Monday…Another week, another observation…

Something I’ve noticed while working with technology is that remaining a moving target is a good thing. Take Apple, for example. Back in the day when the iPod was all the rage (despite that awful, awful clickwheel), other manufacturers immediately jumped in the ring with their portable MP3 player offerings, like Samsung, Rio, and Microsoft. So, by virtue of being first to market, Apple exposed the consumer want/need for portable MP3 players and also the weaknesses of the iPod for exploitation by competitors. But then Apple evolved the iPod product line–nano, shuffle, touch–all of these came over the following years accompanied by general improvements in hardware and advances in the programming languages used to support the devices’ functionality.

Basically, as the lineup of Apple products evolved so did the customer’s experience. This happened on two levels. First, there was just the validation that came with owning an Apple product. By owning an Apple portable music player, you were seen as someone who was in on the latest-and-greatest technology. And as a result you were someone who probably became a bit more fluent in the changing interaction language of portable devices that Apple was driving. The interactions that came with these devices were the second part of the evolved experience. These interactions were more physical. So, instead of interacting with menus through some thingy you probably couldn’t name on the outside of the device, you were randomizing song order by shaking your device or directly tapping the item on your device’s screen. Such interactions were novel, cool, and gave users an increased perception of control over their device.

The combination of how Apple played into the perception of their customers and the way they evolved their products made them stand out even more from their competitors. In fact, it even made some of their competitors look silly by comparison. And now, everyone is trying to do what Apple did. Some companies are doing a good job of evolving their devices to compete with Apple, but they are lacking in how they validate perceptions of their users. Other companies have done a great job of offering a good user experience and creating a validated perception of their users. For example, think of owners of Android-based phones vs. iPhone owners. Both groups of owners can claim pretty decent user experiences (depending on what they do with their device). Both definitely perceive themselves in certain ways, and the companies that market their products to each base do what they can to support those perceptions. As a result, there is some pretty heavy competition between Android and iOS. But between other mobile phones and them? Not so much.

I’m going to be curious in the coming months to see which companies it begins to hit home that good user–customer–experience can set competitors apart.

Today, while stuck at home with 3.5 ft snow drifts and no internet, I listened to the news on my Sirius satellite radio. One major story–aside from that of Snowpocalypse–was the debut of the first ever iPad ‘newspaper’ app, The Daily. What struck me more than the business model ($0.99/week or $39.99/year for content that you can’t get anywhere but through the app itself), was the amount of techie brouhaha surrounding it. This alone got me excited because that usually means something truly unique or monumental is being accomplished with an application. Rupert Murdoch, founder of Newscorp, and Eddy Cue, Apple’s VP of Internet Services, introduced The Daily to the world as the first app of its kind. So, once I had access to the internet again, I downloaded it.

And what was my reaction? “Ooh! This is pretty cool!”

In terms of design, it’s clean and uses space well. Users can peruse content by swiping through items in coverflow view, but it is called carousel by the developing team. As an added bonus, these content items rotate on their own after a set amount of time. Within each item, interaction is intuitive and the results engaging. For instance, swiping left to right in an item while in portrait view takes you through pages of the story. Changing the orientation of the device to landscape view lets you view photos. You can then swipe left and right to view photos. This interaction can get a bit confusing the first time using the application. Some articles swipe left to right to advance through them, while others, such as in the Apps & Games section, require a user to swipe down to read an article and left and right to switch between articles. Luckily there are usually pretty clear visual cues for this, like in The Coquette, the daily advice column: An arrow at the bottom right of the screen indicates the need to swipe down for more content.

There’s a strong social component to the application, too. Users can post to facebook, twitter, or email the story. Leaving comments is, of course, also available. However, you can actually record a comment.

Another cool factor: Video anchor! While in carousel view there is an expandable control panel with an icon that looks like an old TV set. Tapping it will launch a brief video giving an overview of the current article. There’s also story audio that can be accessed by tapping on the headphones icon. This audio will play in order of the articles in the issue, or can be randomized by clicking on the shuffle icon.

Navigation gets an A- from me. The main navigation consists of only 6 items: News, Gossip, Opinion, Arts & Life, Apps & Games, and Sports. Tapping on one, though, launches users into the first item in that section sometimes with no clue as to how many other, or what are the other, items in the category.

Features in this app are fantastic. In the Apps & Games section there are useful app reviews, and daily sudoku (WIN!) and crossword puzzles (meh). There is also a daily horoscope feature and local weather, which I should have mentioned early–the weather feature is pretty nifty. Both the horoscope and weather can be set by the user in their account settings, and once set up, the weather will allow a 5-day and 12-hour forecast. The cool factor increases with the 12-hour forecast as it includes a slider users can move to see the time, phase of the sun or moon, cloud cover, and temperature.

All in all, this seems like a nifty app so far. And in an effort to convince everyone, Verizon is covering a 2-week trial period for new users of the app. With that, what’s the reason not to check it out? (And if won’t check it out because it came from Newscorp or Rupert Murdoch, then your loss.)

As anybody who knows me will attest to, I love my iPhone 4. Yes, I hate the fact that I was basically forced into buying one because the iOS4 update bricked my 3Gs. But I rarely hold the child responsible for the sins of the father, so I’m not holding my iPhone4 responsible for the forced obsolescence of my previous phone.

Now, I rely fairly heavily on my iPhone4 to help me prepare for the week. So when I was attempting to plan my day around the weather, imagine my confusion when I saw this…

Apparently the sun had only risen in Shorewood, IL, while Utica, Aurora, and Chicago, IL were all still in the dark. Even more funny was the fact that I had just exited Union Station and was having trouble reading my iPhone because the sun was blinding me. What could have caused my iPhone4 to have such a brainfart? Don’t know. Everything else was functioning perfectly fine with my phone that morning.