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Would you have predicted that tablets would outpace Netbooks 2-to-1 if you were asked two years ago? According to a new study by ABI Research, due mostly to the iPad, tablet devices are now outselling netbooks by that amount. ABI also implies, that at least for now, the iPad essentially is the tablet market.

iPads make up 68 percent of the tablet market (although many reports show Android coming on strong over the last few quarters). Regardless, the iPad makes up at least more than two-thirds of the tablet market, so when that market sees 13.6 million sales during the 2011 summer, most of the benefit goes to Apple.

Netbooks, on the other hand, aren’t benefitting from the tablet’s rise. During the same period in which 13.6 million tablets were sold, only 7.3 million netbooks made their way into consumer hands.

Clearly, it’s time to start setting up your combined mobile & tablet strategies in as you move forward and taking into account that a tablet isn’t always the same as a mobile device.

Read more details at GigOM.com

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Future, Gadgets, Tablets, UI/UX

Google and Samsung have rolled out the details on the latest Android OS, Ice Cream Sandwich, and the forthcoming Galaxy Nexus smartphone.

The new Android OS sports some interesting new features including “face unlock.”  Here’s some of the highlights:

• Your face unlocks the phone, as facial recognition replaces a traditional pass code.
• The phone gives you a detailed analysis of your data usage, down to the the individual app.
• “Roboto” is a new HD-ready typeface, and quite appealing
• Android Beam, using Near Field Communication (NFC)— bump your phone against another Android to share most content.
• Gmail and Google calendar have new looks and are fully integrated into the OS.
• Create folders by dragging apps on top of each other (very iPhone-esque)
• Take screenshots by holding power and volume down buttons (very iPhone-esque)
• Save Web pages offline and use up to 16 tabs in the browser
• New Data Usage options in the Settings menu will notify users when they near a data use limit and disable the feature when the limit is reached
• You can kill off apps that are using data in the background (even carrier installed apps)
• Open the camera quickly from the home screen
• Face detection in the camera
• Speed up and slow down voice mails
• Quick message sends canned response text message when you decline a call

Just as Apple’s iOS5 borrowed heavily from Android for things like the Message Center, it looks like Ice Cream Sandwich is returning the favor in a number of areas.  Ultimately in this usability battle, it’s the end-user who wins with better experiences on their smartphones.

The new Galaxy Nexus is expected to be the first device released with Android 4.0, with other manufacturers rolling out the update as they see fit.

Get a full run-down of features courtesy of CNet.

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Android, Google, Mobile, UI/UX

Welcome to the rest of the year. If we’ve learned anything these past few years, it is the omnipresent need to create content and gadgets that are great – that provide value to your customers and your clients. And that leads us into a conversation that starts with the smartphone experience.

If you have an iPhone, you know all about the black jiggly X. It’s a symbol of obsolescence and it’s what you see when you want to rid yourself of an app you don’t like or don’t value anymore. One punch of that black X and the app is gone, finis, done for, see ya.

And as I’ve lived with apps as a user and as the head of a company that builds them, it has occurred to me that the consumer tolerance for things that don’t work perfectly the first time you try them has gone WAY down.

Blame Steve Jobs. As we discussed in this space when he stepped down from the head office at Apple, the guy has spoiled us. Apple’s gadgets are brilliant – not just in their design and elegance – but because they always function beautifully, intuitively, and simply the first time you try them.

As a result, the window for creating a product that isn’t quite ready for opening night may be rapidly closing. I feel this intensely when I try out a new restaurant for the first time. If that initial experience is not right – the food, the service, the wait, the experience – I may never go back. Second chances are eroding rapidly because there are so many other places where I can spend my money on food.

I also feel this when I download an app. If it doesn’t work just right the first time I try it, if I have to wait too long for it to kick on, or if it just isn’t clear or user-friendly, it’s so easy to press down, see the black jiggly X, give it a push, say “No Thanks” on rating the app, and it’s gone. Out of my life. Forever.

So what does this mean for the rest of you who aren’t creating apps and software? Or even starting restaurants, manufacturing cars, or shoe stores?

Well, if you’re in radio, I’m thinking that the day is coming to an end when you could sign on a “beta station” that wasn’t really ready for market. If your new format or new jock lineup or new music position or new production isn’t clean, shiny, researched, and ready for prime time, your target audience may just push your black jiggly X.

First impressions matter, perhaps more than ever. Because with all the new products and innovations that come at us on a daily basis, the pressure is on media and entertainment outlets because of the many options available to the consuming public.

New TV shows are cancelled after one week. HP terminated its TouchPad tablet just a couple of months after it debuted. Microsoft killed its Kin line of cell phones just weeks after it was first released.

The bar’s been raised. Permanently. Consumers are angsty, and they don’t have to put up with things that weren’t very good in the first place. In fact, they are insulted by hardware, software, and other products that were promoted one way, while delivering something much less than what was promised.

“Good enough” is no longer good enough.

The next time you’re ready to launch that new and improved morning show or that hot new format, consider the changing mood of the consumer. As an industry, we have simply got to get better in order to effectively compete. You know they’re saying this every day at R.I.M., Microsoft, Nokia, and HP – brands that have fallen behind in recent years. Everyone in radio should be saying it, too.

If we don’t start making “quality – not crap” our mantra, we’d better be ready for that black jiggly X. A lot of ‘em.

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app development, Consumer Experience, Strategy, UI/UX, Usability

In a recent AdAge piece, resident curmudgeon and truly great media observer, Bob Garfield, discussed a new “expert crowd sourcing” model that is making waves throughout the agency world.

At the forefront is the virtual Victors & Spoils founder John Winsor, who says the concept is to “create a new operating system for the advertising industry” utilizing the skills of hundreds of freelance creative thinkers. Thus, the client comes away with a great campaign or creative idea while paying only a fraction of the price.

We witnessed this first-hand at jacAPPS, our mobile apps division earlier this year. We were in need of a new logo but the last thing we wanted to do was spend thousands of dollars to have agency or even graphic arts company do the work.

So thanks to our tech savvy sales rep, Alex Young, we turned to www.logotournament.com.

For a mere $400 (we could have cheaped out and only offered $275), we had artists from around the globe submitting logo ideas and concepts. We even had the ability to contact designers whose ideas were in the ballpark, but needed a tweak or two, a different color treatment, or images moved around.

At the end of the process, we had more logos than we knew what to do with, and more importantly, several wonderful possibilities without having to spend the big bucks. And we had the benefit of scores of designers working on our “account.”

OK, they’re not all winners, but that’s always the case when you go through this exercise. And the bottom line is that we had a lot of really good ideas to choose from without investing a lot of money.

And that’s the point of Garfield’s article, and virtual agencies like Victors & Spoils, GeniusRocket, Poptent, and GiantHydra. Instead of a single shop attempting to develop an idea or solve a problem, you have hundreds of creative thinkers working on your project. As Winsor points out, “We’re trying to create a meritocracy.”

How can we use that same line of thinking in the radio business? How can we utilize the collective brain power of our audiences – or even the entire industry – to solve problems, create our way to new solutions, and do better work more efficiently?

And by the way, here was our winner – a designer from Istanbul, Turkey who uses the screen name ysonmez. He’s a 45 year-old graphic designer who has worked at national agencies as an Art Director and Creative Director. How would we have ever run into this guy here in Southfield, Michigan?

There’s more to crowd-sourcing than just a catchy Internet name. Let us know your thoughts below.

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Creativity, Design, Social Media, UI/UX

Jacobs Media President Fred Jacobs blogs, “I talk with a lot of colleagues who are young parents.  And the integration of technology through computers, tablets, and of course, cell and smartphones is at a high level.  Many are achieving proficiency with these devices before they successfully learn how to use the toilet.

It makes me want to pitch Arbitron on a baby ethnographic study to learn more about this phenomenon.  But given how much I enjoy sitting near toddlers at restaurants, maybe this isn’t such a good idea.”

Are you surprised to read that more than one in five children have used a smartphone by the age of 2? Read more here.

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Smartphones, UI/UX, Usability, Youth