Big Ideas

And now, for something completely different!

Lots of longer, more serious posts from me of late (and many more to come, the drafts are coming along :-) ). But, I thought I'd take a break from that and share something hilarious with you:

www.getlistenup.com

Yes, I did actually come across this via a TV infomercial, it's true. I was mesmerized!! The guy who invented this must be a millionaire right :)? And imagine, this powerful, incredibly accurate technology can be yours for only $14.99.

Please, somebody, please, buy this and tell the rest of us about it.

 

Technorati tags: ListenUp, Advertising, Infomercials

For all of you Lost fans..

Over the past several weeks I must have had 4 different people tell me that they're getting addicted to the show Lost and that I should check it out. Well, I still refuse to do so (mostly because I'm sure that they're right and I really don't have time for more tv addictions) but Chuck Klosterman, one of my favorite writers, says that it's the, "bets network drama in the history of television".

Not only that, but his piece on the continued success of reality television and why it's here to stay is excellent. It's not the most upbeat of viewpoints, but it makes a lot of sense to me.
Esquire:Feature Story: Tenacious TV

So, what kind of tv fan are you? Do you prefer to see the "ungreat" or the extraordinary. I'm sure you can guess which camp I'm in :)




Technorati Tags: Lost, Chuck Klosterman,

Buzzworthy advertising, but mediocre execution

An interesting email reached my inbox the other day from FullTilt Poker, where I sometimes play online poker. It's purpose was to promote FullTilt ads, with the subject line, "Check out the ads we couldn't pay them to run.."

Check them out for yourself

Now, I can see why they couldn't get mainstream media to show these ads, but the thing that I'm left wondering is why they don't do a bit better job of promoting the viral aspects of this advertising. They're funny, controversial and from the company's perspective, they'd like to get them out there right? Why then, is the "Email a friend" only at the top and a bit too generic in title? Wouldn't it be better to say something like "Share these with a friend" or "Test your friend's poker face" - something a bit more telling in intent. Additionally, they should have an input box for email addresses already available, with your cursor in it, making it more natural to share.

Finally, what I'd really like to see these guys do is to embed a link that was clickable at the end of the video and upload it to YouTube , Yahoo! Video and others. If you go check those two sources out, for example, you'll find the videos, but it appears that they're uploaded by others. I think in this scenario, Full Tilt should have proactively posted the videos and enable the ads to actually be actionable ads, in addition to being entertainment to be shared.

Just my $.02

Tags: full tilt poker, viral marketing, funny advertising

I don't do nearly enough fiction reading..

I read a lot. I always have. I think it's probably been the single most important contributor to my success (as large or small as it may be..) over time. I believe the ability to educate myself and to discover new areas of interest is hugely important to building a sustainable process of self-improvement and critique. That's not to say that reading is the only way to achieve that end, but for me, it's certainly been the most effective.

I also find that reading is one of the most fulfilling activities I can pursue. I rarely feel as centered, productive and healthy as when I'm reading regularly.

Having said that, I've noticed that over the past decade (makes me sound old doesn't it??), my consumption of fiction books has really diminished. Right now, of the 50-some books in my apartment that are part of my everpresent "to read" list, perhaps 5 of them are fiction. Which is why I came across this piece in the New York Times on the Best Works of American Fiction and felt a pang of regret. None of these books is even remotely close to my radar for books to read and browsing through the list, I wonder how much I'm missing out on.

It's a question of time, of course. But I wonder if reading more fiction might make me a more productive reader in general. What I mean is this: what if my propensity to choose non-fiction actually made it harder for me to digest the density of non-fiction content because I never give myself a "breather" from it?

I've found over the years that I'm less and less capable of reading just one book at a time. For the most part, I am usually reading 3 or 4 books at the same time, some of which might fall off the list. I have attributed this to the density of most non-fiction and simultaneously, the constant march towards faster, shorter, less dense media. The Internet is only the latest in a string of media delivery vehicles that has allowed us to break down content to bite size easily consumable pieces, to the detriment of our attention spans. BUT, what if mixing up the formats (digital text, video, printed text etc) and densities (non-fiction vs. fiction) actually meant that we could make the transition between the choices more easily and consume more. What if the simple act of introducing more fiction into my reading list meant that I could cut back to just reading one non-fiction book at a time and also consume bigger "bites" at a time, so to speak? What if that was not only true, but that implementing a balance between the Internet, television, radio, magazines, books, etc would make all of us more productive and capable of further media consumption? What if our brains got less tired as a result of strategically mixing up our media consumption?

Hmmm.. looks like I've got some books to go read :)

Tags: reading, media consumption, attention spans, fiction vs. nonfiction books, multitasking

This is very smart..

Viacom's got some pretty smart people working for it.. I've got another post in the offing about the genius of Comedy Central, but I had to blog very quickly about this: Best Week Ever Podcast XML.

That's right, Best Week Ever is being released as a full podcast every week. Not only that, it's got no rights restrictions on it and is available to mash up. They're hoping to have it gain more popularity by enabling people's creativity. Genius! I love it, I think this is a very strong step in the right direction and will surprise people in the ways in which the content gets put to use. Now, if I could just manage to learn how to edit video...

You had me at hello..

Newsflash: Tom Cruise is speaking at Yahoo! tomorrow! That's right, Mr. Scientology is going to be hanging out in URL's, live and in-person.

Let's all hope that he shares a Yodel with us and that it looks a bit like this:

So, some people are expecting it to be a train wreck. Others are annoyed that Yahoo!'s paying someone [inviting someone] who seems kind of wacky/preachy/crazy to speak. Me? I expect that it'll be rather tame, rather scripted and perhaps surprisingly fun. The guy's an actor right? He gets paid the big bucks to entertain and although recently, he's been entertaining us with antics that aren't on the big screen, I'm pretty sure that a corporate speaking gig is a pretty routine event for him.

Especially since all of our questions have to be pre-submitted... Yup, that's right, us employees get to ask questions. BUT, we have to submit them ahead of time. It makes total sense, if I was organizing this, I'd set it up this way as well, in order to avoid people like me :)

But, just once, I'd love it if an event like this occurred and it was totally unscripted and off-the-cuff. Since I can't have that, I've decided that I'd at least like to put together some questions that I wish we could ask Maverick tomorrow.
(Of course, remember, these are just jokes and just my opinions, affiliated in no way with Yahoo! I do, however, blame/thank a few of my friends for inspiration..)

1. “Mr. Cruise, will you please stop being glib?”    
2. “Wow, you’re short in person. That’s all I had to say."
3. “Seriously dude, spill the beans. What’s it like to nail Katie Holmes?”
4. “Umm yeah, same question, except for Nicole Kidman..”    
5. “You're everyone's problem. That's because everytime you go [on] the air, you're unsafe. I don't like you because you're dangerous.”
6. “You still owe me a new couch Tom. You KNOW how I hate shoes on my couch!”  - e-mail from O. Winfrey
7. “Can you show us your e-meter?”
8. “So, who makes more money, you or the head of your church?”
9. “Were you upset that you didn’t get to star in Battlefield Earth?”
10. “Let’s be honest here. You’re nuts. Certifiable. What I’m trying to say really is, in your own words, ‘Help me help you!’”   
    

What would you ask if you had the chance?

Unedited, funny or serious, comment and I'll throw some of the good ones up into the list.

**Quick Update** As was mentioned in a comment, there was no payment for Tom Cruise's appearance - Terry mentioned it in his introductions. I'll update later with an actual post about the event, which was very interesting and fun.

Tags: tom cruise, yahoo! influential speakers program, scientology

Well-designed, user friendly media devices - someone to lead the charge

Having previously spent part of my shuttle ride home mulling over the pain of using the mouse on my laptop and the broader question of interface design, I found myself thinking about user interface some more. I was wondering about what kind of talent you'd need to hire in order to ensure successful UI design. In thinking about how you might go about putting in place a team that was very smart about designing consumer interfaces, particularly dumbed down interfaces for media devices, I realized that there's already a company that is REALLY good at this stuff, at least in my mind. In fact, I think they're so good at it that they've basically designed the interface equivalent of crack - once a user comes in contact with it, they're hooked.

No, no, not Apple. Anyone played with a Newton lately? Besides, their laptops all have those stupid touchpad mouses too, so they're not that smart.

I  was thinking more along the lines of...

TIVO

If you've ever used a Tivo before, you're probably nodding your head right now, thinking about its addictive properties. Once you've used Tivo to watch tv, you become hooked. Not only is the simple capability to pause and record live tv amazingly useful, but the overall Tivo interface (by that I mean the remote plus the on-screen navigation) is simply amazing. It's intuitive, not overly complicated , leads users down a path of feature discovery and it is rewarding. It literally makes me want to go back to that experience more and more often. I choose not to watch tv in "real-time" anymore, because watching it with Tivo is just that much better. Now that, THAT is a pretty unique design capability.

*Disclosure time* I own Tivo stock. But, I've been disappointed with it. I bought in because of the incredibly vocal user base. People who love the product so much that they actively evangelize it to anyone whenever the subject of television comes up in conversation. I bought in because I believe in the long term value of the subscription model. I bought in because I believe in their ability to deliver targeted, user-driven television advertising. To date, Tivo hasn't done a terrific job of executing against these opportunities. This is maddening. Fundamentally, the company has a distribution problem and I don't see it going away any time soon. So I've been thinking about exiting my position; to take my losses, learn and move on.

HOWEVER, I do see an avenue for potential game-changing success. If you accept for a moment that Tivo's interface design is phenomenal and really helped spur the entire DVR market on with its usefulness, then you might think to yourself, "Hmm, that Tivo sure has a good understanding of user interface needs." In a world that is becoming increasingly populated by devices, particularly media devices, it seems to me that what we're desperately in need of are some device user interface experts. Furthermore, those interface experts that we have are facing the dual challenges of designing the best interface and balancing it with the associated hardware and manufacturing costs. It's not as simple as just building software that applies to any device. If it is, well, we know who's going to win that game. But, I think that there's more to it, because of the ongoing pace of innovation in the device space. Given that Tivo's faced both hardware and software challenges, it seems to me that maybe they're best positioned to capitalize on the need for design expertise.

So:

• What if Tivo was to experiment with this side of the business, spending time dreaming up a few devices that they think others should make?
• What if they were to create a service organization focused on designing the interfaces for consumer focused media devices?
• What if they were bought by a large company that cared a ton about how design in the media device future was going to impact their business (Sony, Nokia, Motorola, Intel etc)?

Yes, this idea is totally off the wall and highly unlikely, but I often like to ask those "What if?" questions that people don't spend enough time thinking about. I think that in the case of Tivo, the tea leaves point to a declining growth rate, a lack of significant distribution and a pricing/margin problem that paints them into an operational corner. If I was them, I'd be scrambling around, trying to think about what other options they could pursue while still relying upon the same talents and core competencies. So, if I was them, I'd be focusing on design and I'd be telling every other company that was somehow dependent upon the design of media devices that they needed my expertise going forward. I'm pretty sure that'd resonate with more than a few people.

Does it resonate with you?

Tags: tivo, user interface, media device design

Wow. I might start watching SNL just because of this

This video gets better the more I watch it: Break.com - Funny Pics, Hot Chicks, and Cool Flicks

Double True.

The dream of the digital home

The Economist, as usual, does a great job of bringing us back to reality in its article on "The Digital Home" . Sure, it sounds great to be able to have everything networked and seamless in your home (and everywhere, really) and I have no doubt that it'll eventually become a reality, but I think that there are a lot of people who believe that it's going to happen sooner than it really will.

They make several points more eloquently than I could:

1. The average consumer doesn't care about this as much as those of us in the tech/media world believes. I liked the way that a consultant quoted in the article thinks about it, "...adoption is a function of the users' sense of crisis (ie, motivation to change)      outweighing their perceived pain of switching...".
2. The companies playing in the space tend to think like they're selling a solution to the customer, rather than the way customers actually buy - piecemeal.
   1. I buy a DVD player and later an Xbox and then maybe later, an MP3 player. I don't buy them  all at once or even planned as components that have to work together, they should just work together automatically. The caveat, I think, to this method of purchasing is that if any company benefits from it, it's Microsoft. IF I do care about buying along a set of standards, might as well make sure it works with my computer, which has a 95% chance of being MS based.
3. Vendors are refusing to make their systems interoperable. Some are talking a good game about how they want to, but so far, they've inevitably chosen to be proprietary about some part of the solution that they offer. They view it as a necessary part of their strategy, but their strategy backfires, b/c it F's the consumer and makes it altogether too complex to execute a "digital home".

Despite being a good discussion of some of the challenges facing this broad dream, the Economist does slip up on a couple things:

• As I understand it, Windows Media Center Edition is really taking off of late, to as much as 43% of retail computer sales
• Apple has a control problem. HP might distribute iTunes on their computers but their agreement to make an HP iPod fizzled out quickly. Competing with partners on hardware has to date, been a limiting factor in Apple's growth
• They don't explore the possibility that interoperability could expand the bottom lines of the involved players. If a likely scenario is that one winner dominates and owns the market, wouldn't most companies be better off cooperating and getting a piece of the potential pie, rather than none at all?