Are you guilty of using too many digital buzzwords?

Irreverent and funny but like most of these things there's a grain of truth behind the jokes.  Treat yourself, it's Friday.

Dear Father Christmas..

It's that time of year when children start working out what they want for Christmas. I know, I used to work in the toy industry.  Well grown-ups can have wish lists too, even if they're of the dream on rather than Amazon kind, and this is sure going on mine...

I've just seen this video for the Sony Ericsson Live-View: Everything the Pop-Swatch I had in 1990 (or thereabouts) did in gadget wearable versatility,  PLUS a load of cool Android capability thrown in. 
Geek happiness. Watch!

Fashion retail goes multi-media with YouTique by French Connection

French Connections' foray into the multi-media world tripped across my radar this morning.

They've created a "YouTique" (YouTube based  boutique) to show and tell their autumn collections and provide some sort of quasi-personal online personal shopping guide (i.e select the event / occasion you need to find an outfit for and it will return a personal shopper suggestion video).

So far so good, but it gets better, the videos are annotated with "buy" buttons that link you out to the French Connection website, which is the first time I've seen external linking on YouTube.

 

 

 There's already been lots of great examples of videos linking to other videos and using annotations well, notably the Boone Oakley non-website and one of my other favourites come from Berlei bras in Australia, but this is new functionality as far as I am aware.

I think this approach makes an awful lot of sense, multi-media showcasing of ranges is much more interesting than flat online-catalogue approaches, which is what Abercrombie & Fitch, Hollister and H&M amongst others have opted for via mobile Apps (read the reviews, pretty mixed!), and being able to close the purchase loop there and then is a no-brainer. I think there's an awful lot more French Connection could have done with it, but we'll award marks for trying, and for doing something new.

Via David Cushman's Faster Future blog I found this link to a social media audit of the UK Fashion retail scene which is quite interesting reading whilst I am on a Fashion theme. I also recently noted that Burberry were loaning out iPads at the new season previews with bespoke iPad apps on  allowing customers to order new season collection items there and then. Nice. Gucci were also using their iPad app to shout about live streaming their catwalks shows...

Rich fodder today, the subject of interesting things being done by fashion retailers:  Uniqlo have for a long time been the pace setters in exploiting technology to create interesting interactions between brand and consumer, such as their Lucky Switch activity making banner ads organically spreadable, increasing reach along the way. Whilst I was looking that link up recently to show someone I discovered that they publish this handy overview of lots of their cool Uniqlo activities.  Be inspired!

Meanwhile I'll be off to talk to my clients about how they can mash and adapt the YouTique approach and push it harder!

Bookworms: Dying out??

I've been what's commonly referred to as a "bookworm" since I was about 3.  

But I've never seen a real one :-)  I've enjoyed imagining what they look like though.

It's a lovely term for an avid and passionate reader. I've almost missed flights as I've had my nose stuck in a compelling book. I've lost sleep over books, elastic promises of "just one more chapter before I turn off the light". I've missed my station or bus stop because a story has been so compelling I've been lost to the real world around me.

Somehow reading then ended up being a large part of what I do for work. Yet like most people, most of what I read these days is on a screen. Big screen, small screen, in-between sized screen. I fret that bookworm is a term threatened by the onward march of technology. Up there with cassette as a term that generations below will wrinkle their brows and look puzzled over. Worms in tech terms fill me with fear and dread of the blue screen of death.

Yet for all my digital immigrant book nostalgia I welcome the ways that technology can amplify and add depth to narrative, making it compelling in new ways.  Stories exist in so many forms. Stories swapped over coffee or a beer amongst friends, choose your own adventure stories - in paper or game format, stories translated into videos and pictures, stories reviewed and recommended in new ways and by new people.  Multi-player / media online games are just another way people share and interact in or with stories.

My two recent favourites (back to wearing my work hat) are:

1) the Touching Stories App on the iPad - choose your own ending multi-media adventure & very funny in places. Just nice to see touch being explored as an interface.

2) The Tipp-Ex YouTube takeover / commercial from a few weeks back that gave you the ability to interact and be playful or silly and also dictate your own ending. I particularly liked that for the retro product using new channels.

You could then throw in good ole' Huck Finn which I've been reading on my iTouch for a while now. Old story, new distribution platform. New preferences of when and why I choose to engage with them. I'm also looking forward to having a play with the Story Patch app later. It's designed for kids but I'm imagining it will be like me learning to use Keynote (Mac Powerpoint equivalent) on the iPad -writing presentations when you are much more reliant on tactile manipulation makes you think about how you convey the key point in different ways. Challenge is good sometimes.

Smartphone, tablet, laptop, hardback, paperback - I just now have a whole series of reading choices in my repertoire. Some I'll learn to have different expectations of over time. I'm now a repertoire reader in more senses than one. It used to be just having a few different books on the go at once, maybe one in several languages for pleasure and a business related one for inspiration or challenge. Now it's about what I'm reading on what device. No doubt before long I'll be keeping it all in the cloud not locally and just pulling it down on whichever device is to hand.   

I'm not sure if I'll become known as a content-craving consumer or a starving scanner or by some other nomenclature in the future but I'm pretty sure that it won't have the charm of identifying myself as a bookworm. I'm also sure the world won't stop wanting to swap stories.  So here's a nice video from the IDEO gang on how they see the future of books... I think they just misjudged the title - it's the future of storytelling and information sharing.  Books are merely a specific format.


The Future of the Book. from IDEO on Vimeo.

Ubuntu 10.10 Has a Brand New Wallpaper

Canonical released last evening the final wallpaper for the upcoming Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick Meerkat) operating system.

A couple of weeks ago, we've announced that Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick Meerkat) has seventeen new beautiful wallpapers and a lightweight and eye-candy theme, that will please every existing and future Ubuntu 10.10 user.



Apparently the default wallpaper introduces on August 27th, was not good enough for the final release of Ubuntu 10.10, and for most of the Ubuntu users. Therefore, Canonical replaced that ugly wallpaper with the one below.

This is the final and default wallpaper for the Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick Meerkat) release!

MacX iPhone Video Converter Available for Free - License Code Giveaway

MacXDVD Software (of Digiarty Software, Inc.) has announced a giveaway promo for MacX iPhone Video Converter which aids users in Converting HD and SD video to iPhone, iPod, iPad with original quality. The tool is available for free download for both Mac and Windows users until September 30th.

All Mac users need to do to get a free copy of MacX iPhone Video Converter is to simply download the trial version using the link below, and then activate it with the following license code: AZ-TGUMTQYN-OFQPET.

Download MacX iPhone Video Converter (Trial)

For Windows users, just visit MacXDVD Software here, click the “Windows” button, and the full version will be automatically downloaded to their computers. A license code is not required.

This giveaway version of MacX iPhone Video Converter is not eligible for free upgrades, once a new release is out. Also, no technical support is offered.

On the good side, you get to keep this version and use it for as long as you want, for free.

Also noteworthy is that MacX iPhone Video Converter offers some pretty advanced conversion functionality, making this an offer you can’t miss out on.

MacX iPhone Video Converter accepts almost any popular video format as input, including high definition video formats like MKV, M2TS, AVCHD, MTS, TOD, HD H.264/MPEG-4 AVC, and HD MPEG, as well as standard definition video formats, including AVI, MPEG, WMV, DivX, MP4, MOV, RM, RMVB, ASF, 3GP, WebM, etc.

A lengthy list of features provided by the folks at MacXDVD Software is available below:

- Support Converting both High Definition and Standard Definition Video on Mac OS

- Convert Video to iPhone, iPod, iPad, MP4, MOV, FLV, H.264, MP3, etc.

- Multi-track video supported. It lets audience choose their preferred language when watch HD videos that contains multiple audio language track and video track.

- Trim video segment, clip the required segments from your video and remove the unwanted video advertisement.

- Take snapshot from video files to be saved as JPG, BMP format and extract audio tracks from multimedia files to set as the ringtone for your iPhone.

- A series of practical settings are provided to make personalized videos, such as video trimming, batch conversion, frame rate, video bitrate, audio bitrate, stretch to full screen, etc

- Simple graphical user interface makes it easy to use and it enables you to makes full use of dual and multi-core CPU to speed up the conversion, up to 8x real time

HDR Photos Already Available for Older iPhones, No Jailbreak Required

Speaking of adding HDR capabilities to old-generation iPhones, the folks at Pictional LLC have just issued version 2.0 of their TrueHDR application for iPhone owners which brings a - new rapid Autocapture mode.

“Have you taken pictures, only to find out that the clouds were washed out, making the sky look like a white haze? Or how about pictures where everything in the shadows looked like a dark blob with no details?”, says Pictional LLC.

“With TrueHDR, you can get the best of bright and dark areas and merge them into a single realistic-looking picture that is much closer to what your eyes originally saw,” the app’s iTunes description reads (iTunes link).

Notably, the software puts HDR photography into the hands of iPhone 3GS owners, and does not require a jailbreak.

A report published online by Softpedia minutes ago informs of a hack that will put HDR photos on legacy iPhones via a Cydia tweak set to become available when the iPhone Dev Team rolls out their iOS 4.1 jailbreak.

While TrueHDR does not support the iPhone 3G as well, it does bring the function to a large group of iPhone users whose devices don’t have native support for it, namely those wielding an iPhone 3GS.

“Take full-resolution HDR (high dynamic range) pictures with your iPhone 4 or 3GS!”, Pictional LLC states.

“A new Rapid Autocapture mode makes it easier than ever to take HDR pictures, and new SemiAuto mode offers greater control in choosing exposure points. Share using Facebook, Twitter, or email from within the app,” the company adds, delving into the new stuff delivered by TrueHDR 2.0.

The full changelog is then provided as follows:

What's New In Version 2.0

- New rapid Autocapture mode - fully automatic and fast (with support for front facing camera!)
- New SemiAuto mode - more control, drag the exposure points around to get them just how you want
- Full support for front facing camera in all three modes (Auto, SemiAuto, and Manual)
- Improved UI with easier access to Facebook, Twitter, email sharing

Download TrueHDR ($1.99)

According to the list of requirements, the app is not only compatible with iPhones, but also with the iPod touch - most likely, the fourth-generation model which boasts a camera.

The software also requires iOS 4.0 or later.

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