Why aren’t all ‘objects’ interfaces to other ‘objects’?

Or, how to make your own Apple share price…

Trefis.com provides an analytical share price forecasting application. Their unique interface model, resembling a mind map, provides a user with a ‘glimpse’ into how a share price is constructed based on a company’s Divisional structure (revenue centers).

The application makes it easy to understand each company’s modus operandi, and even easier to edit the forecasts of each core revenue center that has been used to make up the share price to create your own version of the share price truth.

Semantic interface: objects interface to objects

For the everyday share investor, this interface opens up the semantic data used to build the share price, and subsequently makes the application a compelling way to learn more about the company’s Divisions (Products/Services) by clicking on each ‘object’.

So yes, just like in any hyperlinked world objects link to objects, but each object in this model is semantically linked so that the top level price ($243) is related to every branch and its sub-branches; therefore the interface is a semantic representation of a set of objects.

'Apple' Pricing Interface

Granularity of semantic data

Drilling down into a Division, for example “Macintosh”, provides the next level of granularity – i.e. what makes up the revenue behind the Macintosh Division.  At this level the application opens a new window to manipulate each Product/Service within the Division to modify the forecasted revenue and create your own share price.

The semantic data behind each Division.

Model Your Own Predictions

You may believe that the “Desktops” market will be in decline over the next few years, but “Software and Service” will continue to climb because you think Apple will get smart in the Cloud App Market by buying a string of companies like Aviary.com for their online tools.

By manipulating the trend line (as seen below) you can instantly view how the change in revenue would adjust the current Market Price to create Justin’s Price of $246.

Modify Revenue Model

Next Step

The next step would be to provide a feature to give the user the ability to add a Product or Service in a Division, and then I can be Jobs for a Day.

For example: I add a new Product called iView (aka. Tablet) as a new Division, and my expectations are that Apple will sell 2m iViews in Year 1 at a price point of $899; the Trefis system does the rest!

Popularity: 8% [?]

Trending 2010 – The list of things I’m watching this year

Social Media (Retailing) = Committing Social Suicide

Launching into Social Media, in the form of Social Retailing, does not mean ‘must-having’ a FB page or Tweeting out continuous coupons and passcodes. The complexities associated with conducting a social media campaign that gets people together to ’socialize’ via apps on social networking platforms or mobile phones can make a foray into the social media world appear daunting and costly.

However, the reality can also be the absolute opposite; you can conduct social media (experiments) without all the hyperbole.

Commiting Social Suicide

The SocialSuicide.co.uk site makes social retailing very straightforward. They provide a dynamic discount to every current site visitor based on the (average) number of unique visitors that visit the site. And, as it states, “The more visitors we get the greater discount you get.”

I appreciate the simplicity of this model, it’s a sure-fire way to get ‘you’ to send out a quick Tweet or Wall Comment to get a few extra friends over to the site. This looks and feels like Social Media to me, and there is a distinct lack of (very expensive) third-party software embedded in their site to make this concept come to life.

Social Suicides' home page demonstrating unique visitors receiving a discount.

But, I am somewhat confused why the site does not make it easy for a visitor to quickly tweet or post the site’s link to your social network via embedded buttons on the Home Page. I still rank this as one of the better, and blindingly obvious, ideas I have seen to promote site visitation and increase conversions.

Popularity: 8% [?]

Free your ideas: the power of Open Source Concepting

At some stage we all want to ‘redesign’ or ‘innovate’ something to make it better, but we are either too busy (lazy), or maybe, we just want to hold the idea close to our chest because it will make more money if we keep it a secret.

Well, instead of filing the idea next to “Idea #231″, publish the idea and create a following via Open Source Concepting (OSC). As a business model OSC will not protect your thinking from predators but if you want to get the concept into the real world – then go public sooner. The Open Source Concepting business model focuses on raising awareness about your concept, which can open up conversations with potential partners and in turn attract investors.

I think it’s important to distinguish that by ‘going public’ I don’t mean writing a sub-140-character-status-update about your innovation or a meagre couple of paragraphs on your blog. You need to inject enough energy into the idea to turn it into a Product Concept so that other people can visualize your thinking and further augment the concept with feedback and recommendations.

A real world example

Q. How would you approach an airline to innovate the ‘look’ of their boarding passes?

A. Open source the concept; and let a community of followers popularize the idea so that the airline comes to you with an offer.

Example: Tyler Thompson (Creative Director – SquareSpace), has open-sourced his vision for a ‘better’ airline boarding pass (see: http://passfail.squarespace.com/).

Instead of just 'hot air' – the idea needs to be demonstrated by creating a Product Concept.

Now, since he has a day job, Tyler may have no desire to ‘cash in’ on his Product Concept, but the potential of his idea becoming real has increased ten-fold. I would be surprised if designers in the Delta Airline design office are not all over the blog entry and maybe the Virgin Atlantic executives have already passed the link along to a VP for discussion. The point is; this idea could have faded away on a “Moleskin” notebook page.

But instead, Tyler designed a new Boarding Pass and decided to show everyone – whether the concept is translated into a working product is somewhat irrelevant. At the time of this post, Tyler’s Bit.ly click-thrus for the URL of his Boarding Pass site was at 12,279 clicks, which is relatively high traffic for a single blog page, and these are just the links from www.bit.ly. This highlights just one example of Tyler’s return on his (time) investment in open sourcing his idea.

Free your ideas… Open source your concepts…

See my post on the idea that I want to see open sourced for the Apple Tablet: http://creating.concepts.com.au/2010/01/syncing-your-tv-experience-with-the-apple-tablet/ … Now, am I too busy or too lazy?

Sidenote on Open Source Concepting: watch the video “RIP: A remix manifesto” – http://www.eyesteelfilm.com/rip , which discusses how the Copyright system has been subverted to the benefit of organisations that just covet revenue streams, and are not interested in innovating, redesigning, and being entrepreneurial. Every chapter of the video is available here: http://www.opensourcecinema.org/book/rip-remix-manifesto-1-meet-girl-talk.

And then, go and download Girl Talk’s mash up tracks: http://www.myspace.com/girltalk.

Popularity: 11% [?]

By Subscription… Models

I’m a big believer in subscription-based business models. This could work incredibly well for food businesses that are located in populated urban regions.

Check out the local Ice Creamery doing exactly this, in NY: http://www.milkmadeicecream.com/

Why can’t I subscribe (pay in advance) to my local pizza bar, and get a discounted price if I guarantee ‘4, 6, or 8′ purchases a month ?

Popularity: 11% [?]

Sync’ing your TV experience with the (Apple) Tablet

I have ‘cut and pasted’ a comment I posted on VentureBeat.com (http://venturebeat.com/2010/01/05/apple-tablet-2/) relating to the Apple Tablet – Article: “Contest: Your predictions for Apple’s tablet“.

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It will be about one of the Apps that the Tablet comes with, which makes the device integrate into everyday life – therefore: The Tablet + New App + Real World Element = Cool, I need it!

Let’s call the New App: TV+

Scenario:
The Tablet will be location aware and time sync’ed to reflect the TV channels available in your current region. The New App, TV+ ‘knows’ what’s playing via an electronic program guide – making your Tablet a Smart TV device.

The Tablet + TV+ combination provides the functionality to display dynamic content on the Tablet that is sync’ed with the show being broadcast on TV. Allowing simultaneous Broadcasting on one device and Narrowcasting on a different device: whereby TV+ unifies the experience.

I can now augment my TV watching experience with rich interactive media, extra content, and live feeds (twitter or other communications). The content can be time-released to make the viewing experience more dynamic, entertaining, and educational – plus show sponsors (advertisers) can be displayed within TV+ and locally specific – right down to the hardware store in your zip (post) code region.

Take this a step further: a Garden TV Show with a National broadcast can discuss a particular flower type in general, but ask viewers to refer to the Tablet (and TV+) for the exact species of the flower that will grow better in your zip (post) code region.

The list will go on; and I would use TV+ !

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Popularity: 14% [?]