Mind the Gap - Design better Products

Alvin Toffler's Prosumer is the new Maker?

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 12:45:00 +0000

In his latest book "Revolutionary Wealth", Alvin Toffler and his wife, revisit the concept of the "prosumer", the producer and consumer, introduced in one of his previous books "The Third Wave". This prosumer is not to be mixed-up with the "professional consumer", the category invented by marketers sitting between the consumer and the professional.
The prosumer in Toffler's world is:

One who create goods, services or experiences for his own satisfaction, rather than for sale or exchange.

And:

...the ability to do more for oneself and one's family, while in fact withdrawing, at least partially, from the marketplace. In that sense they are the opposite of consumerism.

The prosumer acquires technology as an investment not as a consumption. He makes his own movies, foto albums, books. This trend matches with the current rise of "makers" and "crafters" fairs and magazines, with the rise of the "benders", the "tweakers", the "tuners" and the "hackers". There is clearly a shift from passive mass consumption towards a push for customisation, individualisation and reappropriation. Today's prosumer demands unlimited access to content as raw material for his own creations and opposes fiercely against Digital Rights Management and copy protection.

How much of all this is facilitated by technology? Did access to the Internet, the social web, accelerate this trend by disseminating knowledge and experience?

How will the prosumer influence the products of tomorrow? Does this equates to modules, components and DIY kits? Is crowdsourcing the way to open up product development to the prosumer? Is rapid prototyping the final step in setting free the maker in all of us. Welcome to the future.

Bikes, Batteries and Babes

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 12:30:00 +0000

When visting a local bicycle store to check out some of the latest models, I was surprised by the trend of battery driven rear lights. What happened to the good old trusted dynamo? And if bikes come with a dynamo, why not use it to drive the rear lights as well? The shop owner tried to come up with some explanations but none of them made a lot of sense. The recommended batteries for these lights are non rechargeables. Rechargeables don't last long enough between charges to be practical in use. Just imagine the waste! And I thought biking was good for the planet! Luckily my eye caught this nifty product display from Reelight in the shop. This Danish company offers a front/rear wheel kit driven by induction (requires two strong magnets per wheel). The model I bought comes with an integrated capacitor so lights continue to blink when you stop pedaling at crossroads etc... Once installed, no more worries about batteries and I feel the resistance to be much lower than with a dynamo. Added benefit: where my old trusted dynamo skipped often when it rained, the Reelight, because of its contactless power generation, operates without a glitch. Warmly recommended. So why do you need babes in this story?

RIP DAB?

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 12:30:00 +0000

According to this story on The Register, Germany will end Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) next year. Digital terrestrial radio is currently available via different standards: HD Radio in the United States, Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) in Europe, Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM), a digitized European AM standard, and Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) in South Korea.

Some interesting quotes:

Part of the problem is that analogue FM never went away and most people didn't seem to care for the clear digital-quality sound, and were left nonplussed by such benefits as easy tuning and message displays with song names and titles.

Hmmm, where did we hear this one before? SACD and DVD-Audio anyone? And when is good, good enough? Contrary to popular belief, DAB can sound worse than a good analogue FM signal. Depending on the available spectrum, some broadcasters use low bit rate transmissions that sound like low grade MP3's with all the dynamics gone.

DAB is struggling almost everywhere in Europe. The standard never really succeeded in Europe except in Denmark and the UK, where this year the upgraded DAB+ format will be launched (including podcast services).

Experts believe Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) and DVB-T have surpassed DAB technically.

Maybe Internet streaming and narrowcasting substituted the broadcasting of DAB? Why sticking to OTA (Over The Air) when your wire line home broadband can get you the same stuff? Digital Media Adapters (DMA) provide you with a lot more additional features than a DAB radio, often at a cheaper price. And if you just want plain vanilla music, FM is still around. Will analogue radio go the same way as analogue broadcast TV? Will regulators revive DAB by forcing analogue out of the air? Or was DAB the solution to a problem that did not exist?

Interesting fact DAB+ is not backwards-compatible and ordinary DAB receivers cannot receive DAB+ broadcasts. So those in UK and Denmark will have to buy new receivers if they want to benefit from the new and more efficient codec.

UPDATE 25th of February 2008: I bumped into this article on madcomments.co.uk. Apparently there are some issues in the UK as well. Interesting quote from the article:

... internet radio accounts for just fewer than two per cent of all radio listening at the moment.

HDTV putting the cart before the horse

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 12:30:00 +0000

On November 12-13th 2007, Understanding and Solutions, a UK based industry analyst, organised in Barcelona a conference to look at the state of High Definition in Europe. You can read more on it on watchmojo.com.

Let me quote some of the more interesting statements by the major stakeholders in HDTV in Europe.

...countries like France and the UK still only have around 10-12 channels, none of which have enough HD content available to provide original programming 24 hours a day.

Content is king but not for HD. There are a lot of HD Ready sets out there but most people don't even realise that they're watching upconverted SD content. As we can learn from these quotes:

The rapid transition to HD Ready flat screen TVs in Europe is creating a ‘content gap’ that European broadcasters in most territories will struggle to fill, leaving a pent-up demand for other sources of high definition video entertainment

Now unfortunately the on-going battle between the two competing HD disc standards does not help here either. Costs to produce for this format is quite high for independent content creators, leave alone, the public broascasters.

I remember attending some five years ago a conference sponsored by the European Commission that issued warnings on this content gap. Unfortunately, a lot of cars are sold now but we'll have to wait for the roads to drive them on. Don't tell me they did not know this was coming.

The confusing array of logos facing a TV buyer is a key issue (one speaker had counted 17), as is the widely varying terminology used to describe the new ‘1080p’ flat screen panels

Confusion is an opportunity today. Just walk into any large consumer electronics retailer and try to get unbiased advice. Most of the time, the sales staff don't know what they're talking about and just sell what they're told to sell.
Cable companies are piggybacking on the technology refresh and the confusion to serve you the same content but charge additional fees.

UK: <4% of Sky subscribers take HD services; 4.5% of Virgin subscribers take HD services

France: <2% of CanalSat subscribers take HD

Italy: 1.2% of Sky Italia subscribers

Just have a look at these numbers...

BMW's iDrive on the wrong track

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 12:45:00 +0000

BMW's famous iDrive system has been controversial from its start in 2001. The iDrive is BMW's initiative to consolidate the various controls (navigation, entertainment, climatisation, etc...) into one single interface accessed by one knob with a joystick like function. The idea behind the system is to reduce the visual clutter and distraction in the cockpit. Unfortunately, contrary to the systems objective, it is a case study of a Human Computer Interface (HCI) gone wrong. I had the "pleasure" to discover the system on a BMW 3 series (E90 build year 2006) as it came with the optional navigation system. What I don't understand is that after so many years, the system is still a nightmare to use.

photo source: CNET's article see below for reference.

The whole screen lay-out, navigation and menu structure is so contra-intuitive that you have to play with it before you believe how bad this is. You feel the pain every time you need to tweak a setting or change simple things like a radio station. It is very difficult to remember where the designers burried a function. The 3th generation (from 2007 on) abandons the single controller and adds 6 programmable buttons so users can bypass the system altogether and create shortcuts to functions they use most.

Please BMW, hire some good interface design people and get this sorted out.

Read More:

Driving it, Car interfaces and usability on CNET's Car Tech review June 20, 2007 By Wayne Cunningham.

Jacob Nielsen's frustration with the system.

BMW iDrive 6 years in: The world’s best cockpit controller? BMW Car Club of America, August 28, 2007 by Jonathan B. Spira.

A suit with an extra pair of trousers?

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 12:35:00 +0000

photo source: Ralph lauren Black Label winter 2007 collection.

Unless you go custom made or bespoke it is very difficult to buy a suit with more than one pair of trousers. Trousers are exposed to more wear and tear than the jacket so having an extra pair can extend the lifetime of the suit. In these days of eco awareness, I wonder why nobody is bringing this to the table.

Fermax opens doors

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 12:30:00 +0000

The Fermax Memokey System City 100 Codes is a door opener with a keypad. When we renovated the house, I wanted a system like this so we could grant/revoke access to people (babysitters, cleaning lady) without handing out keys. As an additional benefit, when you lock yourself out without a key, you still can get access. After installation, the electrician explained the system and handed over the documentation. All things set, this worked as it should for 3 months and then this thing happened with halloween. Someone rang at the door while I was changing the diapers of the baby. So nobody answers the door. Suddenly, I hear kids singing in the hallway! Nobody could have opened the door because I was upstairs. So how did they enter? I rushed downstairs and asked how they managed to open the door. One of the kids explained that his older brother followed a course as an electrician and they are trained on these type of access systems. His brother told him that these systems come with factory default codes like "1111". So he tried one of the default codes and entered and started singing with his friends. Imagine my surprise. After reading the documentation, I managed to reset the system and remove the factory defaults. Now, what can we learn from this? Fermax forgets that electricians are busy people and sometimes forget to reset factory defaults creating a potential security risk. Not a good thing for a company selling security related products! Unfortunately, this happens too often. For convenience, manufacturers ship their products with default codes that stay active after installation.

Home Fab - the future is calling

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 11:45:00 +0000

With the recent demo at Wired's NextFest of Desktop Factory's 3D printer we're one step closer to the popularisation of this promising technology. Rapid prototyping is already in use by the military to save on logistics costs. Spare parts are not shipped to the battlefield but created in situ in a Mobile Parts Hospital. And in real M*A*S*H spirit, battlefield or civilian casualties can benefit from the technology as well (Rapid prototyping for Baghdad). These devices can print out customised prosthesis, skull and dental implants. With Desktop Factory's printer announcing the availability of this technology to a wider group of designers and "makers" we can only dream of the opportunities. I can't wait to pick-up my 3D print out at my local copy shop. Lost a bolt from your IKEA assembly kit? Go to the website, identify the part and print it out at your local shop.

Creative Gigaworks T20 collects dust

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 11:30:00 +0000

Strange design decision from Creative to put the bass reflex port at the top of this speaker.

There is no dust cover so the speaker collects dust through a top mounted opening. I understand it is difficult to allocate space for the bass port in a slim speaker but this is not a good compromise. I would recommend a different design where the bass port is on the front/back/side/bottom of the speaker. To make sure the right length is achieved, Creative could use a spiral design to roll up the port in the cabinet or at least provide an acoustic neutral dust cover with the product.

Pencil with a manual

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 11:30:00 +0000

My default writing/drawing equipment is this mechanical Staedtler pencil. I was quite surprised to learn that this pencil comes with a real manual. The manual explains with nice diagrams how the filling mechanism works and how to activate the pocket protector that actually retracts the sharp lead sleeve for safe storage. Well done.

Dyson filters out common sense

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 11:30:00 +0000

Dyson make a strong point of not having to replace filters in their DC08 vacuum cleaner. On the product page you can read clearly "Lifetime filters. No filters to buy". A skirmish with the British Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) forced Dyson to retract a TV advert that allegedly created confusion around these filters.

The DC08 comes with two filters (see picture above). A washable pre-motor filter (right red arrow) and a post-motor filter (left red arrow).
To quote the ASA article:

Dyson said their vacuum cleaners used two filters: one was a pre-motor filter, designed to protect the vacuum motor from fine dust that could find its way into the motor, for example, if the machine was overloaded. The second was a post-motor filter that captured emissions of carbon and other particles from the motor itself, which ensured that the final air emissions were suitable for allergy sufferers.

What comes as a surprise to me is this post-motor filter. This filter is located under the transparent dust bin. According to Dyson in the same ASA article:

This final filter is not meant to be user serviced and is intended to last the entire life of the vacuum cleaner without attention

I probably did not clean the pre-motor filter in time (typically each 6 months) because this post-motor filter surely looks like it could use some cleaning. Since this filter will last the entire life of the vacuum cleaner, Dyson doesn't sell a replacement. Luckily some companies stepped into this void and offer replacements.

Dyson are very fanatic about filters. These are at the core of their product differentiation strategy. They will fight the perception that you have to buy filters at the cost of improving the quality of their product. A saturated post-motor filter should be replaced and they should offer a spare for it.

Designed Deterioriation and Wabi-Sabi

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 11:01:00 +0000

In this article on his blog, Khoi Vinh, Design Director for NYTimes.com, covers an interesting concept he calls designed deterioration. How well do today's products age? And is this aging process an integral part of the product design? Khoi takes the example of a sturdy aluminum Rimova suitcase collecting dents and scratches as time goes by. Instead of the sterile product it was when it left the factory, it grows a personality. It becomes unique and identifiable in a way that extends its serial number. In one of the comments on the article on his blog you can find a reference to the Japanese aesthetics of Wabi-Sabi. Nothing lasts, nothing is finished, and nothing is perfect. Imperfect reliability and quality. It is the aesthetics of Eastern philosophy and it does not come as a surprise to me that Khoi's roots are in Asia.

Let's have a closer look at these statements with our Western reductionist view and relate them back to product design.

Nothing lasts.
What happens after the products useful life? Let's take the example of these two Mars rovers. What will happen after they stop functioning? Just a piece of scrap metal left behind for future generations to contemplate? Look at the junk in earth's orbit and you wonder why this stage of the life cycle is still an afterthought.

Nothing is finished.
Do we still talk about a finished product or is it becoming a service? So exit product design welcome service design? Beta is becoming the norm and is good enough.

Nothing is perfect.
That's why nothing is finished and will stay in beta. It will evolve and hopefully for the better. Continuous improvement anyone?

Book reference: Wabi-Sabi: for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers by Leonard Koren.

The little rover that could

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 11:30:00 +0000

Picture courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech

In Nasa's press release "Mars Rovers Survive Dust Storms, Ready for Next Objectives" you can read how the two Mars explorers continue to work well after their planned 3 months of operation. The resilience of these rovers is amazing: 43 months and counting! Design wise a lot can be learned from this successful project. For more technical information on the rover, visit Rupert Scammell's rover maintenance manual.

Pecha Kucha or how to survive Death by Powerpoint

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 11:13:00 +0000

The Pecha Kucha method (from the Japanese expression for “the sound of conversation” or dare I say "Twitter") patented by Tokyo-based architects Klein Dytham (office pictured above) forces you to deliver your message in a presentation of max. 20 slides or images and 20 seconds per slide. For more info on this latest hype www.pecha-kucha.org.
Something for your next meeting? This certainly will take away some of the frustration Tufteand other infoviz guru's have with the Powerpoint format.

The death of dynamic range

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 10:30:00 +0000

Picture taken from Mike Richter's article.

In this article, Mike Richter highlights a worrisome trend in quality of digital recorded audio. In order to make CD's louder, the dynamic range (the range between silent and louder parts) gets sacrificed. To squeeze the dynamic range, crucial musical information is thrown away by clipping. And dynamic range makes a difference. It is the stuff that triggers the goose bumps and the adrenaline. It is one of the features that made the CD stand out against the LP in the first place. Add on top of this the lossy compression to MP3 or Apple's AAC and one can question how recorded music benefited from the whole digital revolution.
The 24 bit digital audio format like SACD and DVD-Audio never achieved critical mass to substitute the standard 16 bit CD format. Is 16 bit good enough? If we continue on this path, what about Standard Definition (SD) and High Definition (HD) video formats? Will HD substitute SD or is SD good enough?

Read as well:
"Where’s the Other Half of Your Music File?" in the New York Times from the May 31, 2007 by Wilson Rothman.

UPDATE Sep 13, 2007: "Are Technology Limits in MP3s and iPods Ruining Pop Music?" in the Wall Street Journal of Sep 12, 2007 by Lee Gomes.

UPDATE Sep 13, 2007: "The Web is awash in anti-MP3 audiophiles." in the IHT of Sep 5, 2007 by Victoria Shannon.

Tamron's lens quality in focus

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 14:03:00 +0000

Looking for a replacement lens for the standard Canon EOS 350D SLR kit lens, I bumped into the award winning Tamron 17-50 f/2.8. The lens received sufficient positive reviews (photozone review, slrgear review) so I decided to buy one. Today, you can find two versions of the lens on the market. One assembled in Japan and one assembled in China. Depending on market and availability you can get one or the other. The lens I received was assembled in China. Either Tamron is victim of their success and are struggling to keep up with the demand or something more structural is happening with their quality control. The lens came out of the box with a tiny surface scratch on the glass. The position of the scratch looks as if it has been made during the assembly process.

Out of the box, the plastic ring that sits on top of the lens surface when you look into the lens (see red arrow in picture) showed some residue of glue. Now, five months later, the ring is coming detached from the glass. On photography forums, you can read of additional complaints like over exposure and auto focus issues with the Chinese version.

If Tamron puts two versions of a product on the market, they should be consistent in quality and behavior.

IKEA's PAX wardrobe comes with a split

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 13:39:00 +0000

IKEA sells a version of their PAX wardrobe with sliding doors. The self assembly kit comes with anti-dust brushes for the sliding door panels (arrow 1 in picture, click to zoom in). Happily surprised by this attention to detail, I assembled the wardrobe and forgot about the whole thing. Some months later, my wife complains about dust in the wardrobe and I start my investigation. I was surprised to discover a gap at the top and bottom of one of the sliding doors (arrow 2 in picture) enabling dust to enter the wardrobe. This is difficult to spot because of the height of the wardrobe.

My workaround is a seal made of duct tape. Clearly IKEA did a sloppy design job on this one and needs to review the sliding door mechanism.

Good enough or shaving some of the nines from five nines

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 15:47:00 +0000

In this article in BusinessWeek magazine, Stephen Baker explores the downward shift in product and service reliability. We're willing to trade higher reliability for good enough as long as the incentive is innovation and reduced price.

"A marketplace that's not hung up on fail-safe standards is open to risk and innovation, and drives down prices"

For some individuals and small businesses the "gold" service level is just too expensive. For telephony, back in the old Ma Bell days, gold service was the only option. Today we can define our own risk profile and that's why Skype is eating away market share. Beta is becoming the norm and technology is driving this change. Do we want mature products? Is there still something we can call a product? Over its useful lifetime, the product changes with patches and downloads. Windows XP today is certainly not the product it used to be when it was launched. How is this shift impacting the way we design and put products in the market?

Miele's patented dishwasher cutlery tray does not cut it

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 13:37:00 +0000

Together with our new kitchen came this new Miele dishwasher. Our dishwasher is equipped with Miele's new and improved patented dishwasher cutlery tray (tray at the top in the picture). After some years of use, it's very difficult to see where the improved comes from. We benchmark our dishwasher on holiday or when we're house sitting for friends and family. The cutlery seldom comes out clean compared to the traditional cutlery basket. I blame this on the horizontal positioning of the cutlery. Gravity works!

A basket gives you the flexibility to take it out the dishwasher and walk to your drawer to sort out the cutlery. You can remove this tray and walk over to your drawer with it, but this is cumbersome because of its size.

Another dissatisfied Miele customer rightly questions the sacrifice in space that is required to accommodate this tray.

Miele's marketing department praises the benefits of the design:

Separate cutlery tray: Miele’s patented cutlery tray has several major advantages over traditional baskets. Silverware can be safely cleaned and removed hygienically. A spare tray simplifies handling. Simply remove the clean cutlery in its tray and replace it with an empty tray. The trays fit neatly into a kitchen drawer.

Now just imagine swapping a tray like that in and out of your kitchen drawer. Let's have a look at the other stated benefits. "Safely" probably refers to sharp knives that have to be thrown in a traditional basket with the risk of getting a cut. With the tray there is indeed less risk of cutting but it takes more time to load. You have to carefully seat each knife, fork and spoon in its individual location. "Hygienically" highlights another advantage of the tray design. When removing cutlery from the basket, you have to touch with your fingers the parts that you'll put later on in your mouth.

Overall, I have the feeling that the advantages don't outweigh the sacrifice of clean silverware.

On a side note. The detergent dispenser in this machine comes with a lid that flips open to release the detergent (click picture for more detail). Large dishes can block this opening. Typically tablets get stuck and the washing cycle continues without detergent. This machine comes with a lot of sensors. Unfortunately, there is not one on the dispenser's lid. The elegant solution to this is a sliding door as used by some of the other vendors (remember our benchmarking!).

Vanity mirror with a burn

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 13:55:00 +0000

This picture above is taken in the bathroom of our rented flat at the sea side. The photo is taken from above the left door of a typical three door bathroom mirror cabinet looking down to the washbasins. Similar in design to this one (I found this one on the web, and it looks like it has the same design error).

What you see is a burn mark in the the melamine finished rim caused by the down lighters positioned just above the door rim when you open the doors halfway to get the vanity mirror position.
Fortunately melamine is a good flame retardant but read the following section found on DSM's website (a melamine producer):

When melamine-based flame-retardant (intumescent) coatings are exposed to fire, they degrade to form a char or insulated surface as the melamine decomposes. The result is that the substrate material beneath the char surface is protected from the heat for a certain amount of time.

I've underlined ... "for a certain amount of time". How long will it take for the substrate material (most of the time fibreboard) to get exposed to the excessive heat of the down lighters sitting just a few mm above the door rim?

So, how can we improve the situation here? One option is to revisit the lamps and use fluorescent lamps (produce less heat) instead of halogen spot lighting. Another option is to increase the distance between the cabinet doors and the built in lights.

Samsung's display with a split personality

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 14:06:00 +0000

Looking for some reviews on 22" LCD monitors, I bumped into this strange story.
Samsung apparently sells the Samsung SyncMaster 226BW on the European market with three different panels inside (A,S and C type). As long as the specs are the same, who cares? But the performace is different. Unfortunately for the customer there is no simple way to know which version is in the box. Let's classify this under dodgy business practices...

source (in French): http://hardware.fr

Fluorescent tube meltdown

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 13:44:00 +0000

When it was time to change some of the small form factor (T4 size for the specialists) fluorescent quick start tubes in our kitchen I bumped into a nasty surprise. Some of the protective plastic covers over the tubes had melted in a certain area (see picture). I suspect this spot is above the hidden starter. The lamp specialist store could not identify a proper replacement because the fixtures used in my kitchen have non standard lengths for our market. The guy behind the counter told me that they see more and more of these non standards fixtures from Chinese manufacturers. The kitchen supplier stopped distributing spares citing quality issues. Forewarned is forearmed.

BMW 3 series safety belt gets squeezed

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 11:01:00 +0000

BMW 3 Series production series E46(1999–2005) and BMW E90(2006–) suffer from a sloppy safety belt roll up mechanism. From time to time when stepping out of the car after you unbuckle the safety belt, the buckle stays in the door opening. When you close the door, the buckle gets trapped causing scratches, dents and chipped off paint. In one of the pictures (click the picture to see the collection) you can see that some of these spots develop rust. This is not something you expect from a premium car manufacturer. The buckle can obstruct the door locking as well, creating a potential security issue. BMW (or its part supplier) should revisit the roll-up mechanism in order to prevent this from happening.

Luceplan Constanza lamp with a character

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 13:02:00 +0000

The Constanza lamp was an instant classic thanks to its nice timeless design. And as with every succesful product, Luceplan spawned a rich offspring based on the popular archetype. One of these is pictured above. This is a floor stander with "a sensorial dimmer rod close to the light, which has only to be lightly touched to adjust its on-off intensity" to quote the manufacturer. The weak point in this product is the lack of consistency in the sensitivty of the "sensorial" dimmer. Depending on the static charge in your body, this either works or it doesn't. Wear a day the wrong type of shoes and you're out of luck. No light for the day. If it doesn't work this thing has the power to drive people really mad, squeezing the rod like lunatics. The fun part is that you might get the dimmer working by holding hands with a person with the right static charge or touching properly charged objects. I've seen people going through some strange rituals to make this work. Another weak point is the user interface. The rod is the same for the dimmer and the more common on-off switch version. The rod for the on-off switch needs a push whilst the rod for the dimmer requires a gently squeeze. If you have a mix of these versions throughout the house, this can become confusing for the guests especially if the dimmer does not work in a predictive way.

For the dimmer a change of technology is required. I would get rid off the touch technology and revert back to a more traditional dimmer that requires turning a button or a profiled rod in this case. Added benefit, you offer the user a continuous range of dim positions versus the four or five discrete ones with the current dimmer. Another plus, you don't have to cycle through the whole range of discrete positions again when you squeezed too long or too hard and missed your desired position. As for the rods, the minimalist design does not allow for a lot of variation. I would recommend some distinctive profiles on the rods to differentiate between the versions. The profiles can offer additional grip when you have to turn the rod for dimming.

Wrong direction for Connect Four from Hasbro MB

noreply@blogger.com (SmartDust) — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 09:21:00 +0000

Last summer we spent some time at the sea side. Unfortunately the weather was not that great. Time for a game with the family. We looked in the cupboards of the rented flat and we digged up this Italian version of Connect Four from Hasbro MB. The handle to remove the coins from the frame showed some signs of abuse? How come? At closer inspection, the design of the handle clearly invites you to push. Now the strange thing is that you have to slide the handle sideways to drop the coins out of the frame. The visual clue given to the user by the design of the handle is totally wrong. Have a look at the current product page, the design is somewhat improved but they could have done an even better job by postioning the handle perpendicular to the frame inviting the player to slide and not to push. Click the picture for more pictures.