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So I’ve spend quite a bit of time typing out how I think that the Microsoft Zune has issues. At least with the marketing that focuses on “social” activities. The primary issue with it is that there are too many DRM restrictions and the fact that when they’re listening to music, people don’t want to be disturbed. The end result is that I feel the Zune is being totally misrepresented.

However, there is something that appears to be a strong step in a really good direction. That is the new DAVE (Digital Audio Video Experience) device from Seagate. The primary point of the device is to allow immediate syncing and innerconnectivity between various items. To reach this end, it comes preloaded with wireless, bluetooth and a USB hub. Thus you can have one device that streams music or videos to your cellphone or use it to store items or share between two computers over wifi. The possibilities are tremendous.

Apparently the device can also send data from one device to another; a direct transfer so-to-speak. However, I am not entirely sure about this. The representative says that there is a security system built in so that unauthorized people can’t access your data, but how would that allow people to send from device to device? The product demo/announcement will be on Thursday, so we’ll have to see then.

It gets 10 hrs battery life with constant usage and has no screen (which is why I wonder about the setting of permissions for others to access data).

Ultimately, I feel like this is the way we want to go. More than the Zune which has a music focus, this kind of device has a video/person focus. This allows the device to be tremendously more useful. It seems like it would be a horrible annoyance to have a Zune and be listening to music when someone wants to send you something. I mean, they’re interrupting your music. But imagine this DAVE at a tradeshow. You can have a digital business card that you carry around with you on the device and when you meet someone cool, you can transfer that data to them. Heck, since it will sync up with wifi, you can even just put it on their computer or cell phone (with bluetooth) should they not have one of these devices. The possibilities are endless, not to mention that the device is tiny. You could stick it easily in a pocket or in a briefcase. Depending on the access system (say, through a cellphone), you would never have to actually take it out!

The future is pushing to interconnectiveness, much to the unhappiness of the big industries (aka due to DRM). People will find a way around it because they can. For example, There was a note today that someone has already claimed to have finished hacking the DRM of Vista and it was released today. These things don’t take much work to accomplish, no matter how much time is spent developing them. In any case, the futher into the future we go, the more important personal security will be. I believe at some point, the option of embedding electronics (like a computer, a neural interface or a storage device) under the skin or in the body will become available and widely acceptable. So what will this mean for personal security? Could someone hack into your brain? Only time will tell to see what technology is developed, but it is something that needs dire consideration.

The original report on the DAVE as well as a video interview with a guy from Seagate
Press Release Announcing the DAVE

Another week has come to an end. I’m afraid I haven’t been as motivated this week, but hopefully the weekend will re-energize me. I find the event of the weather to be fascinating. When it is raining out, I’d rather been indoors, so having to transit to and from school gets me down over time. However, when it is sunny and clear, I miss the entire day and the brilliance of it; also bringing me down. This is one reason I fully intend not to stay in Mario for longer than three terms. The lack of sunlight is detrimental to my health.

On the subject of evolution, I attended a very interesting lecture at the Dorkbot group on Wednesday night. I likely should have been doing work instead, but I’m glad I went. Presenting was Jeremy Thorp on the usage and possibilities of evolutionary code. What do I mean by this? Primarily, programs that use evolutionary techniques to become better and better. One example he gave was regarding NASA and launching satellites into orbit. In one of his examples, Smart Rockets, a set of rockets are given a goal of reaching a certain point and after all rockets failed (they were rather stupid to start with), the program would take the best two, “breed” their flight paths, and launch a new set of possibilities. Then it would repeat the process until all the rockets achieve the best flight path to the goal, as close as they can manage or as close as they think they can manage. All in all it is quite interesting. His ultimate point is that these evolutionary systems can help people arrive at solutions they had not thought possible via inherent mutation in the system. I find myself being more and more drawn to explore the possibilities involving this kind of biological process. It almost makes me want to learn coding for Processing and Flash so I can get started. Almost. Well, we’ll see.

This weekend shall be another work weekend, but I will strive to let the sunlight in and get some fresh air. The accursed work-room, “Mario,” shall not hold me down!

In designing the skin for this website, I wanted to achieve a painted look with the intent of using Painter to do it. I was told, “Why don’t you go get some acryllics and actually paint it?” My response was “But I can’t paint.” “Then how do you expect to do it on the computer?”

The more I think about it, the more I realize that it is what we believe ourselves incapable of doing that truly binds us to the ordinary. In trying to break out of that box, we find something totally different and new and it is only through that process that something original is developed.

It feels funny to think that I am in the process of painting a website. We’ll see how it turns out!

While exploring my various favorite weblogs, I came across this article over at Gizmodo.

It seems especially appropriate as an addendum to my previous post about the nature of the Zune advertising scheme.

Microsoft Zune propaganda welcomes you to the social, but that’s only about a 58% welcome, because sites around the blogosphere are noticing that around 42% of the songs they’re trying to share Zune-to-Zune are on the “Zune sharing prohibited” list. Even that three days/3 plays DRM slapped on every shared song is not enough for those moneygrubbing and paranoid record labels.

Out of 50 songs tested by Zunerama, Universal and Sony artists were the most represented on the prohibited list. That’s particularly frustrating when you recall that sweetheart deal that Universal Music Group and Microsoft dreamed up for the Zune, making everybody pay through the nose for the right to share Universal’s music on the Zune.

Suddenly the Zune becomes more and more untrue to the brand advertising that Microsoft has set up for it. In fact, I would see this as false advertising and the broken trust further degrades my willingness to purchase a Microsoft product. If I were a Zune owner, I’d be rather angered by this revelation as the core “value” of the machine is suddenly limited.

At first I thought the issue was just affecting ZunePass users, but then I read this over at Zune Thoughts:

I decided to do a test myself to see if the 50% figure had any truth to it. Since I don’t have a Zune Pass account (and can’t without a credit card billed to a US address), my test is limited in scope and should be taken with a grain of salt. I purchased eight songs from the Zune Marketplace Top 30 Songs (most from the Top 10), selected from various genres, and tacked on two KT Tunstall songs for good measure for a total of ten songs, nine of them from different artists. I then created a “quick list” on the Zune (the dusty white one) that had the synchronized songs and tried to share the songs with my other Zune (the dysfunctional black one). The results? Of the eight Top 30 songs, only five were allowed to be shared - that’s a 38% failure rate. If you factor in the two KT Tunstall songs, seven of the total ten songs were shared successfully (a slightly better 30% failure rate).

On the other hand, Tycho seemed quite happy with his choice despite not being able to use the function. And as one blogger writes, “Some As underwhelming as the 58% is, I need to remind myself… that figure is still 58% higher than would have been possible on any of today’s iPods. This is a groundbreaking music sharing approach, and it will only get better from here.”

However, I think the key issue at hand is that Microsoft established a base idea of what the Zune can do and the end result has been much less than satisfactory. I know we are all trapped by DRM, but if you can’t share all your music, don’t focus your campaign around it and hope people won’t find out!

When we are working, I feel that is is important to take a break and get some humor into one’s diet. It is a nice mental break and might even produce inspiration for one’s work. So, while I’m at it, why not enjoy some humor at the expense of commercialism, marketing and design?

Thus I present one of my favorite webcomics, Ozy and Millie. It is a long running comic (since 1998) and features a cast of characters and caricatures. The topics involved are all over the map, but as a comic it is consistently amusing and entertaining. I have been slowly working through it in my little free time and wanted to share a few (small number) of comics that I found particularly interesting. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find more related to the topic of design, but these are quite amusing.

• Single Comic on the Avant-Garde.
• 11 Comics on “The Search For Non-Commercialism”
• 9 Comics on “Sloganeering”

The comics are really short and (I find) quite amusing, so feel free to check them out for a short (did I mention short?) break from work.

I’ve decided to spend time devising entries for the FITC Creative Contest in Toronto.

FITC has three goals - to INSPIRE, to EDUCATE, and to CHALLENGE, all within the Design & Technology space. This is accomplished by assembling the leaders and shakers within the industry, and presenting them through presentations, panels, Q&A sessions, workshops, evening mixers, and the FITC Design & Technology award show.

Link to the Contest Rules and Information

Wish me luck!

I have recently been working on developing several logos and let me tell you, it isn’t easy. I’m proud when I discover an awesome way to do something or make something that I feel is really worthwhile. Then I read stuff like this:

I didn’t spend much time on any of them because they are supposed to be logos. Simple and easy to understand.

I agree with the second part and totally disagree with the first. Logos can take a short time; I made one that I conceived and created in under 20 minutes that perfectly fits the idea I was trying to express. Then there are other logos, like the one I’ve been trying to develop for this site that has taken me hours over many days and still no inspiration or “magic.”

Yes, logos are supposed to be simple and easy to understand. They’re also supposed to represent whatever they are a logo for. If they don’t, they’re a pretty bad logo. Truly capturing the essence of the project can take minutes, hours, days or months (hopefully not years!).

However, in the end, it is truly worthwhile.

As I walk around downtown Vancouver, I see tons of people listening to music on their iPods, CD players, or whatever other method they choose to use to enjoy their music. These individuals, trying to pass the time as they hurry from point A to point B, hardly even bother looking at me as they hurry by.

There is a psychological barrier that wearing headphones or earplugs creates between the listener and the rest of the world.

Putting on headphones in public, in essence denying the world, is probably more thrilling than the act itself would suggest. The kind of social force-field it generates is something I’ve needed to blunt the outside world for quite some time - and the ability to institute a directorial vision, even while in a grocery store, can’t be overstated. I challenge you to listen to Kate Havnevik in some crowded place and not find yourself miraculously transformed into the protagonist of a spontaneous film. Tycho, Penny Arcade

Looking at them, one feels like they aren’t interested in talking, aren’t interested in interacting; they just want to kill the time. For the most part, this tends not to be the case, but the image is definitely there.

This is why Microsoft’s ad campaign of “Welcome to the Social” for their new Zune is so odd. Listening to music is a very personal activity, so why do they think that it can be turned into a social event?

What am I talking about you might ask? Here are some handy Zune advertisements you might find interesting. ( I won’t even get into all the stuff I find wrong with these ads. That is a post for another day. … Although watching them again makes me seriously want to go into it in depth. Sorry to post so many, but I wanted to make sure I got all of them.)

• Picnic Ad
• Battle Ad (This is the best one I’ve seen)
• Concert Ad (Also a decent ad! I wonder if the advertising unit is finally pulling things together?)
• Couple Ad (Then again, maybe not)
• Dog Ad (ditto)
• Spinners Ad (extra ditto with sugar on top)
• Snow Ad (not half bad)

Understandably, the Wi-Fi is one primary advantages that the Zune has over the iPod. This isn’t to say that the Zune is an iPod killer; the iPod does too many things too perfectly for it to be such, but the Zune certainly has potential.

Tycho over at Penny Arcade, put together an interesting newspost about his lack of displeasure at owning a Zune (much to the surprise of many). His situation may be unique (or not), but he does go into depth about some of the advantages that he has discovered with the Zune.

Tycho continues on his discussion of the Zune during his experience at CES (as a side note, why was it so hard to find out what “CES” stands for on its website? I want information, I was given a noisy flash movie. Great webdesign folks, just great.)

I had hoped that there at CES I would have an opportunity to use the Zune’s social features - its “higher brain functions,” as I put it - but I was only there Thursday, after the place had largely thinned out. Near the Microsoft booth I was happy to see many devices speaking wirelessly - so many I had to scroll! - until I realized that they were named after genres, and were (in fact) the display units, which added greatly to my shame.

The two times I had an opportunity to share files were interesting - once on the floor itself, and once in the plane on the way back. In both cases, my offer was rebuffed. This actually feels terrible when it happens, because you’re trying to show someone something that is important to you and they don’t care. But let’s be clear: when someone is listening to music, that’s private. They are actively eschewing the outside world, and here you are - with some song they’ve never heard of - interrupting their lives. Let me also state that your music stops when doing this - even for someone that buys into the device philosophically, I mean… Jesus Christ, guys.

So, Microsoft, where’s the social? If I’m at an event and I want to play someone a song, I can give them my 5 year old, banged up, 10 gig iPod and let them listen to the song. More than likely, we would just have music on the stereo playing and everyone talking. No Zunes OR iPods in sight.

In conclusion, I think that Microsoft’s marketing scheme is the best thing it has going for it on the Zune because it is the primary advantage one has in using the Zune over an iPod, but the campain is also exceedingly bad. I quoted Tycho so much primarily to show the case of a “typical” Zune owner (except that he would have a much higher chance of interacting with Zune owners, I’d imagine, than most people). He is happy with the service, and in fact provides him with better service than he could obtain else-wise, (of course, if this article about Apple deciding to open the Fairplay DRM format is correct, the usefulness he finds there could potentially change). The real gold of the Microsoft Zune ad campaign is “the social” and as I hope to have demonstrated in this post, the Social doesn’t want to be social. The Social want to listen to their damn music in peace.

P.S.

oh, and Microsoft? Please don’t make ads like the one below, ok? They truly say nothing about your product and don’t even begin to get me excited about it.
One Zune Ad

Also, I’d just get rid of “Squirt.” Just do it. You don’t even have to tell anyone. Everyone already understands.

PBS (Public Broadcast Station), a public access TV channel in the United States that is in a partnership with NPR (National Public Radio), recently featured a program on the show Frontline called “The Persuaders.”

What’s going on in the world of today’s marketers and advertisers? What are the new and surprising methods they’re using to decipher who we are and what we want? And, where is this taking us?

Luckily for us, the entire program is available online in 6 parts. I’ve watched through the first one already and it is quite fascinating.

• The Homepage for The Persuaders
• Excerpts from the interviews on the program
• The page with links to the different chapters of the program

If you have the time to watch it, it is a great inside look at the whole industry.

Well, the site name issue was decided for me when I transferred this blog back to my webspace, 10-yen.net. I really like this space and the name and I look forward to using it in the future.

As for now, I have work to do to create the customization work that will ultimately be this site. Quite a bit of the back-end has been prepared to make it more useful for me (via plug-ins and various other changes), but the personality is not there yet.

Thus, we shall be creating a persona for the site. I don’t know what it will be, but it should be fun. Look forward to it.