I read this in today’s Metro. Made me laugh, that’s all. So, if you want to come into our studio and let us thrash you at giant wall-projected Wii Mario Kart, we regret that we will have to search you for bananas and/or mushrooms on your way in.

This was spotted by my Dad last week in a certain North Devon newspaper: The two headlines on this page could possibly have benefited from a quick check before going to print.

Often at home I use different devices and media to get different info at different times. Some examples:

I cycle to the train station as part of my commute so I often want to check the weather. I may either look on my imac downstairs before bed in the evening or sometimes I may have forgotten and so I use the mobile BBC weather site on my Sony Ericsson k800i if I am upstairs already.

I often listen to music in different parts of the home as well. In the kitchen we use the iMac, in the lounge I plug my iPod into the surround sound system and elsewhere in the house I use the iPod with a set of portable battery powered speakers. (I have thought about wireless speakers but never found the reason compelling enough to justify the financial outlay).

Now there are gaps in my consumption of media. How to get a decent weather forecast wherever I am without having to boot up the iMac? How to have an alarm clock that plays more than just radio or “beep-beep”?

So along comes chumby! I will leave you to go and look at the site for more info but it is basically a clever little blob thing that does loads of stuff like show photos and get info from the Internet and play music etc. On the surface it may be a bit scary - a Linux mini computer. Not the best spec for normal people to latch onto. However, if you think of it as a media device in the home then it feels very different. Also they have done a clever thing in the aesthetic design in that it is like a little beanbag. This probably helps for all the times you will drop it but it also makes it look nice in the home - very important to my wife this bit. I can imagine it looking nice on my bedside table as it wakes me up with some rocky music and then shows me the weather report for today. I can equally imagine it in the kitchen with some recipes widget, or on top of the TV in the lounge to play music and show photos.

The other point is the price - a device like this has to be cheap otherwise you might as well buy a laptop or a big iPod.
It costs $179.95 which is great as that is only £90 by current exchange rates!!! This is less expensive than the posh remote from Logitech! What a bargain. Let’s just hope the interface isn’t horrendous!

I will leave it there but I would be interested what other people think of it. Add your comments below.

Blackle - Energy Saving SearchInteresting - a Google clone, whose screen deliberately uses as much black as possible - which apparently saves energy. The actual energy saved must be negligible, but I suppose it’s all the little changes that count, isn’t it? It’s a shame we designers are so fond of lovely white space… 

Hi guys

I bought my husband the iPod touch for his birthday and this is the most amazing piece of technology I have seen with my own eyes. Most of us here at the agency are Apple fanatics, but this device shows you again how technology can be presented in a beautiful shape and made so easy to use that even a 5 year old could figure out how it works!!

I am always amazed about the way people apply for jobs. We receive a fair number of job applications and it is quite shocking the quality of them. Now I am not judging the people here but just the way they apply for a job.

Here are some pointers when applying for a job at a design agency:

1. Go for initial impressions: at first glance, your CV and email/letter must give a strong impression of your core skills. If you are a designer then make sure the CV looks great and that it is clear and shows creative flair without being OTT and hard to read.
2. Prove your skills: You must give examples of your work. Designers and developers should have an online portfolio that demonstrates their best work and ideally a diversity of work to show you are not a one-trick-pony.
3. Clarity is everything: People like me want to be able to glance at a CV or similar and know straight away what that candidate is good at, what experience they have, what they are like, and where they live. If you are claiming to be a great usability guru then make sure your CV is really usable! If you are claiming to be a high level developer then list your skills and what you have done with them. If you are a junior designer then show a willingness to learn and a passion for moving up the ladder.

Ok I will stop the soapbox now. Apologies if I offended anyone. Also please note these are my opinions and other ‘recruiters’ may disagree. I just know what I look for.

Cheers.

In case you haven’t seen it, they have now unveilied the new London 2012 logo. To say it has caused a stir would be an understatement.

As of this morning there were 66 Facebook groups setup to oppose the logo.

The BBC poll for people’s opinion on the logo had 54% saying it won a wooden spoon instead of a gold medal.

There is also a petition which you can sign and join over 14,000 other people so far.

There are numerous competitions to come up with other logos which are producing some great looking results.

Our opinion on this logo is not really important. However, what is a shame is that this was a great opportunity to have a nationwide competition to design the logo. Firstly this would have demonstrated the wealth of design talent within Britain. Secondly it would have cost significantly less than the reported bill of £400k.

We have been a bit silent lately and only posted one or 2 entries but I am about to change all that. Get ready for the flurry.

Starter for 10… Invasion of the paddled feet

I was out of the office last Thursday and I thought I would call the office to check in. I was startled to hear what was occurring…..

For those of you who have not had the privilege of visiting our offices we have a little courtyard garden out the back which is a bit of a sun trap. Well the guys discovered a family of ducks out there!

Now we don’t have a pond or a river or anything like that so we have no idea where they came from - especially as the ducklings looked like they couldn’t fly.

So what do you do when you find this helpless looking family in your back yard? Well Robin’s Bill Oddie side came out and he called the RSPCB. They said to take them down to the river… easier said than done.

I must admit that I was sorry to have missed the escapades as it sounded fun to watch. A little while later and the ducks found themselves inside an Apple box (good reuse example there) and on the way to the river.

Who knows where they are now?

At Digerati Studio we love user centred design. Before drawing anything, we focus on the user and how they will use the website, product etc. Therefore, we need to pay close attention to detail as every user journey needs to be taken into account.

I saw a great example of this from Google today. On Google Maps there are huge potential of possible journeys. One that I thought would not be technically possible to create proved me wrong…….!

See instruction 23!

I read an interesting article today that made me think again about user experience. At Digerati Studio we pride ourselves on user centred design. That means when we design anything before picking up a pencil or clicking a mouse button, we think about the user journeys and the requirements that the user will have.

In contrast alot of shops and companies put a huge emphasis on customer service to maintain a good rappor with customers and a reputable company profile in their industry. However, in my experience I often find one or the other, or neither! Either companies focus on customer service by having a massive call centre available to all their customers 24 hours a day, for example. But neglect the user experience of having to wait half an hour before being able to speak to anyone!

In www.macobserver.com there is a great article that talks of a windows developer coding for the new Apple OS Leopard. This is still in Beta release and the developer experiences some errors. His past experience working with Microsoft Betas has educated him that if you submit your errors found to Microsoft - they disappear into the abyss never to be heard of again!

However, the developer sent his errors to Apple and received a call back explaining where he had gone wrong, what this had highlighted to them about their OS and also sent back his script with some amendments.

This article is a testimony of a company that employ user experience as a whole ethos in their company rather than just simply in their products.