Project Manager: Mm . And you were talking about scroll buttons ?
User Interface: Um yeah I think um I think we've decided that it's gonna increase the cost
Project Manager: Okay .
User Interface: and give no real kinda extra benefit
Project Manager: b
Industrial Designer: Yeah .
User Interface: and it's gonna decrease from the sleekness of it .
Project Manager: Alright , so we're just gonna have the the rubber buttons , was that right ?
Industrial Designer: Yes yes .
User Interface: Hmm um and just to be aware that there are kind of specialist functions and specialist remotes but we probably don't want to focus on those like such as the children's remote .
Project Manager: Okay . So not to be focused on .
User Interface: Yeah . Um there was a mention just as kind of a warning about button design . Um just to avoid ambiguity . So it gave the example of say your volume buttons for up and down , they might both have a V_ on for volume , Um let's think how they did this .
Project Manager: Good in in Flip it round in ninety degree a hundred and eighty degrees and have it up and down .
User Interface: I'm just gonna check so I do this right .
Project Manager: An upside-down V_ . So that would show that volume was going up , whereas the one underneath would see the volume going down .
User Interface: Um . What did they say ? Um I think the thing was that if you decide to do this , to have triangular buttons , um somebody might look at this one and say oh well this triangular button is pointing up , and that's the first thing that they see Project Manager: Right .
User Interface: Actually that can't be right , can it ? Oh well , no , they might see yeah , they might see this pointing down and think right that's gonna turn the volume down ,
Project Manager: Mm-hmm .
User Interface: whereas the actual button's pointing up , so the function is to turn the button up .
Project Manager: Mm-hmm .
User Interface: So , be careful what you put on the buttons
Industrial Designer: So maybe we could have like User Interface: and be careful of the shape that you make them ,
Industrial Designer: Yeah .
User Interface: because they might be kind of two um contradicting kind of shapes .
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: Yeah I I know what you mean . So maybe we could have volume written on the side and then up and down on the on the buttons themselves .
Project Manager: Yeah .
User Interface: Yeah .
Project Manager: You could have volume up and volume Industrial Designer: Possible .
Project Manager: Volume up , down and Like that .
Industrial Designer: Mm .
Project Manager: And 'cause the idea was to have limited um it was to have sizable amount of information on it . Limited number of buttons .
Industrial Designer: Yeah yeah .
Project Manager: 'Cause it was sixteen buttons , wasn't it that were Industrial Designer: Yeah . Yeah we got it down to not too many .
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
User Interface: Um and I think that's all I had to say for that .
Marketing: Okay .
User Interface: Um so what was the decision on the um design of the volume button ?
Industrial Designer: Um Are we are we gonna go through the design of all the buttons at the moment , or are we gonna t
Marketing: I've I've got some things to say about possible design things from trend watching .
Project Manager: Okay .
Industrial Designer: Yeah , maybe we should see yours first .
User Interface: Oh okay .
Marketing: Cool . Right , um I've been looking at some trends in in sort of basically fashion on top of doing the um research into the remote control market the the one that's the one I talked about last time , that we'd sort of asked people about remote controls and what what was good about them , what was bad , what they used . And we've also been looking at sort of fa sort of fashions and what people are wanting out of consumer goods at the moment . So we've had people in Paris and Milan watching the uh fashion trends .
Industrial Designer: Project Manager: You know yourself . Marketing: So  User Interface: Marketing: So just to summarise the most important things which came out of the remote control market investigation . The most important thing was that the thing sort of look and felt fancy rather than just functional .
Industrial Designer: 'Kay .
Marketing: And second , there should be some technological innovation . And then third and l less important than the other two , there should be an ease of use as well . And apparently , the fashion trends are that people want sort of clothes and shoes and things with a fruit and vegetables theme .
User Interface: Industrial Designer: Marketing: Um but um the feel of the material should be spongy ,
Industrial Designer: Marketing: which is contrary to last year , apparently . I presume it must have been not not spongy last year .
Project Manager: User Interface: Marketing: So we need to emphasise the fancy design with on on our remote control above all else . And then also try and add in technological informat innovation which could be our sort of find the thing with a hand clap . And then we need to ma sort of make it easy to use that's as a third priority , so perhaps um fewer fewer buttons and functions as we've as we've discussed .
User Interface: Marketing: And then maybe find a way to incorporate these trends so that we sort of capture people's imaginations . So maybe we could make the buttons shaped like fruit and veg , or the the buttons could be spongy , uh somehow . Maybe we could make them out of rubber rather than sort of hard plastic . And then sort of even wackier than that , we could maybe have a fruit or vegetable shaped remote , say in the shape of a banana or something like that . Right , so that'll be it .
User Interface: Marketing: Maybe a banana or courgette or something . Project Manager: Marketing: How how far we actually want to go along and sort of follow the trends , do we think the trends are particularly important for this type of gadget , or or you know , do they not matter that much ?
User Interface: I think if you start making the buttons fruit shaped , it might make it more complicated to use .
Project Manager: Well you were just talking about you've got to be careful how you shape your buttons , 'cause you're can mis-direct people . And I would've thought the functionality 'cause the people get cheesed off by things by having to read instructions et cetera , so .
User Interface: Yeah .
Marketing: Yeah .
Project Manager: .. .
User Interface: Maybe just one button , say the standby button is quite kinda separate from all the other functions . Maybe that could be a little apple .
Marketing: Maybe yeah . Project Manager: Okay . Now ? Yeah .
User Interface: And then that wouldn't get in the way of like kinda one to nine ,
Industrial Designer: User Interface: and it wouldn't confuse the numbers .
Project Manager: Stand-by button . No th that that incorporates the trend whilst at the same time not confusing people , if you're looking for functionality .
Industrial Designer: Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: Well I dunno I I guess maybe fruit and vegetables may be popular at the moment , but as we know how fickle the fashion markets are ,
Project Manager: But what are they gonna be next Yeah . What are they gonna be next year . Industrial Designer: maybe Marketing: Yeah yeah . User Interface: Hmm . S
Project Manager: But but th but okay but you you can incorporate the tr If y if you change all the buttons then you've got the problem that this year's fruit and veg , next year's uh I was gonna say animals or elephants or w whatever .
Marketing: Mm-hmm . Yeah ,
Project Manager: That means you're constantly changing your production schedule ,
Marketing: I'm not Project Manager: and you've gotta make different moulds and everything else ,
Marketing: Yeah .
Project Manager: so that's not a good idea I would I would suggest .
Marketing: I'm not I'm not sure what what what the sort of timescale we're thinking of selling the product over is . I don't know .
Industrial Designer: I mean it just seems realistic that the remote control market isn't the kind of thing which takes in those kinds of fashion trends .
Marketing: Yeah , yeah . Industrial Designer: to something which is maybe more universal .
Project Manager: Well User Interface: But I suppose as long as it's quite a subtle design ,
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
User Interface: um even if the design kind of changes , Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: We c maybe can imply a fruit shape possibly .
Project Manager: Ah d d But if Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: Maybe the spongy feel is something we could think about , um .
Project Manager: Mm-hmm . Well . Yep .
Industrial Designer: Maybe still with a rubber design we could Project Manager: Was that in the sort of fashion sense that this Or was the spongy feel was that uh sort of fashion ? It was , wasn't it ?
Marketing: Yeah .
Project Manager: So the User Interface: It seems like you're gonna have rubber cases , as well as buttons .
Marketing: Yeah . Yeah .
Industrial Designer: Um .
User Interface: And that you can make them curved or double-curved and that would be the kind of sleek and sexy look .
Industrial Designer: Oh yeah yeah one of the things were if you had rubber buttons then you had to have a rubber case .
Project Manager: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: Um oh no no no
User Interface: Oh right , that fits , doesn't it ?
Industrial Designer: sorry it's if you use the uh rubber double curved case then you must use rubber buttons . That's the way round . If you have the rubber case then you have to have the rubber buttons to go with it . Which makes sense .
User Interface: Right .
Project Manager: Rubber buttons require rubber case . Industrial Designer: Um .
User Interface: And that would fit in with what we want , wouldn't it , for the spongy feel , to have everything rubber .
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: Uh so , yeah . The m the main problem is how f how frequently do the fashions change ? 'Cause in essence in the production you want things to stay you want to basically mint them out
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: 'cause if you've got fashion changes and that you're incorporating , then it means that your stock is um is last year's stock
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: and therefore you're selling it or having to sell it at a discounted rate which you wouldn't want to do . Whereas if you kept the product the same but you could have a difference from year to year , uh it seems to me that you could incorporate a fashion statement if you like , rather than changing the whole kit and caboodle .
Marketing: Yeah . Okay .
Project Manager: You're just changing one aspect like like the standby button or something like that ,
Industrial Designer: Yeah .
Marketing: Yeah .
Project Manager: and especially 'cause then you could make it something that  Industrial Designer: I suppose we maybe are limited in the fact that we still have to put the logo on the actual Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: Well , you might be limited in space , that yes .
Industrial Designer: would or not . Yeah .
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: Well you two are obviously gonna find that out fairly quickly when you move over to your kit modelling stage as to uh how much pl how much how much how pliable is Plasticine .
User Interface: Hmm .
Industrial Designer: Yes yes .
User Interface: Industrial Designer: Maybe we could think of the the cases like changing with the fashions
Project Manager: Industrial Designer: like the Nokia phones where you could take the casing off the outside . But whether that would be too much to incorporate in production ,
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: whether that would just increase the costs ,
Project Manager: Hmm .
Industrial Designer: make it more complicated .
Project Manager: So you're talking there about uh changing changing the casing .
Marketing: That's possibly it .
Industrial Designer: Yeah the a the actual the sort of the look from the outside , so where the buttons would stay the same , and the general function of the remote would stay the same ,
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: but you could change the the way it looked .
User Interface: Yeah and then you could have Oh but you still would have to have the logo on every new case ,
Industrial Designer: Yeah , that's true .
User Interface: but you could have like pink cases for girls and red ones and things like that .
Project Manager: Yeah you you could do a colour change , so therefore you would yeah yeah I mean that's effectively what they did with the with the mobile phones , was to have some in blue , some in red , some in rather than all in black
Industrial Designer: Yeah .
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: or , you know , which four do you want , as long as it's black ? User Interface: Hmm .
Project Manager: But uh so Industrial Designer: So it is a possibility , um .
User Interface: But we are supposed to use the um company colour scheme , aren't we ?
Project Manager: Yes oh that's true
User Interface: We haven't really seen that yet
Industrial Designer: Oh okay yes
Project Manager: uh that might no
Marketing: Yeah .
Industrial Designer: that is User Interface: It might and we might be able to do both but it might clash with certain things .
Project Manager: Well not necessarily , because you could have your company uh We're we're meant to be finishing up . You could have your company badge and logo . I mean a lot of um computers for instance like like on the one you've got there , it actually has a sort of um stick on badge
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: so what you would al all you would really need , whether it , you know , whether the casing be w any colour , could be any colour , but that badge would then have to stick out on top of it so that uh in a sense , with a with a logo like that , because it's on a white background , the only colour that it might not stick out so well on would be a white casing .
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: 'Cause you you know you're sort of you're badging it .
Industrial Designer: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: And in fact a lot of companies get somebody else to make them and literally just badge them themselves with their own uh badge over the top .
Marketing: Mm-hmm . Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: And in fact the way they've got that there even if you had that on a white , which is the predominant colour of the uh the Windows badge , you'd still be able to see it clearly from you know a white casing uh product .
Industrial Designer: Mm-hmm . Yeah .
Project Manager: So .
Industrial Designer: And whether we'd have a big enough market to have this kind of like secondary market of selling the cases might be something to consider .
User Interface: Hmm .
Project Manager: User Interface: Well if it's for young people , um like the phone generation , that sort of thing'd probably go down well ,
Marketing: Mm-hmm . Yeah .
Industrial Designer: Yeah .
User Interface: and the market research has been on that side of things , hasn't it ?
Marketing: Yeah , I mean it's people say that it's the look , they want the fancy looking thing but I'm Yeah . I'm not convinced on whether having changeable covers would be something that people would buy into . I think with the mobiles , it's the , you know it's a communication device , people see you with it all about and
Industrial Designer: Yeah I suppose ,
User Interface: Industrial Designer: where you you keep the remote hidden under the sofa most of the time .
Marketing: i if it
Project Manager: It's uh in in the house , isn't it , I suppose .
Marketing: Yeah .
User Interface: Okay , so if we just went for one colour of a rubber case Marketing: I think Project Manager: So don't change case .
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: Change case colour . And we're sort of saying no to that .
User Interface: Did we decide on the rubber case ? The spongy feel , or did we think that that might go as a trend ?
Marketing: Well , it was different last year . The trend was different last year apparently . It was not not spongy feel . But I don't know whether the trend will change . I don't know whether it's one of those things that like sort of having all fruit shaped keys , that that probably would go out of fashion very quickly ,
Project Manager: Yeah .
Marketing: whereas just the fact that it was a rubber case is probably less less of something that y you're gonna end up hating in a year , you know .
Industrial Designer: Yeah , less likely to Project Manager: Sounds reasonable .  If you're going for fashion trends like that they'll need t you'd have to have interchangeable cases
Industrial Designer: So then th th that would Project Manager: so that you could Industrial Designer: Yeah .
Project Manager: or 'cause otherwise someone's gonna have to buy a complete new remote rather than just a case .
Marketing: Yeah .
Industrial Designer: it seems to make sense that we we'd just maybe stick with the standard rubber case ,
Marketing: Mm .
Industrial Designer: and then have the standard rubber buttons as well .
Project Manager: Okay .
Marketing: Okay .
Industrial Designer: Um .
User Interface: Uh we haven't really talked about uh the curvature of the case . There's flat ,
Marketing: User Interface: there's single-curved and there's double-curved .
Industrial Designer: Um . Mayb
User Interface: I'm not exactly sure what these things look like .
Industrial Designer: Maybe curves give it like the slightly more aesthetic feel ? But the double curve wouldn't require us to perform miracles with the Plasticine . User Interface: Marketing: Project Manager: User Interface: Well it says that Marketing: When you say d when you say double-curved , what what exactly does that mean ?
User Interface: I'm not exactly sure . Um I'll show you the remotes that I've got .
Marketing: Okay .
User Interface: See how uh Let's just get that bigger . See how uh the one Oh I'm not plugged in , am I ?
Marketing: No you're not connected to me anymore .  Industrial Designer: User Interface: That doesn't help . Project Manager: One one thing to cons
User Interface: Shall I just turn it round for time ?
Project Manager: one thing to consider is that in some ways you want um by having a fairly standard case it means they can all fit together on top of each other
Marketing: That should come up .
Project Manager: therefore for storage purposes in shops and the like and it makes it easier that you can if you can store them up on top of each other .
Marketing: Mm .
Industrial Designer: Mm-hmm .
Project Manager: Whereas if you do um fancy things with it , you then gotta put it in a ca a a packaging box that that does that . And the cost of packaging could be quite important vis-a-vis the total cost of the product .
Industrial Designer: Yeah yeah .
User Interface: Hmm .
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: So shall we go through quickly and just work out what we've decide on , if we have to kind of Project Manager: So but  Marketing: Yeah .
User Interface: Um it's not very clear up there ,
Project Manager: No .
User Interface: but you can see some of them have got kind of bulges , like the second one and the end one uh where there's a curve there .
Project Manager: Mm yep .
Marketing: Right .
User Interface: I'm not exactl I don't know if a double curve is maybe it comes up slightly , or ?
Marketing: That's what I was trying to work out .
User Interface: But um it is a kinda sleeker look if you've got curves in there .
Project Manager: Oh right . S so do you wanna go for curves , more curves ?
Marketing: Shall we
Industrial Designer: Project Manager: We're meant to be f we're meant to be finishing this meeting in about a minute or so .
User Interface: Definitely a single , maybe a double .
Industrial Designer: 'Kay , so shall we quickly Marketing: Yeah .
User Interface: Shall we go for single curve , just to compromise ?
Industrial Designer: We'll go for single curve , yeah .
Project Manager: Okay ,
Industrial Designer: Single curve .
User Interface: Marketing: Okay .
Project Manager: curved or double curved ? So it's single curved .
Industrial Designer: So did we did we decide on the kinetic power supply ? The one you move around ?
User Interface: Yeah .
Marketing: Yeah I think that think that's a good idea .
Project Manager: Yep .
Industrial Designer: Okay . Um  User Interface: And the rubber push buttons , rubber case .
Marketing: Rubber Rubber buttons and case .
User Interface: Um and we don't really know much about the colour scheme or logo yet do we ,
Industrial Designer: Oh we ca
User Interface: but possibly a sticker .
Industrial Designer: Yeah yeah , we'll still have the Are we gonna go for the simple circuit board just to keep the cost down ? I th I think we can by by not having anything too complicated .
Marketing: Yeah .
User Interface: Yeah . Yeah and and the voice recognition , we can use that can't we , just to find it . Without affecting the circuit board .
Project Manager: Yes . Yep .
Industrial Designer: Um .
Marketing: Yeah yeah .
Industrial Designer: And see we could always decide against it if something comes up that's just something to that we seemed to leave out .
Marketing: Okay . And then are we going for sort of one button shaped like a fruit . Or veg .
User Interface: Yeah that sounds like it wouldn't do too much harm in a couple of years . Uh what sort of shape do we want ?
Project Manager: So we've got spongy feel buttons as well , have we ?
Marketing: Don't know , maybe just
Project Manager: As well as or w or was that Marketing: Yeah . That's ru rubber buttons , yeah .
Project Manager: So it's rubber buttons ,
Industrial Designer: Yeah , it was just Project Manager: so it's not really spongy feel buttons , it's just rubber buttons . With a rubber case right ?
Industrial Designer: 'Kay .
Marketing: Yeah . User Interface: Yeah , so it's not too wacky .
Marketing: Reasonably spongy I guess , yeah .
Project Manager: And the standby button is gonna be different .
Marketing: Yeah okay .
User Interface: Um I think an apple would be a good recognisable shape . If you start getting into kinda aubergines and things , it gets a bit weird .
Marketing: Project Manager: Okay so what what shape are we making the standby button ?
Marketing: Yeah . Apple ?
Project Manager: A apple .
User Interface: Vote ?
Project Manager: Oh oh Sorry ?
Industrial Designer: Marketing: Yeah .
User Interface: Shall we vote on it ?
Industrial Designer: We will go for the a a a apples apples .
Marketing: Yeah .
User Interface: Anyone got any suggestions ?
Marketing: Apple apple a a qu Quite a big one , as well .
Project Manager: User Interface: Okay . Ah . Marketing: A big apple . Uh User Interface: Well it could be red .
Project Manager: Marketing: Could be a red apple , yeah . Either , don't mind .
Project Manager: A red apple ? Is it ?
User Interface: Yeah 'cause we wanna incorporate a bit of colour if we can , once we find out um Industrial Designer: Okay . And then we're gonna are you gonna work on keeping the button design quite simple ? Just like the Just working out what we're gonna do for the next time .
Marketing: Mm-hmm .
Industrial Designer: Um .
User Interface: Yeah . Yeah that seems pretty straight forward .
Industrial Designer: Yeah .
User Interface: 'Cause most of them will just be kind of mainly circular or like very plain .
Industrial Designer: 'Kay .
Marketing: Mm-hmm . Okay .
Project Manager: Sorry what was that last thing again there ?
User Interface: Uh just to keep the shape of the buttons simple .
Project Manager: Right much option on that . I thought you were going for a single curve and User Interface: Ah just the uh shape of the buttons .
Project Manager: Alright .
Industrial Designer: And j yeah , just keeping the sort of the labelling them labelling of them fairly simple as well . Fairly sort of self explanatory .
User Interface: Yeah .
Project Manager: Right , so shape of buttons simple . Okay . So that's that , I guess . We should now go away and get these things sorted out . I guess you two are on plasticine duty or whatever .
User Interface: Marketing: Industrial Designer: Okay .
Project Manager: Okay , so um .
Industrial Designer: Is that the end ? Okay .
Marketing: Looks like it . Project Manager: Okay .

Summary: The team discussed the material of the remote and the shape of the buttons. They finally made the decision that the case and buttons of the remote should be made of rubber, and the shape of buttons should be as simple as possible.