The Art of the Possible

Opportunity is all around. Perhaps some might  call me  crazy for  stating that  but wherever   change occurs in a market, opportunity is also created.

Recent  changes in our economy have been so great that it has  caused business leaders to consider the situation to be a reset  not just a recession. You can see  this  commentary by Tom Peters on his blog here.

If we are talking about a reset, then we we need to revaluating our tactics and strategies. Whatever you  plan was, whatever you metrics were, its highly likely  that you need to  revisit them. That applies in virtually  every personal and  commercial plan you have, from home ownership to company floatation.

Thinking about this made me want to revisit  a few key publications that have  appeared in  recent years.

The Long Tail  by Chris Anderson

The long tail is  about how endless choice  has the ability to provide to generate  huge  demand, that the world is no longer focused on popularity  ( remember when Top of the Pops mattered?) but on endless niches. Hits still matter, but there is a lot going on in the tail.

The concept of the long tail was easy to apply  to books,DVDs and Music. But  the use of the tail is appearing  in other markets too, in particular foods (organic and gourmet products), clothing (vintage and custom clothing), even in brewing (micro brewers & distribution).

Even content itself can be exposed in the long tail, take a look at  Guy Kawasaki  and Alltop.com. So what does this  mean?

1) a diverse inventory matters

2) exposing that inventory matters

3) customer experience matters

4) Having a  brand that is  known and trusted matters.

While the sad demise of Woolworths recently  filled the media. Perhaps  what it is less well known is how  the brand has been bought by and will now appear as an online brand.

In the physical world Woolworths was always the place you  thought “there is a good chance I might find it there”. Well, an online Woolworths undoubtedly  has the potential to provide  the same consumer experience, yet with an infinite amount of shelf space and inventory, it really can meet a very broad range of consumer queries.

Woolworths may well have a very prosperous  future in the long tail.

Earlier this week I posted a note about how a silverlight version of photosynth was now available.  You can now see that tool used in the context of the Presidential inauguration  on CNN.com.

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2009/44.president/inauguration/themoment/

I think its  great example of how  images  from different photographers  using different cameras were able  to capture a scene and link those images together to  form a single view of a moment of history.

Many of you will now have had a chance to  try out Photosynth which can be found  at http://photosynth.net/

Photosynth can essentially  stitch images together while maintaining ( if the image is shot correctly) the relative position of the image in relation to  other images in three dimensions.

It  you can then view these images  using the photosynth viewer.

Earlier this week  Microsoft   announced the ability to playback photosynth images in a silverlight  player.

The biggest impact of this is that photosynth viewing is that it is no longer dependant on the local machine. Therefore photosynths can now be viewed on PCs and MACs.

You can find more details about Photosynth and Silverlight here:

http://photosynth.net/silverlight/about.aspx

Take a look at the great barn in the  sliverlight viewer.

I thought it  about time I should write up a little about a trial project that was put together with Microsoft Surface with Tesco wines.

While Microsoft obviously  supplied the base hardware. Two of our partners Identity Mine and Conchango  worked on the design and development of the surface application.

As part of the trial the Technology was used at a Tesco Wines tasting event.

You can see a video of the application being used here.

I always enjoy the response we get  when consumers try surface. Everything  they think  they can do  with the surface, they inevitably can (  moving items,  turning items around). The number of possible  retail  experiences that could be generated  by such a technology  seem huge.

MIX is  the key event for Microsoft in the Online space. This year’s event will  be held in Las Vegas between the 18th and 20th of March.

Even if you can’t make it – its worth booking marking  as all the content from the event will be posted online, and there will be many announcements posted up onto the  site.

http://2009.visitmix.com/Default.aspx

I’ve been reading “Design Matters: How great designs will make people  love your company” by  Robert Brunner and Stewart Emery.

Its an interesting text, though  it does come over a little strong in the Apple/Jobs fan boy department.

Perhaps the observation  that struck a cord  with me the most was the concept of  “mattering”.Does your product matter to someone?

There is a reference to Microsoft in the text, in  terms  that Microsoft software is used by millions of people everyday, only a small percentage would see that software as mattering to them. Its seen more as a utility.

Software can matter to people – Facebook matters, Twitter matters, Instant Messenger matters etc. People genuinely care about what such software does, it becomes intrinsic in their lives.

So how do you make your software matter?

Well that clearly comes from the experience your software enables not the software itself. I’m no experience designer but if you find this area interesting looking into the work of our Principle Researcher for Design at Microsoft, Bill Buxton might be a starting point.

I have to  admit to being a bit of  book fiend. I just can’t walk past a bookshop without going in. I always seem to have  a want list, and Christmas always  gives me the excuse to go, sometimes literally, for larger volumes.

The first one is certainly  the largest book I now own. It is certainly not bedtime reading material, and commands an entire desk for its reading.

The Le Corbusier  book Le Grand is a massive volume in every sense of the word.  It also presents a fantastic level of detail into the workings of one of the greatest design visionaries of the 20th Century. I am no book reviewer, but if you have any interest in Architecture or design, it really is worth a look.

I was also very lucky to pick up in LA  a copy of Guy Bourdin beautiful  two volume set – A Message For You. I love the photographic work of Guy Bourdin, he has never achieved the notoriety of many other famous  photographers.

His work is so colorful and imaginative, full of narrative and intrigue. Its astonishing that the majority of the work was done in the 70s, without a hint of Photoshop.

The two other physically lighter  volumes I picked up were:

Truman Capote- In Cold Blood

and the  mind  bending:

Michio Kaku – Physics of the Impossible.

Well you can’t say I don’t have  diverse interests!, happy reading!

I mentioned in a previously  that Chris Bishop ( chief research scientist at Microsoft Cambridge)  from will be presenting the Christmas lectures  at the royal  Institution , this year. You can find more details regarding the lectures below, the theme is the building of the ultimate computer.

http://www.rigb.org/christmaslectures08/

Although the Christmas lectures are aimed at a young audiences  they are extremely well put together and they will be available on line from channel 5 – here.

Well, its all over  bar the sale of the stores for dear old woolies.

A huge percentage of the population will be misty eyed at the  demise of Woolworths. Once the only source  of anything decent  in a  the small town high street. The creation or ever larger supermarkets and specialist stores eroded  Woolies  market offering down to  a very large pick and mix selection.

My biggest irritation is that of the Media drive to point out business failure  as   sign of an ever increasing  mammoth depression. If one were to believe the media,it would  appear that there could well be no retailers left on the high street by next month.

The failures of  Zavvi, Woolworths, MFI & Whittards all  appearing to be  signals of impending doom, and the need for the public to start digging allotments  as soon possible.

But lets just take a little pause here.  Were these good retailers? in good markets? selling products and creating propositions that consumers actually wanted?

You don’t need to be a retail analyst to  figure out that selling CDs on the high street  is not exactly a growing market these days.

But our dear media friends don’t make stories about how well some online business are growing, and  growing very well.

Take ASOS.com for example:

Asos scope broadens as sales double

Now, I have no doubt there is a nasty full on recession on the way, but people still consume ( even if less). The right propositions to the right market still work.

As Marc  recently noted  I have been  fortunate enough to try out a test build of Windows 7 on an Advent netbook.

There are plenty of reviews circulating  on the web about the new capabilities of Windows 7.  Take your pick from here.

What intrigued me the most, was the  performance claims around the usage of Windows & on the ever growing trend of Netbooks PCs.

The Advent Machine (4211-B) has 1Gb of Memory.  I have to admit to being very pleasantly surprised by the performance of Windows 7 in many of the areas that matter to me  ( startup, shutdown, sleep & wake). I am always conscious of extolling the virtues of any technology that is not in the public domain yet, but from my personal tests, the performance on such a low specification machine is formidable.

The netbook is a clear emerging trend towards a true consumer, portable device  for the user who perceives access to a full set of internet services as paramount.

To date  this has been a trend that has been somewhat problematic for the end consumer. The challenge being that the majority  of machines initially shipped  with distributions of the Linux operating system. Whilst a technologically competent  platform, the challenges of maintaining, updating and supporting such systems became a real challenge to the average consumer.

Netbooks could really be a platform for Windows to shine on in the future.

Or rather very good food, is becoming  an  increasingly hard an exclusive  thing to find. Clearly having the time to have have had a lunch or two at a few Alain Ducasse restaurants   in France has had an effect on me.   I find France and its relationship with food  intriguing . The words that come to mind are care, quality and pleasure.

The large majority of people I meet her care about, where their food comes from, right down to the region and how it was made.

There is a huge respect  for the quality of the food and genuine pleasure in the consuming of that food.

In the UK we seem to have lost that skill and value from the fabric of our society. Our GDP may be higher, but we are defiantly not eating that well.

So, your home PC dies ( disk fails, blows up etc). You haven't  got a backup ( or if you have its only of a few things, and  not very up to date). This would be the exact moment when you could say "never mind, I have a complete, up to date image of that PC on my windows home server, I can just get another machine and recover everything back". If you have not got Windows Home Server then you might be feeling slightly more upset.

And that's a really good reason, why having Windows Home Server is a very good idea.

Link to Windows Home Server

Over the next few weeks I will be getting my home server up and operational. I'll report back on the progress I make.

Well I have to admit to some  failure in my ability to update and maintain this blog. The biggest sin in blogging appears to be failing to blog regularly. Really , I have tried! But I don't have a job with any real regular pattern to it, and I can easily find myself in different part of the country every  day of the week.

I am also conscious about what I write. It just seems too easy to cut and paste a few links and say 'what do you think about that?' I don't think that adds value at all and devalues the purpose. surely one should be adding some thought or commentary.

What I talk about when I talk about running- Haruki Murakami

Murakami is one of my favourite authors.His style is very hard to explain. It always a first person narrative, and its deceptively simple. Its like sliding on very polished marble. Its beautifully smooth, it feels effortless but you know  an awful lot of effort went into producing it.

His latest book, is even more humbling for me, as he writes about his running. He s very modest about his running, but the man can run!  a marathon  every year! 62 miles in day ! triathlons! It  really is a demonstration  of will.  As he did with writing  where he simply just started writing one day, the same is with running, he simply started running one day.

What impresses me the most is how  he finds time to do this, plus all is other  works. How he is so self disciplined and meticulous  in what he does. Apart from the obvious  benefits of exercise it also does help focus the mind , particularly as you grow older. The challenge of simply having the same drive you has when you were younger needs  a degree of discipline and focus and somehow that can be be archived through physical effort.

Somehow i need to create a pattern in my own life that allows this physical effort and drive the production  of better more steady work.

So how does this make me a better blogger? I am not really sure, I will have to work on it, you will be my judge.

What signifies the summer more to me than, cricket, tennis , Henley or Ascot, is that rather un-British event. The Tour de France.  Having seen a few stages of the tour myself, and travelled some of the stages. I am completely awestruck by the degree of physical fitness that must be required to  not only compete but to also race in such  event.

There are thousands of sites detailing out the the wonders of Le Tour. If you would like to see more about one of the biggest sporting events on earth, then I might suggest this excellent article and set of links from Wired Magazine.

Haute couture is a very demanding business. I find it  a very interesting business. There are huge demands placed on creativity, technical excellence and customer experience. Earlier this year I visited the Victoria and Albert Museum and London and  viewed the Golden  Age of Couture  exhibition.

With the advent of the Internet  and an ever increasing global customer the base Couture house now have to reflect their  brand online. For a number of years couture and luxury brands  have struggled online, some even avoiding  having a presence  at all.

However Couture is starting to lead the way  in the online world the site of Chanel is an excellent example of  technology elegantly deployed.