Stephan Ango

The Vanilla Option

2013-04-14T16:38:19-07:00

Vanilla beans are the fruit of a rare orchid native to Mexico. Their aroma and flavor comes from a compound called vanillin. Most “vanilla” products are actually made with vanillin extracted from oak wood.

Each vanilla flower blooms just one morning out of every year. The orchid can only be naturally pollinated by a small Mexican bee, and if it isn’t pollinated that morning, the flower will wilt. No bean. Commercially, vanilla is now delicately hand-pollinated one flower at a time.

The labor involved in vanilla production makes it the second most expensive spice in the world (after saffron). Its flavor has been prized since Mesoamerican times, and as you well know, can be found in every ice cream shop on Earth.

So I ask—please, next time you think of using the adjective “vanilla”, consider the words “plain” or “mundane”. Because vanilla is far from being either of those.

Now look at what you’re building and ask yourself, is your “default” option anywhere near as good as vanilla? If not, don’t get carried away trying to design chocolate and strawberry.

“It seems that perfection is reached not when there is nothing...

2013-04-14T16:42:14-07:00

“It seems that perfection is reached not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to remove.”

Antoine de Saint Exupery

Apple and Infinite Recyclability

2013-04-14T16:41:38-07:00

Glass and aluminum, fetish or feature?

Apple goes whole hog. You gotta admire that. Few companies have the guts to embrace their own decisions fully, but Apple has consistently done so and consistently attracted criticism for that attitude (remember floppies? Blu-Ray? Flash?).

Sometime in the mid-2000s Apple began embracing glass and aluminum as dominant materials across all product lines. Some speculate that it’s a Jobsian fetish, that the choice is purely aesthetic. But while the look is certainly iconic, and there are functional benefits too, there’s a very rare commonality between glass and aluminum that exceeds coincidence. It’s a property which I believe Jony Ive will take credit for advocating. Glass and aluminum are both infinitely recyclable. That is, both materials can be 100% recycled with virtually no degradation.

Because they are infinitely recyclable glass and aluminum can be melted down and reshaped without losing structural integrity. That’s why glass bottles and aluminum cans are so widespread. The benefit of infinite recyclability is not just in the reuse of material it’s also in the environmental cost of creating usable glass and aluminum. According to The Economist, recycling aluminium requires 95% less energy than making it from scratch, and glass requires 30% less.

Today there are hundreds of plastics available to industrial designers which in most ways will perform just as well as aluminum or glass, but none are infinitely recyclable. The problem is that plastics generally contain additives and colorants. When such tainted plastics go to recycling plants, they are mixed with other plastics which contain other additives and colorants resulting in less valuable, less useful plastic which cannot be reused for the same purpose – thus the term ‘downcycling’.

Infinite recyclability for a clear conscience

Apple, like many other hardware manufacturers has often been accused of engineering planned obsolescence in its products, meaning that these become obsolete before the functional end of their life. Indeed Apple’s one-year product cycle far outpaces the potential longevity of an iPhone or MacBook.

But in the arms race that is the high-tech marketplace, it is difficult to imagine how a company like Apple could survive without updating their models regularly.

My guess is that Apple sees infinite recyclability as peace of mind. Despite the necessity of regular hardware updates, the structural components of all their products could be 100% recycled – turned into brand new Macs and iPads. A clear conscience.

Buttered on both sides

From what I see and hear, people seem to like the new aluminum enclosures. I certainly do. But Apple’s love of glass hasn’t seen the same reception. Glass shatters, glass causes glare, glass is heavy. These are some of the complaints I’ve heard. As John Gruber said, the iPhone 4 is practically undroppable, “it’s like dropping a piece of toast that’s been buttered on both sides”.

On the other hand, glass is enjoyed for its beauty and cleanability. But the discussion rarely turns to environmental benefits. One culprit is certainly Apple itself – Apple does very little to promote the recyclability of its products.

When Apple released the Unibody Macbooks, they made a big deal of the new aluminum enclosure: its simplicity, its strength, its precision. But what of recyclability? Zilch. Even in this interview for industrial design magazine Core77 Jony Ive makes no mention of the efforts made to improve the environmental footprint of the iPhone 4.

Small bullet-points can be found in the tech specs of most products (almost always dead last) and their ‘Environment’ page has a few short words:

Apple’s approach to recycling begins in the design stage, when we create compact, efficient products that require less material to produce. The materials we do use — including arsenic-free glass, high-grade aluminum, and strong polycarbonate — are highly valuable to recyclers, who can reclaim them for use in new products.

Apple calls its iPad Smart Cover “genius”, but relegates a world-class corporate environmental stance to a few orphaned bullet points. Why?

Hiding the environmental story

Clearly, Apple has spent tremendous resources over the past ten years engineering a highly sophisticated supply chain and production process to accommodate glass and aluminum. But why has Apple been so reluctant to inform the public of this effort?

Honestly, I’m not sure. Here are a few ideas:

Perhaps Apple hasn’t finished implementing the effort. We know Apple likes to makes announcements once all their ducks are in a row. As of today a few products have yet to embrace the new materials: Apple TV, Airport Express and Time Capsule. Perhaps another refresh is due? Perhaps Apple hasn’t ironed out its recycling program which would improve the efficiency of turning iPhone 4 scraps into brand new materials for iPhone 5s.
Maybe Apple sees its sustainability practices as a given and assumes that all companies should be just as responsible. If that’s the case Apple needs to wake up and channel its inner Chris Rock into a powerful new ad campaign: “Niggas always want credit for some shit they supposed to do. A nigga will say some shit like, ‘I take care of the environment.’ You’re supposed to, you dumb motherfucker!”.
Maybe Apple has considered the Chris Rock route and worries that consumers would come to expect infinitely recyclable materials in all their electronics, thereby turning the signature glass and aluminum look into something more commonplace?

Unfortunately, I’m afraid the true reason is more grim. Consumers just aren’t looking for green labels in their electronic devices. Apple may simply be waiting for its environmental stance to become a more marketable factor. In my opinion, however, consumers need to be educated on recyclability and should indeed expect more products to have such a thought-out lifecycle.

Tomorrow’s Physical iTunes Store

2013-04-14T16:41:41-07:00

Distribution Revolution

Apple’s recent announcement of the iPad stirred controversy. Reactions seem mostly negative. Smart people call it ‘future shock’.

With the iPad, I believe Apple has changed the game on two fronts: computing and content consumption. Smart people have explained the new paradigm of computing. I won’t go there. What I want to focus on, is how Apple is changing content consumption today, and how tomorrow it will revolutionize content distribution.

Content Providers

The major media industries of the western world take three forms: music, film/TV and publishing. All three industries are contending with a world inexorably moving towards digital consumption.

When Apple introduced the iPod, it revolutionized the music industry. What was different wasn’t the device, it was the 99 cent download. Bringing the music industry on board was critical to the success of a digital music player, and no one before Apple had done it.

Apple tried changing the film/TV industry with Apple TV. So far its inroads are minimal because this colossal industry looks to compete with Apple via Hulu, and other proprietary (or legacy) distribution channels. But I believe Apple can prevail there too.

Today the publishing industry is in shambles. Publications are shutting down all over America, and with pay walls failing as a solution, the web seems to be a dead end. Like putty in Apple’s hands the publishing industry is ready to make a leap of faith. This is great news.

Content Consumption

The iPad introduces the first viable alternative support for newspapers and magazines. Not only is it viable, it presents completely new forms of interaction and exciting opportunities to monetize. Wired recently made a great case for it.

The iPad presents a third dimension for the interaction between reader and content: depth. ‘Zoom out’ to see the publication in full, ‘zoom in’ to receive information more granular than ever before. This has been the dream for ages. Apple just happens to be in the right place at the right time.

Hear me now. 5 years from today, physical newspapers and magazines will have virtually disappeared from America. (The book is a different matter.)

Content Distribution and the Master Plan

With written content finally having its place in the iPad, Apple has created devices suited to the consumption of every type of media.

Integral to Apple’s success is iTunes (and soon the iTunes Bookstore), the hub for all content to be accessed, paid for and downloaded. So what will kiosks, bookstores, record shops – media retailers as a whole – do when everything can be found on iTunes?

The answer is the physical iTunes store. If Apple doesn’t do it, someone will.

Just like today’s record or book shop, the physical iTunes store is where you go to consume media (and coffee). Except there’s no physical media to be seen. It’s all touch screens and docking stations. You’ll walk up to a docking station, plug in your iPod/iPhone/iPad, and Genius will take over. At the physical iTunes store you get full song previews, just like you would at a record store, and you can flip through entire e-books and magazines, just like you would at a bookstore.

Genius knows what you like and gives you recommendations based on your listening, viewing and reading trends. The physical iTunes store is a place to experience digital media in a visceral way, unlike anything you experience at home. Surrounded by large touch screens you can flip through beautiful album covers and read liner notes; reviews are there too.

With a flick of the wrist you’ll send content straight to your device as you continue to browse. With 1-Click purchase there’s no cashier and with data storage in larger locations, there’s no download time.

The physical iTunes store is easily scalable. It has no inventory. It’s a stand at the airport and a multi-story emporium at the center of metropolises. The pulse of data is its heartbeat. It knows you better than any store clerk and provides the greatest selection no matter the size of the shop.

Physical presence still has a place in this world. People crave that palpable social experience. We just need to think of it differently.