Marketing: Thanks . Okay so I was looking at trend-watching . Um unfortunately I wasn't given too much information . I was given a brief executive summary , and then an update on some recent fashion trends that we might like to look at . And then I'll just tell you some personal preferences that I got from that . Um okay the most important finding was that the fancy look-and-feel seems to be twice as important to the users as the current functional look-and-feel design , which I think we've kind of already discussed before . Um the second most important finding was that the remote should be technologically innovative . And again these are all things we've kind of already come up with on our own , but this just backs it up . And thirdly the remote would be easy to use . As far as fashion update , we've learned that fruits and vegetables will be the most important theme for cloths , shoes and furniture .
Industrial Designer: Marketing: So that might be a bit of a challenge to incorporate this into our remote , but we can try . Um and also , as opposed to last year , this year the material is expected to be spongy in feel . Okay so from that um , as we've already said , we need to focus on a fancy look-and-feel . Um I think we've already discovered that it's kind of hard to go away from the traditional rectangular design . But I think that , even if it's very subtle , we need to kind of trick our consumers , so they at least get the idea that they're getting something that's new and modern and sleek and Whether it's through the shape or the colours or all of that . Um for technologically innovative , we've talked about the tracking device . We brought up the idea of having two pieces , which we could discuss further . And Manuel had suggested um the energy source and the user interface , discussing some of those , um that we could change a little bit . We need to keep it simple , have limited buttons , which I think the two piece idea might be really beneficial for . Um we need to incorporate this fashion trend of fruits and vegetables . I don't know , I mean I guess the two options are if we had our remote in the shape of a fruit or vegetable .
Project Manager: A banana shape ?
User Interface: Oh it was sort of banana shaped . Marketing: Yeah . Yeah . Right . Or with exterior designs . But my question is , I mean the stereotypically speaking , you kind of picture males with their remote controls , and I'm not sure how they'd feel about having fruity logos on the outside .
Project Manager: Marketing: So maybe we could have something that's somewhat removable , or I don't know , different options for female , male target groups . And then the spongy feel . I guess we could look at mobile phones and other technology that's out there . C and look at different types of material that might please our users who want spongy-feeling remote controls . So that's that .
Project Manager: So possibly like a uh ,
Industrial Designer: Alright .
Marketing: Project Manager: sorry , just to butt in for a second . Possibly uh like a cover like they have for mobile phones ?
Marketing: That's what I was thinking yeah .
User Interface: Those like , yeah , sort of spongy ones .
Project Manager: You have one with a flag , and one with a banana and one that's a spongy
User Interface: Marketing:  Yeah . So when you buy your remote you can buy
Project Manager: feel to it . You can Marketing: various coverings .
Project Manager: Mm various covers .
User Interface: What's it called ? Cust you  personalised , yeah .
Marketing: Personalise your remote . Project Manager: We could leave that to the cover department . User Interface: Yeah . Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: Project Manager:  We all know they've got nothing to do all day .
Industrial Designer: Marketing: Industrial Designer: User Interface: Okay . Why can't I see the crazy . Um yeah I talking about the interface concept and how the customer relates to , will use the , consumer will use the actual device . Um so I've looked at some of the stuff I was sent , um , try and get some inspiration . But keep in mind that our own ideas that we had . Um I was sent some information from the company saying that they , the technology department have devised a new speech recognition technology , where you can program questions into such devices . They gave an example of a coffee machine where you program a question , you program the answer , and the machine responds accordingly . Um okay . There's different ways of a user can use products l like a remote . Um there's a graphical use , where you you look at pictures and well on a screen . A command line where you obviously type things in , and you get a response . Um and then it ju that's just to point out the sort of inconsistent u sort of use of interface in remotes . You can't really see that picture well , but there's various different remotes , once again with lots of different buttons on , making it more complicated .
Industrial Designer: User Interface: So , then I had a look at new products that are on the market . Not necessarily remote controls but ones that you'll recognise . Um this is the voice , there is a voice recognition remote control , which can control mus multiple devices . I have a there is a picture . You surf your favourite channels uh with your voice . Store up to eighty speech samples , controls four devices , T_V_ , cable , satellite , V_C_R_ , D_V_D_ and audio . And you can record your own v verbal labels , that are connected to remote control functions . So the technology is there . Um the one on the left is very similar to what we drew up on the board in the previous meeting , where there has scroll down functions on the side . You can sort of just make those out . And then on the right is obviously an iPod , which is you know possibly one of the simplest things to use out there , and really is , and all that is is just a a nice big scroll menu that y you sort of go through . That is a possibility . And nothing's simpler really . Um then there's things like this , which is a a a kid's remote , where the the parents have the facility to control and program what children can watch before . So the remote control it o only allows them to access the channels that their parents want them to watch . And um it means that th children have a novelty of having their own remote control . So I don't know if there's a possibility of having one remote contr you know like we just had two components , maybe it can have more components you know , different remotes . Um the point made at the end there here is that you have to be sort of be need to be clear on your um devices , as to what , you know , things you use . Sometimes an arrow pointing down , which may suggest volume down , could become confused just as a V_ for volume . Just little things like that , which would need to be made clear in the design . Um I think , d carrying on from what I've already said , a user friendly remote with minimum buttons . Maybe we've so suggested this two-part thing , where if it was to have a speech recognition thing , you could maybe control that on the do it or program all that on the control bit . And then just have the simple sort of hand-held thing that we sort of devised earlier , as the actual remote . Um I don't it could be a graphical display , the actual remote contr the actual control port maybe could have like an iPod where you just sort of control through the menus . Stuff like gets more and more compli complicated . And then the the hand-held bit should be ergonomically designed . And that is it . Why am I Oh yeah . Just . Where are we ? Uh . Just to sort of show you . M they've even got things like that .
Project Manager: User Interface: Huge things . Which is just for your gr ninety year old grandma yeah ?
Project Manager: Marketing: Industrial Designer: That's industrial design for cranes , stuff like that .
User Interface: Yeah . Yeah .
Project Manager: Notice the giant dog bone shape ?