Ride the Wave

by Lisi Howell

With every new year comes a slew of new ideas to inundate our lives with new things to do, the newest sights in Iceland no one has yet seen (and we must be the first), the newest toys, gadgets and gizmos. There will be the next kindle, the next iPod, the next smart phone and the next fad in movies. First it was sound, then color, and now its 3D! for goodness sakes, I swear it's as if no one ever thought you could watch a regular movie and seriously enjoy it without 3D, blue ray or HD pure viewing power. Sometimes I get drawn into that desire for the cool, new-fangled thing — and for good reason. I do really want the iPhone. It would be such a blessing to keep up with clients emails on the run or check my calendar for an open date night when that cute boy at the grocery store finally asks me out. But should I invest in one? Is it worth it to me in my personal/professional life and also my desire not to get caught up in the compulsory consumer culture that plagues us in the western culture.

I've designed many cell phone interfaces without owning the handy dandy tool of the 21st century, the smart phone. I felt like I was a fresh page full of new ideas. This little screen was just waiting for me to think of something it needed. However, most ideas I had fell flat because they had already been thought about, implemented or thrown out for more intuitive solution. My lack of a smart phone made it so I was less apt at making good judgment calls on the need for, say a scrolling window versus a flip left and right because I had never encountered a situation that called for me to use one or the other. I ended up relying on all my design colleagues for their smart phone gadgets as a resource. Their investment was their gain. This was a start of looking at design in a hands on/utilitarian/user experience sense. I looked at the Palm Pre, the iPhone, the HTC and android as investments and salivated over what innovation was coming out in the next year. This consumer oriented gadget ended up being a coveted mainstay for my job at a couple companies and I realized the purchase would reap benefits I could see in a matter of moments.

Another thing to keep in mind, gadgets are also good for business and the economy. What was once a heretofore unknown player in the market, Apple blasted on to the scene as only Apple can do. Making every competitor within a two block — or more — radius pick up their tails and run with abandon towards the door that Apple just opened. At this time, there is no way that any of these industry giants can compete with Apple on the newest and best thing. Apple started investing decades ago and never stopped. Cell phone technology is where people's money is going. These new phone ventures took to the market and dumped loads of money in the US, India and China with needs for innovative design, technology and product creation. At my last company in San Francisco, a major player in the phone service game was investing 22 million dollars that year in research, design and strategy to redefine themselves and create one of the most well thought out and highly evolved phones on the market. This investment signals that companies are willing to spend, even in this economy, and realize that the future benefits will eventually outweigh its investment cost. San Francisco's economy is still booming right now, even in the economic downturn and I have to say my pockets were lined with some of that green coming from the cell phone industries. It is imperative for competitive companies in the market invest in the newest in technology. Research with the best, design with the best. These companies need to understand this and invest in their future and our future economy. Ride the wave. Cell Phones, not cars, can make a difference in our economy.

The new graphic designer is posed with the complex task of understanding the human brain in order to make decisions about color, type and balance, whether you have three choices or two choices to get to secondary pages, if a page should scroll left or up, if the user really wants to have social networking at his/her fingertips. It's more than just having intuition and making text and graphics beautiful looking on a a page. As the new year progresses, we must realize all our jobs are becoming vastly different from what our parents saw as our jobs in their day. Everyday we are needing to educate ourselves on what new invention or method of learning has helped humans communicate better and more efficiently. Just as we glean inspiration from other designers we must become inspired by the new waves of technology at our fingertips. We are making an economic and design decision in our choice of phones. I for one am going to jump on the bandwagon for a new smart phone. One that will smoothly transition me from a confusing world of unwieldy user interface, to seamless ingenuity of fusing all aspects of my life into one little shiny plastic and metal object.  I'll go into this knowing it will make me a smarter thinking designer, an investor in our economy and the technology that will be supporting millions of jobs in the future. Of course, if only I didn't have so many well designed choices, the decision of which one would be so much easier. :)