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Interesting article here on the evolution of the TV remote control. “The remote control will change more in the next three years than it has in the previous six decades.” It’s exciting and rather terrifying in equal measures. As ever though, there’s a danger of forgetting the people who really matter in all of this – the average consumer – for whom even today’s remote controls can inspire terror.
It’s also interesting that there’s so little reference to smartphones in this. The new Google TV interface can be controlled by an Android smartphone; the iPhone works very nicely as an Apple TV controller and allows us to set our Sky+ box from afar. We increasingly rely on our smartphones to control many of the other things that matter in our life. Isn’t it a logical next step – if only to reduce some of the clutter on our coffee tables? Discuss.
Interesting report here from Ofcom that has been picked up by quite a few publications this morning. It’s easy to see how at face value this could read “teenagers prefer mobiles to TV”, sending TV channel controllers all round London into a panic. But I suspect that there’s no need for hysteria. While the TV device may now be less vital for younger audiences, this doesn’t mean that TV content is.
If you ask tech-savvy teenagers to choose between a TV, a mobile and PC internet (as the survey does) many of them will quickly work out that if they choose a laptop or a mobile, they could do many things on it: talking to friends, listening to music, visiting websites, keeping up with people on Facebook, playing games, following celebrities on Twitter, sending partially-clothed images of themselves to school friends. And watching telly. The TV, on the other hand, looks rather one-dimensional by comparison. Logic, innit.
Slideshare copy of my slides – with notes – from today’s ’Connected Home’ Summit at the Streaming Media Europe conference. Thanks to William Cooper and all the other participants for a fascinating (I hope) session. All being well, you’ll be able to view this as a PDF with speaker notes. Feel free to like, disagree or ignore as you see fit.
Slides from today – Slideshare
Just in case you should be in the vicinity of Olympia on 18 Oct, I’ll be sharing a platform with Nigel Whalley of Decipher at the Streaming Media Europe – Connected Home conference. And I will be talking about consumers: how they are changing, what they are doing, and what they need from technology and content providers. And if that all sounds a bit vague, it is. I haven’t written it yet. But I’ve got a month…
Well, the press releases went out yesterday so now it’s official. We’ve been acquired by SPA Future Thinking.
We’ll continue to operate out of our current offices, with our current brand and current techniques and ‘Essential Way’ of working – but as the latest member of the SPA Future Thinking group, we’ll get access to the resources and support that we need to push on to the next level.
SPA Future Thinking has its own field force, DP unit, Analytics Hub, operations and finance teams, marketing and business development teams, and a team dedicated to developing innovative new quant and qual techniques. We get to use all of these services, to ultimately deliver even better and more efficient research to more clients – while still being us.
So the next phase of our growth starts here.
Thanks Tom and co for organising.
Admittedly these slides may require some explanation – so just shout.
 On this first day of Wimbledon 2011 we’re delighted to say that the BBC has commissioned us to conduct consumer research into their 3D TV coverage of the finals.
Working with the BBC and Sony Professional Solutions, we’ll be conducting research at a number of 3D cinema screenings of the men’s final, as well as some additional qualitative research around the 3D TV screen experience.
As research projects go, it’s a pretty exciting one: a showpiece event combined with a milestone for a major new TV technology. And with the new roof on Centre Court, even the rain can’t spoil it!
We’re delighted to say that ITV and Essential won last night’s ‘Best Research and Insight Project’ award at the AOP Awards. Well done to the team at ITV – not least for squeezing one last bit of value out of our ‘cross platform’ project. Sore heads all round this morning.
 Our ITV Cross Platform study (or ITV’s Got The X Platform Factor, as it has come to be known) is the project that just keeps on giving.
Following Essential’s and ITV’s ‘Best Consumer Insights’ Award from the MRS in December, it’s now been shortlisted for ‘Best Research and Insight Project’ at the AOP Awards. Prizes are announced on the 9th June, so we’ll keep our fingers crossed.
The Chromebook, Google’s new netbook that is “built and optimised for the web”, launches on 15th June – my boyfriend’s birthday. He’s been dropping hints for months now, so I thought I would check it out. Since this is Google we’re talking about here, I was unsurprised to discover that using a Chromebook means you have to live completely in the cloud, storing your entire life online. Since my boyfriend does this already, it seems like a match made in heaven. However, I was surprised to discover that they are also offering these netbooks to businesses for a monthly subscription fee. You sign a 3 year contract and get an upgrade at the end of the contract, and not only that, but Google provides the support as well.
To me this seems like the biggest and most attractive step so far, in moving computers from a product-based to a service-based business model. The Chromebook is really just a means to an end – to get on to the web. Without a web connection it is really just a glorified paperweight; so why own one? We live in a servicised world, where the focus is on the service rather than the product. If you take me and my boyfriend as an example: we don’t own a car, we are members of Streetcar; we don’t own any CDs, we use Spotify; we don’t own DVDs, we use SkyPlayer; oh, and (in case you’re reading Tom) I want a Kindle for my birthday – good bye books. It is a much more sustainable way of living; healthier for your bank balance and healthier for the environment.
The Chromebook is by no means perfect (it doesn’t have PowerPoint for a start!) but, in my opinion, it’s a step in the right direction.
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