bpope’s blog

Ignoring the fact that some critical components are missing (e.g. the camera), this after-market case brings up an interesting point of design.

In the consumer electronics industry, more specifically at Apple,  industrial designers are starting to pay more and more attention to the interior of their products, too. To some extent this has been the case since the original Macintosh (Steve Jobs required that ribbon cables follow Apple’s rainbow color scheme). Currently “user serviceable” areas in the laptop lines are taking on more of Jonny Ive’s aesthetic.

To that end, I guess it’s obvious that the inside of the iPhone was not meant to be “user serviceable” but it will be interesting when the inside of the iPhone is just as impeccably designed as the ouside.  Oh, and the etching on the clear case is fugly, too.

addendum: as campo reminded me, the cables in the original macintosh ended up being generically colored because Jobs’ requirements were very expensive.  Nevertheless, you can tell where Jobs’ head was (and is) at.

It seemed an interesting title for an editorial piece, more suited to Christmas than the November issue of the Journal of Sound and Vibration. I read it curiously, wondering at the happenstance that had put this particular magazine in front of my on Christmas day.

Over its history, NASA has been funded by about $400 billion, compared to the $600 billion Congress just approved for the banking industry bailout (disclaimer, NASA’s budget comes to about $800 billion in 2007 dollars).  Nevertheless, our law makers feel that it is more appropriate to trust bankers, brokers and accountants with more money than scientists, researchers and engineers.  George Fox Long’s editorial cogently points out that what is needed to run this country, now more than ever, is smart people.  Scientists who can push the envelope.  Engineers who can rebuild our infrastructure.

More than anything, though, we need politicians “with the fortitude and intellect to suppress their own egos and allow well qualified individuals to address the technological challenges that face the nation.”  That was Mr. Long’s wish for last month’s elections.  I hope that it has come true, that would be a nice Christmas present indeed.

Working at Apple had a few perks, among them testing out the new in-ear headphones. I haven’t been nice to mine at all and they’ve held up amazingly for six months. The sound quality is a amazing, even better than what i’m used to getting from my Bose in-ears. The biggest difference to me, though, is that the Apple headphones fit inside your ears like earplugs.  While the Bose headphones fit snugly, but do not isolate the user from the noises of the outside world. That means more music and less ambient noise.  Admittedly, that can be either good or bad. Actually, at times I find myself using only one of the headphones because I don’t like being entirely isolated from hearing the world around me. I would use the Bose headphones, but the silicone tips have a tendency to fall off and go missing, a problem that does not plague Apple’s offering.

As for the three-button remote, if you’ve got one of the new generation of iPods that it works with, I think you’ll love it. It’s not only helpful, but it is a remarkable feat of engineering. Also, for those of you with iPhones, the microphone and center button work like the current headsets. Anyway, I’d definitely recommend them. If you like the earplug fit, go out, buy a pair and keep my friends in their jobs.

for those of you that are interested by design, technology, and innovation, this is a really interesting piece in the NYT about how collaboration and interaction result in incremental developments that are often only perceived at the ‘eureka!’ moment.

The really important message here is that the results of this man’s research/observation can be used to improve businesses and research ventures. Especially in this climate, I’d say that’s exactly what we need. (Speaking of which, click on through the link, the Times could use your help too!)

Some words that all product designers and industrial designers should take to heart:

Companies should be true to the material. That means making plastic look like plastic, metal like metal and rubber like rubber. Honesty with materials means you are being honest with your customers.

This quote is from Cormac Eubanks, a principal at Frog Design, was quoted in this Gizmodo article. I wanted to re-post it because I heard almost exactly the same words from Jonny Ive this summer. Makes sense, right? Tell that to the businessmen…

I know, having worked on their design, I’m supposed to be an Apple guy, and proselytize for the iPhone with all my waking hours.  Still, I hate to see good products get categorically panned when they shouldn’t.

Let me preface this by saying, I haven’t used a Blackberry Storm.  (Though, I really want to see what their touchscreen feels like.  I just haven’t gotten the chance yet.)  Every review I’ve read has said the same thing though: the Storm is a disappointment in almost every way.  The software is slow and unresponsive, the UI sucks…stuff like that.  Back to Apple…nearly every complaint I’ve heard about the iPhone has been software related (yeah…thanks Campo, haha).  Sure there’s some hardware stuff too (the recessed jack on v1.0 or the fingerprints on the touchscreen), but mostly it’s software needs.  Jumping over to e-books, the Sony e-reader outclasses the Kindle in nearly every department, except the book distribution model, which is essentially also a software thing.

The point I’m trying to make is that, as a product design engineer, I would sweat over tenths and hundreths of a millimeter in product thickness or width.  I would spend hours and hours agonizing over how to make a button feel just right.  Yet all of these details are eventually overlooked in the end because it’s all about making a complete product: integrating software, hardware and marketing.  It’s the complete package that matters to consumers, and admittedly that’s what’s important in the end, but I hate to see really good engineering shortchanged in the shuffle.

So, please, take a moment to appreciate some of the good things in a product before categorically saying it sucks.  Thanks.

Gizmodo is good at some of the things it does…snarky posts about technology.  Not a whole lot of technical detail, but usually cutting edge and sometimes off the beaten path.  More often than I’d like, though, they pick up some cool new product or technology and miss why it’s really so cool, other than being new and shiny.

For example, a few days ago, they posted about SmartBolts.  The indicator on the head changes color based on the tension within the bolt, allowing users to precisely tighten the bolt to the appropriate level.

What did Gizmodo say?

It’s not hard to under or over-tighten a bolt when you are building a cabinet, let alone installing hardware into the human body. Luckily, some clever engineers came up with the idea of SmartBolts.

Wrong Giz…if you want to control your tightness, just use a torque wrench.  This is not a solution for those people that don’t have a torque wrench, though.  The cool part about these things is that because they measure tension in the bolt instead of the torque applied to the bead of the bolt.  According to their literature SmartBolts give as much as 30% accuracy over the control obtained with a torque wrench!

Anyway, I know what I’m getting when I read Giz, or Engadget or anything like that, but every once in a while I’m glad I actually look a bit deeper into what they post. It’s just that sometimes I wish they did too.

(This post was inspired by the fact that I was directing someone to pictures from Antarctica, a website I hadn’t visited in at least a year and a half.)
3 years ago, when I traveled to Antarctica, I was asked to keep a photo journal and write entries for a website every few days or so.  So, I drew the outline of what I wanted my website to look like, and how I wanted things posted, and the BSA’s webmaster dealt with the rest.  All I had to do was post photos and text to an FTP site and he did the rest.  Looking back, what strikes me now is that during that entire process (4 months of planning and 4 months of travel) not once was the word “blog” mentioned.

Contrast that to today: you can’t go an entire day (at least, in the community that I am part of) without hearing the word several times, reading posts from several other blogs, or posting to one yourself.  It’s incredible that everything that I asked an ‘expert’ to take care of just a couple years ago, anyone can do now.  What’s even better is that current tools allow for the process to not only be easier, but also better!  Whether you use wordpress, blogger, or some other tool, it has become exceedingly simple to publish as much or as little as you want with minimal effort.

If you’re still reading right now (and I’m going to guess that maybe 2 people are/will), you’re thinking…”yeah, no kidding…web publishing tools are growing exponentially, now you can post from literally anywhere with mobile applications” which leads me to the really cool part of this…what are the possibilities in another 3 years?  will people continue to push to more easily share more and more of their lives?  I’m going to guess the trend will be towards compartmentalizing what is shared, and directing information such that it is more easily shared with certain target groups of people.  (Of course, if there’s a way to monetize publishing on a personal level, that would be huge too.)

Thanks to @campo, I’ve started using twitter.  As usual, I placed signing up for new techy things at the bottom of my priority list.  So, he merely re-prioritized for me: set up my profile and threatened to abuse my good twitter-name until I changed the password.

We’ll see how the twitter thing goes.  For some reason, I don’t immediately dislike it the way I dislike Facebook status messages.  Or, perhaps, this will be the beginning of a conversion and I’ll start liking other forms of broadcasting myself (including status updates).

Anyway…follow me at twitter.com/benpope

For years, I (and I’m sure many other people) have dreamed of an LED billboard on the back of my car, or the front, to express what I really mean to other drivers.  Only things like “thanks for letting me in” or “you’re an excellent driver,” of course.  Never anything bad, I promise.

So, when I saw the “Drivemocion LED signs for cars” headline on Gizmodo, I got a bit excited.  Of course, it was for no good reason.  I had conveniently missed the “Emoticons” precursor to the headline.  Apparently all this sign does is display one of 5 emoticons depending on what you input on your dashboard-mounted cntroller.  Seriously, if I want to let some driver in Boston know that his/her tailgating is not appreciated, flashing a sad-face through my back window is just going to encourage that behavior.

Check out the link for a video if you’d like, and you can be just as disgusted as I was…