Articles in Frontiering Products
Trendhuntertv has created this interesting report which highlights 20 top trends that are emerging for 2010.
The list of the top 20 includes
- Personalization
- Unservice
- Peacocking
- Rental
- Culture
- Prodependancy
- DIY Healthcare
- Nostalgia
- Crowdsource
- Emotionology
- Simpletising
- Ecopolitan
- Greenpliances
- Nomadabodes (portable living spaces)
- Pop-uptailing
- Life-swapping
- DIY Decor
- Next Besting
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October 15th is Blog Action Day, where 10,000 bloggers around the world are writing about climate change.
Social Media certainly provides a platform to harness the “collective” due to the global accessibility of internet and the ease of content publication which has given consumers a voice. Cause marketing is certainly one of the early adopters of doing this, and I expect to see a continued growth in corporate sponsorship of these initiatives, demonstrating the merging of social media engagement and PR.
One of the hottest news for social communication this month was the beta launch of Google Wave.
Like a lot of people, I’m still waiting for my Beta invite – Google released 100K invites on Sept 30, 2009, and hopefully a 2nd wave of invites will come soon. {Update : Thanks to Gus for sending me a twitter invite soon after this post was published)
bumptop
Here’s a very interesting utility that transforms your windows desktop into a 3D environment, much like a desk. It allows you to place icons in various sizes depending on importance, as well as having them on the wall.
Bumptop also has some clever techniques for sorting and grouping the various functions in an effort to make life more productive. Moving photos between applications is rather cool, and the following video provideds an excellent demonstration.
IBM has launched an Android based mobile app to “Augment” what is happening at Wimbledon. Taking a live feed from the handset’s camera, it superimposes content and data associated with various points of interest into that video stream. For example live scores, court information etc.
The widespread adoption of 3G and Smartphones has meant that the potential audience for leveraging location (using the phone’s GPS), and supplementing that with value added information is reaching a critical mass.
I think it makes sense to trial new technologies at these type of events.
MSNBC have released a NewsWare site, which provides an interesting news spectrum which can also be customised into a widget to embed on your blog, social network profile, or desktop.
The news experience includes this spectrum which is very engaging.
There is also a Newsblaster tool which lets you read the news while you are playing an online game.
To promote this feature, MSNBC setup the world’s first interactive cinema crowd game.
New interactive technologies can help to bring brands or big ideas to life.
Bullseye in partnership with 808South are pleased to announce Australia’s first client demonstration of the iBar™.
Speaking about the technology, Ian Farmer Senior Brand Strategist for Bullseye said
“The iBar™ has received many innovation awards in Europe and we are excited about the digital possibilities this technology can provide to Australia. Designing a creative set of interactive experiences is an integral part of producing a rewarding and engaging brand interaction”.
Sleeveface is defined as "one or more persons obscuring or augmenting any part of their body or bodies with record sleeve(s) causing an illusion"
This unique art-form has inspired over 1400 Flickr photos, a series of Youtube videos, and even a Facebook group with over 10,000 members.
This is a great example of a self powered community linked by the single common objective of creating art from record sleeves.
David Armano is one of the great visual thinkers best known for his Logic + Emotion blog which is full of creative visuals that clearly explain concepts.
Here’s his talk from this years Interaction 08 conference which describes how the convergence of design and experience are having an impact of the roles people play and the way we work.
The User Interface (UI) of any system is critical to the success of the application, and that is why major software companies have roles for UI experts. But now you can record and then watch the trail of your consumer clicks thanks to a product from ClicTale.
Clicktale has a useability study (part 1 and part 2) which discusses findings based on their tracking service.
The key ones are
Many consumers are frustrated when wanting to interact with corporations. Phone calls met with “please hold” notices, or emails that get a “thanks for your input” reply, but nothing further.
Getsatisfaction is trying to solve these challenges by providing a place where consumers and marketeers can communicate. They call it “people-powered customer service” and allows consumers a platform where they can converse about customer service issues specific to a particular company or product.
My virtual model gives consumers the ability to try things on, before buying.
You enter in your measurements, upload your face and presto .. now you can see what you would look like before purchasing. Brands such as Speedo, H&M, Sears, Lands End, Best Buy and Marie Claire are represented.
In addition, the site allows you to share and comment on saved outfits to tap into others opinions.
To expand this capability it is now offered as a Facebook Application.
I like to listen to visual communications, and I am most comfortable talking while drawing images and diagrams. So the idea of a visual search engine appeals to me.
Quintura is just that. You start by typing in a search string, and then navigate across a visual cloud map to zoom into the accurate definition or meaning you are after.
Here’s the result when you search on Frontiering.
There were 2 reasons why I decided to move my blog from B2evolution into Wordpress. Firstly, was to provide a greater management of unwanted SPAM, and the second was to get access to the growing number of available Widgets that various sites are now providing.
One such widget that has been produced by HP for both Wordpress and Movable Type is their Printing Widget. (hat tip to Neville Hobson for bringing it to my attention)
