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This recent article in Wired made me think about the New Directions project, and specifically about how we might rethink some of our paradigms.
Essentially, the article talks about how Apple got into the cell phone business and turned it upside down. Traditionally, telecommunications providers have run the industry, and handset manufacturers have had very little power. Handsets (i.e. the phones themselves) are bait-and-switch devices, massively subsidized by the telecommunications companies, who then make big profits off the contracts that customers sign. The features available on handsets haven't been driven by creative thinking at the manufacturer, but by what the wireless carriers have decided they want to support.
The iPhone, obviously, is a very different animal. It's elegant, user-friendly, multi-purpose, and highly desirable. Apple designed it that way to protect their business interests. And they did a good job; people will pay a lot of money for an iPhone.
The iPhone wasn't Apple's first cell phone, though. Their first stab at the market was a partnership with Motorola, to create the ROKR, a cell phone that also played digital tunes. It looked like this:

It only held 100 songs, even if it had storage space for more. And to upload songs, you had to connect it to your computer. Last but not least, as the Wired article puts it, it looks like it was designed by a committee.

5 comments
Prominent, professionally done "people photos" work well on other library homepages (UT Austin for instance)
What a good idea for us.
http://www.lib.utexas.edu/
I think there's also an argument to be made against the aesthetic effect of the iPhone. (Then there's the hideous audio quality of the iPod, but that's another story.) I am not pleased with the look and feel of this device, but my peculiar tastes are beside the point. The point is that, regardless of the iPhone's UI flash and mostly rectilinear profile, folks are willing to spend the time, money, and effort to learn to use it. The user as center only goes so far; the device is also a central focus--it has mass, it breaks down, it requires maintenance--yet we elide that circumstance when we praise its simplicity or intuitiveness.
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