Nokia Design EVP Thanks Apple's Lawyers

During the closing arguments of Apple's patent lawsuit against Samsung, Harold McElhinney, lead counsel for Apple, contended that design innovation was indeed happening outside Cupertino, notably with Nokia's Lumia device series. "Every smartphone does not have to look like an iPhone," he said, displaying pictures for the jury of Lumia and other smartphones, which were intended to show the lack of innovation happening at Samsung.

The Lumia 900, with its polycarbonate unibody and bold cyan colors, was one of the most compelling alternatives to the iPhone when it hit market, and today, Nokia unveiled its latest iteration: the Lumia 920. Featuring a 4.5-inch curved glass display, inductive charging and NFC functionality, as well as Windows Phone 8, Nokia's newest flagship is proof there is life beyond iPhone, as McElhinney had argued. "I saw [his] quote, and I was like, 'Thank you,'" says Marko Ahtisaari, executive VP of design at Nokia, with a smile. "The best way to respect competition is to do something meaningfully better that's different--not different for the sake of being different, but something that's meaningfully different and a new expression."

With Apple's $1 billion patent-infringement victory over Samsung, device makers across the industry are likely reassessing their approaches to hardware design. But while some believe the trial's outcome could spark widespread industry innovation, others argue that forced differentiation does not equate with innovation--it could lead to "different and dumb," as my colleague Kyle Vanhermert put it.

Ahtisaari agrees that different is not always better but sees opportunity in the lack of differentiation currently in the market. "You look out there, and it's a sea of black and gray and occasionally white devices with rounded corners," he says. "That's what the market is right now: hugely competitive but a lot of stuff that just looks the same."

For the Lumia 920, he thought, "Can we make an expression that's modern and new?" His design team pushed to refine the device's polycarbonate body, add wireless charging capability, and create an atheistic that meshed well with Microsoft's metro design language of Windows 8, colors and all. "I think we've done [something modern and new]...and Apple's lawyers seem to agree," Ahtisaari quips.

But Ahtisaari stresses that Nokia is not being different for the sake of being different. "We're a company that's turning around and design is playing a big role in that," he says. "You build a recognizable identity for products over time, and you evolve and refine that."

Source : fastcompany[dot]com

Customer Experience: A Cost Benefit Analysis of Simplicity

Simplicity for the customer causes complexity for the organization.

When Manish Chandra was launching Poshmark, a shopping party app, one of the design decisions he faced related to the payment system. It was relatively easy to plug PayPal in. However, Chandra was focused on making everything really easy for the customer. So, instead of using PayPal, his developers spent two months developing a system where payments could be made in two clicks.

The result of Chandra's relentless pursuit of simplicity for the customer was a mobile app that has been a big hit.

Very few organizations have the tools to develop a business case for simplicity. There are no models that I've come across that articulate the return on investment on making something easy to do. This is a huge gap in management metrics.

We know the costs of making things simple; Two extra months of developer time. But we rarely know the value that will accrue. So, in most organizations the pressure is there not to spend those two months.

Making it simple for the customer causes many challenges for the organization.

Customer simplicity is internally disruptive. I once worked with a bank that had an online mortgage application form that requested 14 separate pieces of information from the potential customer. This application perfectly integrated with the bank's internal systems. The problem was that they were getting 2 enquiries a week through the form.

A new manager arrived and demanded improvements.

The web team radically simplified the form, requesting only three pieces of information. The organization was shocked. Internally, everyone hated the form. It's incomplete, they complained. It won't integrate with our systems, they complained. We'll keep getting stupid enquiries from Mickey Mouse, they complained.

The manager decided to give it a try.

In the first week they got 180 enquiries. And yes they did get stupid enquiries from Mickey Mouse and the likes. But in the first three months with the simple form they did 20 times more revenue than in the previous three months with the older, more complex form.

Making life easier for the customer makes life more complex for the organization. Staff who are customer-centric are often seen as troublesome by their colleagues because they are always putting the customers' needs first. There is a very strong internal force to make life as easy, as smooth, as possible.

Many organizations find it very hard to measure outcomes. It's a much simpler job to measure whether you have a payment system than to measure how easy it is to use your payment system.

I see the same organization-centric thinking around content. The focus becomes on producing the content itself because that's a relatively easy thing to do. To focus on what the content helps the customer to do is much harder. But that's where the value lies.

Measuring the content or the app is the old model. Because of the Web we can now measure much better how things are used. Let's focus less on what we produce and more on the use.

About the Author

Gerry McGovern, a content management author and consultant, has spoken, written and consulted extensively on writing for the web and web content management issues since 1994. His latest book is titled The Stranger's Long Neck: How to Deliver What Your Customers Really Want Online.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com

With Apple V. Samsung Verdict, Innovation Wins

A high-profile lawsuit may cause two giant tech firms (and others) to make bold design and engineering decisions.

The Samsung v. Apple court case has, at least for the most critical part, been decided. With but a few details, the jury came down on Apple's side, finding Samsung guilty, willfully, of copying Apple's technology and designs. It's high-profile, bitter, sneaky, fascinating, snarky, and sometimes downright boring. Lawyers and judges have a few matters like punitive injunctions to work through. And too many people are already convinced there will be negative repercussions.

But ultimately its aftermath might be good for the tech world and for digital product consumers the world over. In the cold light of day, and in design offices and far from the courtroom, it may even spur dramatic innovations in mobile tech.

Design

Think about it: Apple's accused Samsung of slavishly copying its external product design and the look and feel of how the product works in user's hands. Superficially, it's hard to argue with some of this position. Samsung's phones before the iPhone were simply not in its class, and owed more to the past than the future (even the F700 which Samsung was, slightly dishonestly, trying to suggest as prior art for a slab-like smartphone design). It even went as far as aping Apple's innovative cubic mains charger and using a very 30-pin iPod connector-like system in its Galaxy tablets, when it used microUSB elsewhere. The one juror who's spoken out so far has even mentioned this situation.

Samsung said Apple's designs are "obvious" and that its a shame to be arguing over plain old rectangles. There's some truth to this, although Samsung misses out on the fact that sometimes it takes a genius to point out the obvious and also that sometimes design, in the best Dieter Rams mode, is all about simplifying, and taking details away.

Patents

On the patent side of the coin, Samsung said Apple was abusing its core smartphone and tablet patents, some of which are about the actual electonic systems that make everything tick. A bunch of these patents fall under FRAND regulations, because without fair access to them Samsung would be effectively hobbling the growth of a free and competetive phone market--a market that's becoming more important for everyday life.

Apple argued that Samsung is infringing some of its patents that relate to the way iOS devices work--the seemingly subtle and yet actually very powerful tweaks, finesses and design philosophies that really do make iOS devices a delightfully intuitive experience for the user. Many of them are new, and wouldn't have made sense in a pre-touchscreen smartphone/tablet environment. They're pushing the leading edge of natural user interface design forward, and having knock-on effects for many other of our modern gadgets.

Both firms tried to get some of each other's patents invalidated in the ongoing case, but the jury decided that that simply wasn't true.

What Happens Next

In some sense it doesn't matter that Samsung's lost, and may owe Apple billions and face import restrictions on some of its products. Yes, if it all goes badly for Samsung, it'll feel the pain (at least a little--its billions in global revenues will help soften the blow). But the more important point is that both parties are now incentivized to behave differently. One can even argue that they're now predisposed to innovate like they've never done before.

Apple--which isn't evil no matter how some may think--may press on with its smartphone and tablet UI innovation in an effort to truly distinguish the look and feel of its products in an ever-busier market, conscious that Samsung is nipping at its heels. iOS is getting a little long in the tooth, and now may be the perfect time to spend company time transforming it into the next generation of smartphone OS's.

Apple may also feel empowered to try some very radical external design changes. It sounds a little strange saying this when Apple's won big points in the California lawsuit on the strength of its iPhone design. But you could say the lawsuit draws a bold line under the iPhone's look and feel, marking it as distinct and special. That line feels like a conclusion, and could suggest it's time to make the next radical (rather than evolutionary) design step.

This is something Apple's done often before, from the first iMac to the iPhone and the MacBook Air. Tim Cook and Jony Ive could even decide that its time to radically reimagine the entire market, and come up with yet another classic mobile device that establishes its a new market (iGlasses to outsmart Google at its own game?).

Separately, Samsung may be incentivised to dance far away from Apple's reference designs. If it wants to steer clear of future lawsuits, the firm's smartphone designers may have to create some very novel devices that definitely appeal to consumers while standing out thanks to their visual appeal.

In terms of smartphone technology, either in terms of hardware or software, Samsung could also feel pressure to push the envelope. It has long-standing manufacturing experience and it's probably conscious that its existing FRAND patents aren't going to be huge money-spinners for ever. The Korean firm may even sense that a radical UI make-over is worthwhile, now that the "looks like an iPhone" halo effect is very tarnished. That could see Samsung's Android-cored TouchWiz user interface taken in some very unexpected directions.

It's not just Samsung either. All of Apple's smartphone peers, be they Android or Windows Phone makers, may feel the need to keep very clear of the look, feel and functionality of Apple gear. They do want to stay in business, you see.

Finally, in terms of the legal core of the suit itself it's even possible Samsung and Apple may agree with the position of Google's public policy director Pablo Chaves, and decide that the current patent system (particularly in terms of software) is critically broken--and actually is counter-productive for encouraging innovation. Even Apple's execs will be aware that despite "winning" this suit, there's an unavoidable negative air surrounding a case like this. And to avoid similar cases happening in the future, one solution would be to change the patent system itself. Lobbying does work, and these firms have deep pockets.

Call us over-ly optimistic if you will, but this is a very high-profile case between some of the biggest companies in the world. The overall outcome, if it does spur innovative thinking, may be great for us as consumer. Think of the weird and wonderful devices that we'll get to see as both Apple and Samsung try to outsmart each other and out-design each other in the future.

[Image: Flickr user ljrmike]

Source : fastcompany[dot]com

Quark Releases DesignPad for iPad

On Wednesday, Quark announced a preview release of its DesignPad app for grid-based design on an iPad.

The Denver-based company said that DesignPad, which is available for free, allows aspiring designers to try different layouts and designs via multi-touch gestures. The pre-defined layouts, which can be customized, include ones for ads, posters, newsletters and brochures.

DesignPad Offers New Approach to Design

The designs can be shared by Twitter or email, or moved to its big brother, QuarkXPress 9, for further design.

The company said that DesignPad, with its ability to quickly experiment with different layouts and create a wide range of final designs, was “an entirely new approach to design.”

Gavin Drake, Quark’s Vice President of Marketing, said in a statement that the company was “always looking at innovative ways to make graphic design accessible to the whole spectrum of creative professionals.”

With DesignPad, he said, “everyone can get real hands-on experience,” making the app a “valuable teaching aid,” in addition to being a tool for experienced professionals “to start a design on the go” and then easily share it for feedback.

In addition to pre-defined layouts, DesignPad’s features include slider controls for adjusting columns, rows, text and picture areas in layouts, a “randomize layouts” option, and text control for fonts, color and inset position.

Color, Opacity Control

There’s also color and opacity control on boxes and frames, text copy and paste functionality, the ability to choose from an online selection of free stock photos, and support for both U.S. and international document sizes with selectable units of measure.

Custom layouts can be saved for future re-use, a swip-and-pinch functionality enables the positioning, cropping and resizing of pictures, and there’s an option to add background images or floating text/image boxes.

For designers who want to work on the DesignPad piece in its higher-end relative, a QuarkXPress 9 version of the layout can be created for use in that app.

Founded in 1981 and named after a building block for all matter, Quark introduced its flagship QuarkXPress desktop publishing program in 1987. In 1992, it released Quark Publishing System to connect contributors in the publishing process, and 2001 saw the release of QuarkXPress Server, a high-performance publishing engine. One of its more recent products is Quark Dynamic Publishing Solution, which provides automated cross-media publishing.

 

 

Source : cmswire[dot]com