VW to launch new GTi as an iPhone app... only

Hmm. This is certainly brave, or maybe mental? I'm the first to advocate digital media, but rarely do I suggest it as the only strategy to communicate with customers.

Volkswagen are launching their latest GTi via an iPhone app only. Spending circa $500k instead of $60m makes obvious financial sense, but without the non-digital channels, will it reach enough people to spread knowledge and create sales? This one remains to be seen - I'll be very interested to see if it works, and if it does, it may well make my job easier by using it as a case study for wary clients :)

Read Volkswagen to Rely Solely on IPhone App for GTI Launch on AdAge

Data visualisation: On the Origin of Species: The Preservation of Favoured Traces

Darwin's seminal work On The Origin of Species went through 6 editions, growing from 150,000 words to 190,000. Ben Fry has developed a beautiful way to visualise this, laying out the words of the first edition, and then colour-coding the changes as they happen, all along an animated timeline. Hard to describe (as I've just demonstrated), just head over and check it out - it's a wonderful piece of work that must have taken forever to complete...



Check out Ben Fry's On the Origin of Species: The Preservation of Favoured Traces

Tonematrix - audio lab toy by André Michelle

Like so many workplaces, tons of things get emailed around our office. Most of them either don't interest me or don't grip me.

Then there are beautifully simple, but immediately usable little things like André Michelle's ToneMatrix.



I can't stop fiddling with this thing :) And it instantly makes me feel like a musical genius (trust me, I'm not). It's so simple to use that you end up fiddling with it over and over. Plus, I discovered that right-clicking gives you the option to "copy" your tune (a matrix of states: see mine below) which can be sent to someone to paste onto ToneMatrix and load the tune themselves. Brilliant :)

Copy the code below and right-click, paste onto the ToneMatrix Flash element on the ToneMatrix page to load my work of art! (ahem)

102402,102400,103168,118786,114784,98304,2,12,0,15360,131070,2722,2722,131070,58698,58698

Augmented Reality... in a banner

Wow. Hats off to Burger King for being brave enough with new technology to comission this, and (suspected to be) Crispin Porter + Bogusky for coming up with it.

While the rest of the world gets its collective head around Augmented Reality, and coos over the iPhone and Android apps popping up using it these guys have jammed it into an MPU already :)

As reported on my colleague, Willem's, website users hold up a dollar bill to their computer's video camera to kick the AR goodness in. This is really smart: 1) it's aimed at the US and a $1 bill is something everyone has on them, even at their desk, and 2) the idea is to promote the $1 burger.

Simple idea, smartly executed.

Cisco's augmented-reality mirror

Concept only, but looks dang fun and definitely the way I think we're headed

Seen on Digital Signage Insights

Audi car configurator on Microsoft Surface

Hats off to Razorfish for this one (and jealousy for the fact they are hands-on with developing on the Surface).

Audi Car Configurator on Surface @ IAA 2009 from Neue Digitale / Razorfish on Vimeo.

This is a great execution - fun, and functional. Just needs a big fat "Buy now" button once you've configured it :)

Jquery joy

I'm becoming a big fan of JQuery, the lightweight open-source JavaScript library. I've even used it on my new photography website, www.leonmccomish.com, where I showcase some of the photos I've taken as I'm learning to use my DSLR.

Over the past few years, I've fallen out of love with Flash and ActionScript for the projects we deliver in my line of work. Compared to DHTML technologies such as Jquery, it takes a lot longer to get a project to an acceptable alpha-stage or prototype. There's also a much, much smaller pool of resources available to deliver the project. Often, if a bug exists towards the end of the project, or the timelines get condensed, you only have the 1, or 2 developers who can a) code AS3, and b) understand the project. This latter point highlights another issue I have with AS at the moment: that, despite the syntax and code structures brought in to formalise the language, every coder seems to code differently. I don't think I have ever worked on a Flash project where a 2nd ActionScripter coming onto the project has not said "I can't work with this code, I'm going to have to re-write it". Costly, time-consuming and very frustrating.

So, to JQuery. Of course, it doesn't have the full animation and interaction capabilities of Flash, but - when well applied - it can do some excellent things. And - remember - no plug-in, no preloader. I found www.usejquery.com, which is a great showcase of the things that can be done with JQuery. Some examples of note:

http://bonadiesarchitect.com/
http://marvinchristianlee.com/

Why social media can be dangerous for your brand

Social media is empowering, and brands love to try and leverage that.

Remember, though, that the door swings both ways. HSBC Reviews is a site that has sprung up, pretending to be official, but isn't. It references Twitter Tweets of people who think HSBC is good or bad, along with their written (Tweet) reason. The homepage proclaims a damning indicator:



This is a good example of the power of customers using social media in a damaging way. It also uses ShareThis-like technology to empower the users to share the link around on Facebook, Twitter and Delicious, which can spread like wildfire.

A grab of the screen is below, in case they pull the site (HSBC have a hefty legal team I would guess):

Bullet impacts at 1 million frames a second

Beautiful. Makes you wonder how much we aren't aware of without the technology to be able to appreciate the things that happen beyond our senses and abilities.

Reminds me of the song "New Skin" by Incubus, which has a sample in it, which goes:

...Until the 20th century, reality was everything humans could touch, smell, see, and hear.
Since the inital publication of the charged electromagnetic spectrum, humans have learned that what they can touch, smell, see, and hear...is less than one millionth of reality...

Always blows my mind, that.

London Stock Exchange Rejects .NET For Open Source

Original Slashdot page

This is a really damning move by the London Stock Exchange. We develop with .NET in my company, but I used to work in a development house using PHP. .NET does seem to be a better development environment, better structured and supported, but it also feels like it takes longer to get anything done.

Microsoft must be reeling from this move.

Imogen Heap plays "Wait it out"

Man, this life gets weirder and weirder. TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is an embodiment of what I believe about digital: that the possibilities are endless, limited only by our own imagination. Imogen Heap is one of my favourite artists, and has been for some time.

I've just discovered that TED featured her a while ago, I've embedded the video below. Weird how so many things are crossing over for me at the moment.

Original TED page

Coca-cola mirror vending machine

Loving this :) Mirrored foil on the vending machine for Diet Coke, so you look thinner when you go up to it. Smart.

Seen on AdsOfTheWorld

Tilt-shift used in Australian bank's TV ad

I love tilt-shift, and blogged about it in December, 2008. This is the 1st time I've seen it in a TV ad, and it looks great. Probably gonna get boring and overused quickly, but I like it right now.

Seen on AdFreak

Russel Davies: blocks of time and the mechanical facebook

Cracking prototyping article by Russel Davies, who is championing the benefits of making something, over simply sketching or discussing it. He's especially applying that to the complex and lightspeed-evolving world of social media, for example by realising Facebook status updates as a paper-based 'wheel':

I'm often thinking of ways to interact with social media, and also how to visualise its data and existence. I have a couple of conceptual ideas I think have huge value - drop me a line if you want to work with me on them.

Read Russel's full article here.

Marco Brambilla - Civilization video art

Astonishingly beautiful piece of video art, conceived by Marco Brambilla, produced by Crush in Toronto, and installed in The Standard Hotel, New York.

"...Civilization, a vision he had of taking hundreds of stock footage, movie footage and original clips and combining them to create a moving landscape depicting the ascension from hell to heaven..."

Incredibly, this very tall creative piece is shown to viewers as they go up or down in the hotel's elevator. Read more about it on this page.

Branded Software: Your Next Campaign is a Startup

Odopod - Branded Software: Your Next Campaign is a Startup

Brands and their advertising agencies are choosing to create software as components of their marketing efforts. Whether it’s an iPhone app or a service like Nike Plus, these are essentially software products.

The traditional agency process is not very well suited to the creation of software. In fact, in many cases it may be counter-productive.

Really interesting blog post this. I myself have been running a vast project for over a year now, as Senior Project Manager. The product is a car sharing application (much like Zip Car) and we devised, built and maintain the global website.

This is so far removed from the work the rest of my agency does - branded Flash microsites, banner campaigns, social media work - that the agency process does not work for it. As such, I ring-fenced a team of developers (because standard resource-sharing of agencies would mean different developers working on my product and ramp up times every time, plus code structure variations). It's a complex situation though, as the client is ramping up teams on their side as they see the success build, so we must do the same. This drifts me and my team away from the core business of marketing, and so we need specialised processes (product manager, product requirements documentation, phased feature releases) that the rest of the agency really has no experience of.

Powermat - wireless power charging available now

I've been watching the development of wireless charging for a while now - whereby you can simply place your devices on a mat and it begins charging (no wires to plug in).

Powermat is now actually available, and I'm really tempted (although hits UK shores end of October so not yet). It's a great start - it's not perfect as you have to buy a 'receiver' per device and the mat as well. So, for the iPhone you buy a protective 'sleeve' which has it built in for example:



There's more info and a wider range of products on the Powermat website, including the mat itself as seen below:

If you like the paying-bills-with-a-picture-of-a-spider guy

He's got a brilliant site, with loads of batshit-crazy articles. I love this guy's misanthropic hijinks... mainly because I feel the same way :) You have to go in via an article, rather than the homepage. Here's a link to get you there: http://www.27bslash6.com/matthewsparty.html

Newton Faulkner - live video from Regent's Street

And this live video ain't half bad either...

Newton Faulkner - Badman video

Aw - this is brilliant. 1 man, 1 chroma-key sweatshirt, 2 shoes on sticks and a crappy video in the background. Fricking genius, I tells ya :)

Ball-it - Finnish startup challenging Nintendo Wii

These Finnish developers have come up with a really bizarre idea. Seems a golf-ball shaped and sized device is the interface with a breed of fitness games they have developed.

What's interesting to me is how this further blurs the lines of HCI - making interacting with computers much more natural and intuitive.

The video below is crappily shot, but gets better after about 1/2-way through:

Seen on CrunchGear

Cyclopedia - location-aware maps & Wikipedia!

Now THIS is cool. And it's tempting me to get a 3GS now. Bring up Wikipedia articles relating to content in the world around you. I love it :)

See more at the official site

Apple mapping - the death of Google Maps?

Interesting post on Gizmodo about Apple's likely move into mapping, after they acquired PlaceBase back in July. PlaceBase creates maps that are highly customisable and has a very flexible API.

Likely uses? Maybe an Apple-specific mapping tech for the iPhone? Touch-specific app for the new Apple tablet?

PolicyMap uses PlaceBase's technology, so check it out - it could be the next mapping tech you're using :)

Original Gizmodo post

cAR Locator - iPhone 3GS app with AR

Nice! Mash up of GPS locating car tech, using AR to point you to your vehicle again. Loving this :)



More info on App Store HQ

Intel (and Apple) create LightPeak

Imagine being able to do away with USB, PS/2, FireWire, HDMI and all the other myriad of different connections, and replace them all with 1 optical uber-connection, capable of running 10Gbps bi-directionally, scalable to 100Gbps within a decade. Well, that's what Intel have created and it's called LightPeak (Intel page | Wikimedia article).

The video below shows it running HDTV, whilst also copying a 2Gb file, within no impact on the video playback:

And here's a powerfully geeky video showing the cabling, which is the width of a human hair (!):

Impacts of this are huge as copper wire is reaching its limits:

Existing electrical cable technology in mainstream computing devices is approaching practical limits for speed and length, due to electro-magnetic interference (EMI) and other issues.

Found on iPhoneFreakz

BumpTop 3D desktop gets extras

I've been following the BumpTop 3D desktop with a lot of personal interest (as in, I don't think I've blogged it yet :)

BumpTop is a different way to interact with files and folders, using 3D space, a literal representation of a desktop, and intuitive swipe gestures to manipulate files.

They've just released a bunch of additional enhancements for the app which appear specific to tasks (e.g. photo manipulation) and the interactions look really intuitive to me. I'd love to be able to try this out, especially on a Surface device.

Wow - long hiatus... sorry about that

Work's been insanely busy these past few weeks so not been able to post much. I've just delivered a huge digital experiential project I've been Project Managing for the past 6 weeks or so - hopefully I'll have more time now.

It's actually, this live event in Clapham Common, London, UK so if you feel like going along, shooting some hoops, and having our digital analysis system tell you your shot angle and how to improve, head on down.

It's a unique mix of technologies really. The analysis device is something we shipped in from the US, and it's never been in the UK before - check out www.noahbasketball.com for more on that. We hook into that using LAN cabling on a switch-based LAN network we created. Then we have a .NET application running the local webserver and website. 2 admin users input data via the admin tool, which goes into the SQL DB. 2 plasma screens are running Flex apps, which do real-time messaging with the DB via WebORB to show the player's stats on-screen, and a leaderboard of all players to the audience. Phew :)

Here's a shot of the rig that we've been developing in my office for the past 6 weeks:

Yesterday, we took it on-site for the first time and rigged it up as it would be used today and tomorrow with members of the public:

The whole site was built up around our rig - it's a pretty big footprint now it's all there: