in other regions expect an experience which reflects their important values. In Europe, this might include ‘conviviality (social not solitary) and quality (craftsmanship, individualism, local provenance). Nokia, for example, has recently shown prototype handsets which embed ‘green values’ and social responsibility.
But as the global design market becomes more integrated, it may become increasingly hard in the future to work out whose values are inherent in services and products.
Image ‘ipod’ copyright 2007 Apple Inc.
Image ‘eco phone’ copyright 2008 Nokia.
1 comment 22 January 2008
iCoursework
Lucy Pickard writes:
In an interesting classroom change, A-level media studies students will now earn 20% of their marks by podcasting or blogging, according to various newspaper reports (Education Guardian, Mail). Formal essays are to be exchanged for voice-presented video clips and informal, blog-based writing in recognition of the skills needed to succeed in media today. The Queen’s English Society was quoted as lamenting the loss of traditional essay-based coursework, but the OCR exam board maintains that the changes are in line with both the growing demand for a ‘more modern and exciting’ media studies qualification and recent media developments.
The image is from the business blogging site RSSApplied.com
Add comment 5 January 2008
New ways to donate
Eleanor Cooksey writes:
With the rise of CSR and increasing interest in pro bono work, I was struck by an article in last week’s Economist which describes the range of projects now available which use spare processing capacity on ordinary PCs. They range from the biggest and best known, SETI@home, which started in 1999 searches for signs of extra-terrestrial intelligence, and now has over 3 million contributors, to projects looking for the next prime number. Whilst we are used to the idea of volunteering about ‘doing good’, donating spare PC processing power suggests we could think more laterally about how we can share under-used resources.
What is also interesting is the ever widening pool of those who might volunteer in this way. A growing number of other devices, including games consoles, also contain significant amounts of processing power and are internet enabled. One of the projects, Folding@home, (which looked at protein simulations) became the largest known distributed computing network thanks to its 40,000 plus PlayStation 3 volunteers.
Add comment 17 December 2007
Online couch potatoes
Becky Rowe writes:
Watching TV on your own or looking to indulge in the irreverent wit of a bunch of Guardian Unlimited readers? Then log on to the ‘Real time telly – talk about it now’ thread. The premise is that you can chat about what you are watching, whilst you are watching. Particularly good to spice up the solo viewing experience, or if your ‘witty’ comments have been banned by your sofa buddy, but you are still desperate to share…
This phenomenon came to my attention last Saturday when I noticed that the X-factor thread had become one of the most active on the GU discussion boards. Not only is a place to share observations about the contestants, or canvass votes for your favourite, but there is now a real sense of online community around the live Saturday night transmission. A perfect example of what happens when real (if you count X-factor as real!?) collides with virtual
Add comment 26 November 2007
Second Life interview
I know most interviews with site founders teeter on the grim line between marketing and hype, but there’s a surprisingly reflective interview with Second Life founder Philip Rosedale in today’s Technology Guardian,.
For those of you who haven’t got time to read it, the headline points are:
- Current turnover is $500m (and growing rapidly)
- The value of having its own virttual currency is that it enables micro-transactions.
- Retention of users is only 10% (they think because it takes 4 hours to get the hang of the place). If they can get that to 40 minutes they think that will rise to 50%
- The business model is less abstract than it appears: Rosedale describes it as: “What we are really selling you is computation. We are selling you CPU core. If you buy a 16-acre piece of land, which is about four city blocks, what you are renting is one processor.”
- They have plans to develop the avatars so they can function elsewhere on the web, outside of second life.
- And in response to a question about whether avatars can commit suicide, he says, ‘Yeah, in fact I think someone’s going to write a great dramatic book about that some day”.
Andrew
Add comment 17 May 2007
