You be the judge.

From Apple’s patent:

A package is moved from location to location through delivery services like Federal Express or UPS; however what occurred during transportation, and what transpired to the package, is anyone’s guess. Occasionally, an object within the package is broken, indicating that the package experienced excessive abuse; but whose fault it is, or how or when it happened, are not known. What environments the package experienced is also not readily known.
[...]
Preferably, the MMD [movement monitor device] includes a real time clock so that the MMD tags “events” (as hereinafter defined) with time and/or date information.
— Personal items network, and associated methods, United States Patent 7,552,031, June 23, 2009

And a description of the CosaNostra pizza box:

The pizza box is a plastic carapace now, corrugated for stiffness, a little LED readout glowing on the side, telling the Deliverator how many trade imbalance-producing minutes have ticked away since the fateful phone call. There are chips and stuff in there. The pizzas rest, a short stack of them, in slots behind the Deliverator’s head. Each pizza glides into a slot like a circuit board into a computer, clicks into place as the smart box interfaces with the onboard system of the Deliverator’s car. The address of the caller has already been inferred from his phone number and poured into the smart box’s builtin RAM. From there it is communicated to the car, which computes and projects the optimal route on a heads-up display, a glowing colored map traced out against the windshield so that the Deliverator does not even have to glance down.
— Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson, 2000

Jason Kelly describes how Apple’s retail experience impressed him on his first visit to an Apple Store:

Most new Mac users rave about the solidity of the product, the no-bloatware out-of-box experience, and the sheer beauty of Apple’s technology. What I want to focus on today, however, is Apple’s superb retail experience.
[...]
Such a store shows a great deal of confidence in the products, which gives me confidence as a buyer. I’m not being rushed out the door with a flimsy piece of paper saying I have tech support for a year if I need it — just call this number in India, but don’t under any circumstances bother us here — but am instead given all the time and freedom to arrive at about the only conclusion anybody can: I want one. — Big in Japan: Apple Retail Experience, seekingalpha.com, June 15, 2009

The result was a satisfied new customer:

You know what else I wondered? What new epiphanies awaited me at the Apple Store. What other little miracles of technology whispered my name? What excuse could I find to visit my new friends in Ginza, and buy something else from them?

In Apple’s patent application for a sensor to measure how long skiers and mountain bikers remain aloft on a jump, the following passage amuses:

[0006]However, persons in such sporting activities typically only have a qualitative sense as to speed and loft or “air” time. For example, a typical snowboarding person might regularly exclaim after a jump that she “caught” some “big sky,” “big air” or “phat air” without ever quantitatively knowing how much time really elapsed in the air. — ACTIVITY MONITORING SYSTEMS AND METHODS , United States Patent Application, February 13, 2009

Apple just received a patent for integrating a camera directly into the screen. From my post about it two years ago:

What if the screen is the camera? What if you could look right at the screen during a video chat? Wouldn’t that solve the problem? Wouldn’t people then think you were looking right at them? Wouldn’t that make video chats even more personal and emotional?— Secret iChat hardware feature in Leopard?, Watching Apple, May 13, 2007

The context back then was iChat but it makes even more sense for iPhone, where video chatting would require a camera facing you on the same side as the screen, while taking photos or videos would require a camera on the other side of the phone so you could frame them on the screen. Hiding the camera in the screen would also preserve the visual elegance of the iPhone’s hardware design.

Your iPhone would then contain two cameras—one for video chats, the other for photos and video. Cost would likely rise; size and weight would likely rise a bit; but power usage wouldn’t necessarily increase because the iPhone might prevent you from using both cameras at the same time.

Perhaps video may require a pricier plan, since it’s otherwise hard to imagine carriers getting excited about all that video traffic on their networks, especially since at least one report says iPhone users are already generating up to four times as much data volume as other smartphone users. On the other hand, it could be WiFi-only.

Easy-to-use video conferencing would probably convince many to buy their first iPhone. And it’s exactly the kind of feature that would get existing users to buy another iPhone, something Apple’s probably very interested in.

Rumor has it that iPhone 3.0 hardware may include a compass. Combined with Core Location, this is getting interesting.

Nature outlooks sometimes include bronze panoramic viewfinders that describe what you can see in the distance. For example, to your left you see a big mountain peak which the viewfinder—featuring a ridgeline aligned perfectly with the actual peaks—informs you is named “Mount Doom”. Another glance at the viewfinder tells you the river below and to your right is named “Anduin”. Kind of a low-tech heads-up-display, like the one in Minority Report.

Never mind that a built-in compass and Core Location will let Apple finally match the Android demo that showed Google’s Street View updating live while you pivot in a 360° circle—we can see more of those panoramic viewfinders!

Manhattan: “What’s that building over there…hey, it’s the Chrysler building!”
Seattle: “What’s that peak to the right over there…hey, Mount Hood!”
London: “What’s that pub over there…hey, beer!”

This is going to be fun.

An article in the Yorkshire Post caught my eye this morning. (That’s a puffin on the right, by the way.)

Field guides such as the British Birds Video Guide and Butterflies of Britain and Ireland have only recently appeared on the App Store—possibly because they involve a tremendous of number of image, audio, and video files—but they’re already making such an attractive alternative to the traditional printed guides that nature watchers are altering long-held habits: where previously they would make notes before consulting the guide, nature lovers are now using their iPhone apps to make an identification while the unfamiliar birds and butterflies are still in sight.

The audio and video are what’s different:

I loaded them on to my iPhone and took them for a test drive. My first destination was the fringe of some woodland on Rombalds Moor, between Airedale and Wharfedale, where I expected to find two oft-confused species side-by-side.

Meadow Pipits and Tree Pipits are easy to tell apart if you hear them singing or calling regularly, but identifying them by sight is more problematic.

With a bird in view, my phone soon told me I was looking at a Tree Pipit. The close-up video showed it had fine streaks on its flanks and for confirmation I compared it with video footage of the Meadow Pipit. So much easier than colour plates in a bird book.— Latest mobile phone technology gives birdwatchers a flying start
, Yorkshire Post, May 8, 2009

It’s interesting to see iPhone affecting something so seemingly distant as nature-watching in Britain, a pastime with strong discipline…

So would I break the habit of a lifetime and start checking unfamiliar birds and butterflies while I’m seeing them, or continue to make notes? I’ll probably do both. If it’s on my phone, the instant identification guides will often be hard to resist.

…and it becomes even more interesting with a timely article in the New York Times this morning which reports that researchers have created an iPhone app to identify trees automatically by the shape of their leaves alone:

THE traditional way to identify an unfamiliar tree is to pull out a field guide and search its pages for a matching description. One day people may pull out a smartphone instead, photographing a leaf from the mystery tree and then having the phone search for matching images in a database.

A team of researchers financed by the National Science Foundation has created just such a device — a hand-held electronic field guide that identifies tree species based on the shape of their leaves, said Peter N. Belhumeur, a professor of computer science at Columbia and a member of the team.— Digital Field Guides Eliminate the Guesswork, New York Times, May 9, 2009

Consider what makes apps like these possible:

Mobility. When people say “the best designs are invisible”, they mean that the tool fits the task so well, you focus on the task instead of the tool. Field guides are used in the field. Laptops may be portable, but they’re not mobile; you might carry one to an observation hide, but you would hardly hold it up, eye-level, while looking at a bird in the distance. Similarly, to identify trees by their leaves, you need to take a photo of the leaf. With iPhone, you just aim and shoot.

Great media support. Field guides are really identification guides. Traditional printed field guides are restricted to text and images, but nature also moves and makes sounds. Great support for video and audio make it possible to identify subjects with greater confidence.

Easy to use. iPhone’s design is fundamental to these apps. Because the apps are easy to launch and use, they are used.

Powerful processor/Connectivity. The iPhone may not match desktop machines for speed, but it’s no slouch either. And there’s always the option to connect and process data remotely. Either way, you can leverage sizable databases:

The computer matching is done using images of recently acquired leaves, Dr. Belhumeur said, typically 20 leaves from each species, but sometimes more, that are in the image library. For Plummers Island, the team collected 5,013 leaves representing 157 species; for the trees of Central Park, it collected 4,320 leaves representing 144 species, said Dr. White of Columbia.— Digital Field Guides Eliminate the Guesswork, New York Times, May 9, 2009

Birds, butterflies, and trees for now, but who know what else will emerge? Vast data and processing power in your hand with always-on connectivity—exciting!

A Yahoo report about upcoming Windows 7 features includes a few that sound familiar…

• Let users decide the left-to-right order of icons in the task bar
• Display a contextual menu when you right-click on a task bar icon
• Auto-collect files stored in many different places elsewhere into a virtual folder

…at least one that sounds curious but useful…

• Drag two windows to screen left and right to auto-resize them for side-by-side comparison

…and some that sound hilariously ill-conceived:

• Shake an open window with the mouse to minimize all other windows
• Move the mouse to the bottom-right corner to make all windows temporarily transparent, then click to minimize them all

But what’s particularly amusing about the Yahoo article is the “back stories” explaining why Microsoft added these features to Windows 7:

Microsoft’s research showed Vista users commonly launching a series of programs, then closing and immediately reopening some.
Microsoft realized that these people wanted their programs to appear in the same order on the task bar every time…

…Microsoft had resisted the idea of hiding a key feature behind a right click, worried people wouldn’t find it. But the data showed
most people right-click on icons to see what that might do. — Behind the scenes with Windows 7, yahoo.com, April 19, 2009

These stories make it sound as though Microsoft is simultaneously channeling Apple (usability-driven) and Google (data-driven).

That window shaking, though? Pure Warner Bros..

Word Scramble for iPhone by Zynga appears at first to be yet another grid-based word game where you race the clock touching letters in sequence to spell words for points. Because these games are simple in concept, simple to implement, and offer good replay to gamers at little cost to developers, the App Store is full of them. Unfortunately, many appear to be crafted with more regard for turning a fast buck than for creating a fun experience.

Word Scramble Online

But Word Scramble is not only free and fun, it’s well-designed and includes some surprising but appreciated features:

• online play against the anonymous hordes
• online play against your friends, whom you invite from your Contacts list with a special code
• Play and Pass, letting you pass the iPhone between up to 4 players in turn

I’ve really enjoyed the online play, but once the round starts and you’re racing the clock against others, the hectic action highlights a few design choices of the main screen shown at right—not flaws exactly, but limitations that if addressed would make the game easier to play and more enjoyable.

When you’re playing, some things are important…

Continue reading

Dictionary.com’s new iPhone app, released in late March, includes a dictionary, a thesaurus, and a word-of-the-day (WOTD) feature.

And it’s free. Merriam-Webster’s dictionary for iPhone costs 25 dollars. That’s got to hurt.

What’s good

• Fast.
• No connection needed to use the dictionary and thesaurus.
• Spoken audio pronunciations
• Suggests words as you type

What needs improvement

• Should remember you were in the Thesaurus when you last quit the app, and return you there after launch.
• Needs to display a Cancel button when the keyboard is shown. Right now, once you summon the keyboard, the only way to
  dismiss it other than by searching is to tap the little X icon in the search field twice.

• Encourages you to “Get our FREE Word of the Day email”, even though you’re already using that feature on iPhone.
• Suggested words need slighly larger targets. Right now, it’s too easy to accidentally tap the wrong one. Making matters worse, the definition page lacks a back button to let you see the suggested words list again.
• WOTD doesn’t let you see previous entries.
• WOTD doesn’t offer audio pronunciation.

What needs serious rethought

• Recent displays words you’ve viewed in the dictionary, thesaurus, and WOTD. It’s handy, but the design is odd:
  • WOTD should not be included. It needs its own history.

    Including the dictionary and thesaurus makes sense; including WOTD does not. Looking up a word in the dictionary or thesaurus and checking out the WOTD are different activities. If you already have a decent vocabulary, many of the words in WOTD may not interest you, yet they’ll still occupy space in Recent.

  • The buttons for viewing that word in the dictionary, thesaurus, or WOTD are too small and too close together.

    They’re unnecessary, in fact. The tab controller at the bottom of the screen already lets you move easily between dictionary, thesaurus, and WOTD, so if the app simply remembered which you had last used to view that word, tapping the word could default to where you last viewed it.

  • The color-coding used to distinguish the dictionary and thesaurus buttons is confusing. The colors would be a bit more effective if Recent included a legend, but it doesn’t. But again, the buttons are unnecessary.
  • Dear developers,

    About that Edit button…I understand your dilemma: you couldn’t put the Edit button on the bottom because you already had the tab controller there, and you couldn’t put it on the top because you’ve reserved the titlebar for branding. But real estate is too limited on the iPhone and convention too strong to usurp the titlebar for branding alone. Please move the Edit button to the titlebar.

    Thank you,
    A user

Some worry that Pixar’s approaching summer release, Up, will squander Disney’s money, that Disney paid too much for Pixar in the first place:

Some industry watchers, a few of them still griping about the hefty $7.4 billion that Disney paid for Pixar in 2006, are fretting about the film’s commercial potential, particularly when it comes to benefiting other Disney businesses. — Pixar’s Art Leaves Profit Watchers Edgy, nytimes.com, April 6, 2009

What would have been a good price? Disney’s golden goose—the company’s animation department—hadn’t laid many appealing eggs for years, and morale was low. If Pixar is able to spark a creative renaissance at Disney, which appears to be the case, how much is that worth?

Revenue from the Pixar theatrical releases plus merchandising has already passed $6B, plus Pixar’s films have inspired themed rides and other tie-ins for Disney. And the films, because they’re based on stories people actually care about, have restored some of the luster to the Disney brand lost with lackluster derivatives like The Lion King 1 1/2. What’s that worth?

The Pixar acquisition also kept Pixar from going to a competitor. What’s that worth?

While some seem eager to get Pixar to release its own The Lion King 1 1/2…

Richard Greenfield of Pali Research downgraded Disney shares to sell last month, citing a poor outlook for “Up” as a reason. “We doubt younger boys will be that excited by the main character,” he wrote, adding a complaint about the lack of a female lead.

…it’s reassuring that someone at the company understands the true Disney magic:

John Lasseter, a co-founder of Pixar and now Disney’s chief creative officer, routinely says in interviews that marketability is not a factor in decisions about what projects to pursue. Instead of ideas that feel contemporary, he aims for stories that are rooted in the ages.

“Quality is the best business plan” is one of Mr. Lasseter’s favorite lines.