Category Archives: Shopping

The Metaverse

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The Metaverse Is on the Way: Here's What You Need to Know - CNETWhy is there so much hype about the Metaverse these days?  It has even taken over from AI as the hottest tech topic. Last week when I asked Matthew Ball, the author of a forthcoming book about it, if I could take a peak inside he told me unfortunately no since the publishers want to keep it under wraps until it actually comes out in print. According to the blurb on Amazon’s site about the book, the Metaverse “is suddenly everywhere…It is a persistent, 3D, virtual world―a network of interconnected experiences and devices, tools and infrastructure, far beyond mere virtual reality. And it is poised to revolutionize every industry and function, from finance and healthcare to payments, consumer products, and even sex work. The internet will no longer be at arm’s length; instead, it will surround us, with our lives, labor, and leisure taking place inside the metaverse.”

That is hype to the max!

No wonder everyone is talking about it. Only today, I heard a radio show scaremongering the audience about all the potential dangers children face when entering the Metaverse – from being bullied to being groomed. However, just like AI, the idea of the Metaverse has actually been around for a while. Its earliest incarnation was in the form of virtual worlds, like Second Life, where people could create online spaces to socialize, learn, and hang out in. The virtual worlds were represented in 3D graphics which were navigated and experienced via a desktop. People could fly around and walk through walls to get from one place to another.  I remember on my first visit, ‘flying’ to a virtual lecture in a massive stadium that resembled the Coliseum in Rome. All rather strange and fun for a while but nothing to get really excited or worried about. So why now?

In the early 2020s, Mark Zuckerberg (Meta) took it upon himself to talk up the Metaverse as if it was the next big thing since sliced bread. One of his ambitions was to make the next generation of virtual worlds feel truly immersive. The step change from the older virtual worlds, like Second Life, was to radically change how people experience and interact in the Metaverse. Not through a desktop display, but by donning a VR headset and using the connected VR touch controllers to move their avatar’s arms around in the virtual world just like they do in physical world. This more extensive form of embodiment is what is envisioned will provide the compelling immersive experience.

This image shows one version of Zuckerberg’s vision of the Metaverse. Three avatars are enjoying the outdoors, moving their arms and hands around, as if they are together, even though they are apart in the physical world. However, look closely and you notice something slightly odd about the avatars. They don’t have any legs! The reason for this it seems is largely down to technical limitations. In contrast to the VR controllers which can map onto arm and hand movements relatively well in real time, the sensors and controllers which are currently available that can be placed on someone’s legs, are not able to represent someone’s leg and feet movements in VR nearly as well. It is often the case that obstacles can get in the way (such as someone’s belly), resulting in movements of the legs being obscured and so not able to be detected accurately. Because of this, VR headsets like Oculus, were not designed to capture the whole body of a person. Time will tell whether these kinds of occlusion problems can be overcome. You never know, in the future, we might see people putting on a whole body suit (like a Spiderman outfit) rather than just a VR headset when entering the Metaverse.

Meanwhile Second Life  has become commercialized. People can go there to shop for clothes and gadgets. The first ever Meta fashion week took place in Second Life last month. Even though the model avatars are impressive in how they move they still seem to be floating in air rather than walking down the catwalk. After the show, skins of the outfits that were modelled on the virtual agents could be purchased with Non Fungible Tokens (NFTs). Once purchased, people could then dress up their own avatars and parade them in Second Life.

 

Instead of using human models some designers like Dolce & Gabbana decided to use cartoon cats to show off their skins. One of the reasons is they look cool. Another is they avoid the problems of trying to emulate a human model and so don’t have to worry about how lifelike the model avatars appear. And no cats are harmed in the process. It is fantasy world all over again!

TikTok Food

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TikTok has been around since 2016 and caught on like wildfire amongst young people all round the world, as quickly as Facebook did when it first took off. It is fast and furious, and because of this terribly addictive, leaving you wanting more. Essentially, it is a social media platform primarily targeted at GenZ, who spend hours making and viewing their’s and each other’s short, snappy and slickly-edited videos. Each TikTok video typically lasts less than a minute. After clicking on a random video, the viewer can easily find themselves immersed in watching hundreds of other videos from that person’s account and then before they know it are onto someone else’s videos. An hour or more can easily pass by just as the videos do.

The choice of topics covered on TikTok is endless, but most videos are about the stuff that young people are into these days, including dance moves, fashion, jokes, adorable pets, lip synching and slapstick pranks. They also include skills that traditionally most kids have not shown much interest in, such as cooking. I was listening to The Food Programme on the radio the other day which just so happened to be featuring the growing trend amongst young people watching TikTokers demonstrating how to cook, that is quick and easy, without fuss, while looking yummy. Collectively called #FoodTok, videos in this genre have been viewed many billions of times. The mind boggles.

One of the people mentioned in the programme was Poppycooks, who has made a name for herself by specialising in how to cook the humble spud. Her video of how to make roast potatoes went viral which she then followed up with several other recipes of cooking potatoes, from crispy to crunchy to fried to mashed. She was really clever in working out how to keep viewers coming back for more, by adding a new video each day of the advent calendar, this Christmas just gone, comprising 25 recipes. The best was left to the 25th December, salty, super-thin, mouth-watering chips. They are indeed moreish. Poppy also has a cheeky look, adding a pinch of humour every now and again. You can’t but help fall for her and her style of cooking. The sound of her breaking open and biting into a crunchy potato is mouthwatering – and would make most people want to peel some potatoes and get cooking.

Like with other social media platforms, the secret to which TikTok videos become viral is largely down to a combination of algorithms, appeal and advertising. The trick is working out how to sustain interest. Many people may have a one hit wonder while a few go on to make a career out of it. Poppy, for example, has nailed it. She now has over 2 million followers. But staying high in the leagues of TikTok influencers creates huge pressure. The FoodTokers have to keep conjuring up new recipes they can show off in consistently tantalising ways always under 60 seconds! It is an amazing skill. Unlike the celebs of yesteryear, who have become famous through wealth, being in the know, being a looker, and/or having a huge talent, these youngsters can rise to the top  through their deft video-making and editing skills, making things look easy and super cool. They may only discover they have a real talent to entertain when beginning to create the videos. And literally anyone with a smartphone/camera can bubble up and become a star over night. This is one of the joys of this media – its serendipity.

Sometimes, people experience autonomous sensory meridian response (ASMR) when watching FoodTok videos, which essentially is a tingling body sensation that starts on the scalp and then progresses down the back of the neck and spine. For some people, this kind of sensation can be triggered by listening to crunching, slurping and other whacky sounds. SamSeats, for example, has made an amazing video of many tingling sounds associated with preparing a fancy ratatouille dish.  The sounds include ice cubes being dropped in a bowl, a knife slicing through an assortment of veggies and the rapid and fine chopping of garlic cloves and sprigs of herbs. It is music to the ears and makes you want to watch and listen to the video again. Each time you do, you hear something new. The second time I viewed it, I heard the glugging sound of oil being poured from a bottle and the frying of onions. Such food performances, speeded up to fast-beat tempos, are simply sumptuous. I can see how addictive they are (although sadly I never experienced the ASMR sensation of tingling).

And now I am tempted to upload to TikTok my old fashioned YouTube video (10 years old now) of ‘a plate of sizzling food’ being served up. Here it is: sizzle sizzle.

 

(Image of roast potatoes from lianaskitchen.co.uk)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Standing Out

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Much has been written about the power of a label to make the object it is attached to stand out. Popular techniques used include striking images, bright colours, ironic slogans and unusual designs. The trick is to make the label grab someone’s attention – be it online, in a store or in a catalogue. The competition for customer’s eyeballs is particularly marked for wine where there are thousands of brands vying for their attention.

On a recent trip to Western Australia, I visited Tylers, a small family-run vineyard who market their wine through a fun form of ‘selfie-labelling’. Visitors can pose for a photo which is then made into a label that can be stuck onto a bottle of wine they have purchased – transforming it into their very own personalized wine. All for no extra cost.

The vineyard was very low key, comprising a small farm shack where the tastings took place; the inside and outside of which were covered from top to bottom in previous visitors’ wine labels. Located in one corner of the shack was a dusty old PC, that was used to design the labels and a printer that kept getting jammed. It felt like stepping back in time to the halcyon 80s computing days. Some of my colleagues, who I was with on the wine tour, immediately saw how they could improve the tech. But for me, I thought its ‘old fustiness’ simply added to the place’s nostalgic charm.

Another recent innovation – also from Australia – has been to use augmented reality (AR) to make printed historical characters appearing on the wine label come alive – as if they were actually talking to you. The brand ‘19 Crimes’ has stolen the market on this; presenting a line-up of british convicts who were sent to Australia back in the 18th Century, and who regale their stories for why they were incarcerated and how they then subsequently became colonists. The AR characters celebrate the rebellious spirit of the exiled men and women who then went onto forge the national spirit in Australia. It is intriguing and atmospheric listening to their stories . Rather than using AR as part of a game, such as Pokeman Go does, it has been used in an adult context, bringing the story behind the wine label alive in a playful, mysterious and slightly uncanny way.

Placing labels on people, however, has a very different impact. The compulsory yellow badges that were required to be worn by Jewish people during the Nazi era were intended to stigmatize, humiliate, segregate and control them. Quite abominable. Nowadays, labels in the form of badges are used to signal implicit messages to the general public, asking for understanding and acts of kindness – for example, politely requesting someone give up their seat on the London Underground if they see a woman wearing a badge saying ‘baby on board’.

In Japan, a label has even been created for female staff to be worn when working in a store to indicate to other staff they are menstruating. The badge is adorned with a cartoon character called Miss Period. The underlying message is intended to enable other staff to feel OK helping the wearer and for the wearer to be excused if they feel the need to have a longer break. To many outside of Japan, it may seem somewhat strange and a little demeaning, to see someone wearing a Miss Period badge.

For shoppers not in the know, it might be read as saying, ‘I am having my period now’. But what is the customer to do? Should they avoid the sales assistant? Say something to them or other? Without any guidance, it can be awkward for the general public to know what to do or say on seeing such a badge being worn. In this context, the image is clear and rather cartoon-like, but the message less so, resulting in both the wearer and the observer feeling uncomfortable.

Another form of product labelling is one that informs consumers about something. One such initiative that is doing the rounds again is called PACE – which stands for ‘Physical Activity Calorie Equivalent or Expenditure’. The underlying rationale is that a label is placed on food or drink packaging to specify how much exercise would be needed to burn off the calories, if it was consumed – for example when eating a burger or drinking a can of coke. Some people may take the number literally and spend 40 minutes on a treadmill to earn their drink. Others might think twice about having extra fries or a muffin, when reading how much exercise is needed to burn it off. It might just nudge them to refrain.

An ongoing debate is whether this kind of information is more effective at making people change their behaviour than simply stating the number of calories. Does a calorific number (e.g. 600) or a type of activity (e.g. a 40 minute run) increase the likelihood of taking more exercise and or eating less? A recent study by the University of Loughborough has suggested that people selected about 65 calories less per meal when their food was labelled using the Pace system. That is nearly a whopping saving of 200 calories a day. It is not clear, however, whether its impact also increased their physical activity in the manner subscribed.

I also wonder if it might make people think that as I have saved on eating less during the day by having an apple rather than a chocolate bar, I have earned myself an extra glass of wine in the evening. When it comes to Christmas dinners, I can’t see many saying no to a second helping of  homemade trifle and then hoofing it down the park for a 2 hour run.

Grown-up Robots

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When visiting the vast Westfield Emporium in San Francisco last week I came across my first Pepper Robot. It was performing in front of an attentive young man in a cordoned off area next to an escalator. I watched their encounter unfold; the young chap followed the robot’s instructions to play a guessing game and after that join in creating some music. The chap seemed to be engrossed and did whatever Pepper asked him to do. Each time the chap responded Pepper became quite animated; its eyes and ears locking onto him and changing colour sporadically. The chap’s responses alternated between speaking, gesturing or touching Pepper’s ‘tummy tablet’ interface. Whilst talking to the chap, Pepper’s white plastic head also moved rather jerkily along with making various welcoming arm and hands movements. Both appeared to be enjoying themselves.

After a further five minutes of interaction, the chap said goodbye to Pepper and I took my turn. I said hello to it and then selected various options from its tablet tummy as well as listening to its suggestions. This hybrid model of a talking, gesturing, child-sized robot that passers-by interact with by mirroring its actions or selecting options from a touch tablet display seems intuitive and an endearing way of communicating with a machine. Clearly, it is not trying to be like a human but has been designed to act like a robot with anthropomorphic qualities.

I began by playing some imaginary music pads Pepper had laid out in front of me along to a piece of synthesized music. Pepper then played the mix back to me – but it did not sound that good. Then I tried the option of learning German. Pepper asked me to say, ‘guten Morgen’. When I pronounced this with gusto, it was very happy, rolling its eyes around and moving its arms up and down while flexing its potato peeler fingers.

The Pepper robots have been around now for about a year and have found their home mainly in shopping malls, conference venues and showrooms. They started appearing first in Japan and now have reached the shores of the US and Europe. The reason retailers have got interested in them is for their potential marketing value: attracting shoppers back to the malls. It sends out the message loud and clear: come to our shopping mall and have fun. As well as playing games, the retail Pepper robots have been programmed to offer advice about the various stores, eating places and special offers.

Behind me was a family, with two young boys, watching and waiting patiently to have their go. It seems like something that people from all walks of life will want to try out. Certainly, Pepper is a crowd-pleaser but not sure, however, of its crowd-pulling potential. I couldn’t see anyone going specially to the mall to be entertained by a Pepper and then going further into the mall to spend. But, then again, you never know, since I ended up buying a dress in one of the stores and having a nice lunch in the good court.

Meanwhile, this year’s must-have Christmas toys have been predicted to be a life-like doll called Luvabella and a Lego robot controlled by an iPad. Presumably, the former is targeted at girls and the latter at boys (It does make cross that such blatant toy gender stereotyping continues well into the 21st century). Luvabella, however, is far from Pepper-cute looking. It looks more like a monster doll with huge blue eyes. And it makes disconcerting gurgling and kitten-like noises when you feed it plastic food, play peek-a-boo or give it a plastic toy to kiss. I have never heard a baby make noises like the ones Luvabella produces. There is not even an uncanny valley feel about it. I can’t imagine why any child would want to play with one. What’s more this kind of cringe-making, pretend like-like toy has been wheeled out before. Amazing Amanda came out five years ago and was equally sickly and did not sell well. The novelty wears of pretty quickly – and the play-acting that is offered is so contrived. Give me an interactive androgynous robot Pepper any day that is equally appealing and entertaining to kids of all ages and gender.

Super Smellers

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carscentsLast night the weather suddenly turned into a full on symphony as I made a dash from the train to the taxi rank; all at once rain started lashing, wind howling, lightning sheeting, thunder cracking, reaching a crescendo of hailstones crashing on the ground. It really was a case of elephants and lions rather than cats and dogs. I sank into the backseat of a taxi thankful I did not have to wait. The inclement weather was mercifully silenced and shut out by the slam of my door. Within seconds my nostrils were filled with a distinctive smell of almonds that turned to marzipan. Before I knew it, I was being transported back to childhood memories of eating Christmas cake.

Because it was such an unusual and strong smell, I mentioned it to the cab driver who guffawed:

“All the girls say that. Smelling of almonds and then marzipan. It is actually Coronado Cherry.”

I sniffed again and tried hard to think of cherries and sure enough I began to detect some different notes.

“Yes, it is cherries like you taste in Dr Pepper!” I chirped.

He laughed heartily again.

He replied “It is funny because men usually say it smells of chocolate.”

We then got into a very animated conversation about the difference between men and women’s ability to smell. He reckoned that 9.5 out of 10 women say it smells like almonds while 9 out of 10 men say it is like chocolate. His sample is based on the 10-20 customers he picks up a day over the last 3 years he has been buying his tubs of California Coronado Cherry. What is more, he doesn’t ask them directly, but just waits for them to say something about what they can smell. Just like with me that sets him off. What a wonderful icebreaker I mused.

But not only that, it is a lot of data collected ‘in the wild’ that shows a massive gender difference. I had no idea we were so different in our ability to identify smells. Whether women are better is another matter since we all seem to think his car smells more almond than cherry.

littletreeI’ve always thought car air fresheners are a bit naff. My memory of cardboard pine trees in a variety of colours dangling from rearview mirrors is that they were always overpowering and unpleasant – artificial sickly sweet. Reminded me of when I was 16 – and the first time I went on a date with Aaron the carpet-layer from Luton – who had a couple hanging in his Ford Cortina. Whatever was I doing…

carscent2When I bought my Scirocco a couple of years ago, it had that horrible new car smell of plastic and rubber. It never seemed to fade, so I caved in and went to Halfords in search of a car freshener to mask it. I was amazed to discover just how many different kinds of exotic trees, sticks, sprays, and tubs of super smelly gunk there are now to fill our cars with fragrance. Seems the marketing departments have gone overboard with Tropicana scents that conjure up drinking cocktails on a beach. All of them had exotic sounding names with the likes of “Jelly bean Margarita”, “Bahama Aruba Blue Breeze” and “Bahama Waikiki Wild Hibiscus Vent Sticks.” I bought a stick that promised the taste of Pina Colada – coconuts and pineapple. After taking the wrapper off, however, it smelt more like the Costa del Sol than fresh fruits. It was awful. I had to throw it out and keep the car windows open for a couple of weeks to get rid of the new smell.

As we neared home, my taxi driver regaled how he has met women who could even name the make and brand of perfume others are wearing. What must it be like to be a super smeller?

Super Technology

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logo_rememberthemilk My smartphone beeps. This time, a message from my fridge alerting me to buy milk on the way home. This rather tired example of smart technology is still being rolled out whenever anyone talks about the benefits that future technology holds for us. Why can’t it order the milk and get it delivered without needing to involve me? Surely, that would be the smart thing to do. A bottle of milk would be sitting there on the doorstep for when I arrived home. But, equally, I could have nipped out to the corner shop when finding the milk had run out. Just like many of us happily do now. Once there, we might have a chat with the shopkeeper and find out about the local gossip or their opinion about the heatwave or their joy at England beating the Aussies in the latest Test match. And even try the new apple and ginger fruit juice he has just got in.

cornershopMuch of everyday life is made up of these unexpected encounters. We bump into people we know all the time: at work, down the street, at the cinema, in the supermarket and even miles away on holiday. Inconsequential in themselves but which is the social glue that holds society together.

Opportunities for unexpected human contact are slowly being eroded for every transaction that becomes automated – unless you use apps like Tinder specifically to meet a random person you fancy the look of. Taking humans out of the loop is of course nirvana for business, helping them to cut down on operating costs while making services more efficient – and at the same time encouraging people to buy more.

It can also take the headache out of having to queue – and how we hate having to wait for others in front of us especially if they are slow. Last week, when driving to Cambridge, I whizzed across the Dartford Crossing without having to stop at a toll booth and chuck a few quid into an over-sized bucket and then wait magically for the barrier to rise. The new Dart Charge system that has been installed swiftly reads your car registration number and checks to see that you have paid online within 24 hours of crossing. That is super technology.

Dartford_Crossing_400x400dartsystem-large

Trouble is it takes five minutes to fill in the form and register online to use the Dart service. They want to know all sorts of things about you, your car and not forgetting the all important bank details. The same has happened now when parking at Brighton station. There are no barriers or uniformed officials sitting in glass windowed booths. There is still one small wooden hut but it was locked with not a person in sight. All rather eerie. You can pay in advance or up to 24 hours afterwards. After that they slap on a penalty. I paid as soon as I got home fearful I would completely forget once ensconced in domestic life.

It took me another five minutes to key in my details online. The same pattern happens when buying tickets for train journeys. I nearly missed my train last week when trying to buy a ticket to Lincoln on the Virgin site. There was some mix up with being a new user versus a registered one. And it did not tell me until I had filled in all the details including the prized seat facing forward at a table with electric socket. They just vanished from the screen after the error was detected. I had to get a new password as I could not remember what it was. It would have been easier if I had bought it at the station and much less frustrating!

The underside of the relentless push towards ever more automation is that we humans have to do the ‘paper’ work to make it work – tapping all those personal details into our computers or smartphones for every new transaction, making up new passwords and forgetting them. For each new cloud-based system that comes along and replaces the old fashioned way of doing things – like paying with cash and having a human be in charge of the transaction – requires us to sign up before or after and give bank details.

And then there all of those services that we have signed up for using direct debit because it was easier and because sometimes they give a miniscule reduction – be it the TV licence, car tax, gas, water, leccie, Virgin/Sky Media, Netflix, O2 and so on. While taking away the pain of having to fill out yet another form online (once it has been set up) it means we forget how much money each month they are taking from us. When they increase their monthly subscription or charge we simply shrug. I don’t know how many direct debits and standing orders I have now. Some just disappear from my radar. When email notifications pop up from these companies I often don’t bother opening them. I don’t want to really know I have spent an extra £50 this month on data while roaming abroad.

Shockingly, I don’t know how much I earn anymore. Instead of enjoying the monthly ritual of opening a pay slip that would come in a brown envelope – especially when there was a rise due, many of us now have to go online to find out. That means remembering the URL or typing into the search engine when in the work’s intranet and tapping in our user ID and password (finding the one the computer used to have stored is no longer valid) to get to the same information. I simply forget – since there is no monthly email reminder I’ve been paid. And it is not as pleasurable looking at the data in a spreadsheet format – which invariably it is formatted in.

The weather is miserable out there today. So I booked online to get tickets to go to the cinema tonight. It only took a couple of minutes, even after having to scroll down a long menu of countries to enter that I live in the UK. Why do they need to know that? Then up popped a ‘Verified by Visa’ form for me to fill in. I hate those things and can never remember what the 2nd, 4th or 8th or other 3 random sequence of letter/digits they ask for from my password for that credit card. So another couple of minutes filling this bit in and stressing that it was correct.

Hey presto – up popped the message:
“ORDER COMPLETED SUCCESSFULLY”
but then as I read on:

“Collect your tickets from the cinema counter or kiosk – Don’t forget your Reference Number!”

Usually it provides a RFID code that you print off as your ticket so you don’t have to queue. What was the point of doing all that key tapping in again and paying an extra online booking fee (nice one!) if I still needed to line up?

An email arrived a few minutes later with the codes on them. Just as well.

I just read in the news that the number of fines issued by the new automated payment system at the Dartford Crossing in its first 6 months exceeded the number of speeding tickets issued in England and Wales for an entire year! 867,897 motorists were fined £70 each compared to the 713,000 speeding tickets issued throughout the whole of England and Wales. That is a whopping £60,752,790! But it gets worse. Some drivers have reported that they are being charged on days when they have not used the crossing. Apparently, the automated letter recognition software sometimes mixes Cs and Gs and other similar looking letters. That is not smart technology. I dread to think how much has been made by Transport for London (TfL) since the Congestion charge was introduced in London over ten years ago. In 2009, alone, nearly 1.5 million congestion charge penalty charge notices at £120 each were made. TfL managed to collect £77m of what was owed to them. That is daylight robbery.

How Much?

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hatch'sThere is a lovely fish market called Hatch’s next to where we are staying on vacation in Cape Cod. There is always a queue of people inside buying from the many different kinds of fish on sale. Three of us went in there the other day to buy some fish for a planned BBQ and looked at each other blankly when confronted with the fish counter – we were clueless. We admitted to each other that we had never bought fish from a fishmonger before. K said she just went and selected fish from the cooler fridge in the supermarket. R simply shrugged and I said I had never bought fish in my life – being allergic to it. We watched the other customers pointing at various fish and making purchases. I watched one woman being handed a big bag and the fishmonger saying “that will be 87 dollars.” I gulped, wondering how was it that fish could cost so much.

Then our turn came. R pointed at the mussels and muttered something like a pound or a pint. The sales assistant helpfully showed us an amount and we all just nodded. Then K asked for some cod. The man asked us how much? We answered in unison, “enough for three?” The man took a huge slab and showed it to us and we all nodded together again. In the end, it turned out to be enough for 10 people!

The next day I went to buy some salt water taffy fudge in an old fashioned candy store and the sales assistant asked me if I wanted a pound? That seemed an awful lot so I replied half a pound – which turned out to still be a lot.

A couple of generations ago everyone went to the greengrocers, fishmongers, butchers and bakers and knew precisely how much and in what units to buy – be it apples, sausages, eggs, bread, milk or sherbet lemons. How we buy has been transformed in the era of supermarkets and online shopping – where we simply look and select pre-packaged food. Some may read the quantity on the label but most just select a shape and check the price.

It is not just the way we shop that has changed it is also many other aspects of how we go about our daily lives. An article in the magazine, TechCrunch, published this week by Rajat Suri discusses how software is transforming how we live, from fine dining to driving cars. He points out how there is “an entirely new consumer-facing software layer of apps and services being deployed as we speak”. Tablets are now appearing on tables in restaurants that diners can select their meals from and no doubt will soon recommend to the diner what they would like to order, thereby obviating the procrastination that wastes waiters’ time when coming to a table to take an order from a party who have not decided. The smart dining software could check, too, the nutrition and calories of the ordered dish which in the background could be uploaded to the diner’s latest healthy living smartphone app. Other vital statistics might then pop up to amuse the diner such as how many people have eaten that dish today, how many are left in that restaurant (thereby removing the disappointment when the waiter returns and says “I am sorry we have run out of that dish.”). Who needs to interact ever again with a surly waiter or a fussy diner?

smileyBut perhaps the scariest idea about smart dining software is to use it “in real time to optimize operational processes like waiter steps of service”. Instead of being able to linger and chat with customers or be assigned to their favourite tables, waiters will be monitored by smart software that will learn and then schedule the most efficient way of getting food to the table with the minimum number of waiter steps, eliminating any unnecessary deviations from the optimal path for the restaurant. Now, that really takes the biscuit out of AI and big data.

High-Tech Shopping

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Last week I spent a whole morning at a mega Sainsbury’s supermarket in Chingford, somewhere on the outskirts of East London. The British TV series, Gadget Man was filming content for a new show and they asked us if they could try out our lambent shopping handle.

The handle we designed is a minimalistic, mobile and fully functional display that clips onto supermarket shopping carts/trollys, intended to help people decide when choosing between which groceries to buy. It can be easily customized to provide salient information about the food dimensions people care about, such as salt content, fat content and food-miles. The latter are represented by varying lengths of a series of LEDs on the handle and a changing emoticon showing their total miles against a social norm. For example, scanning a packet of quinoa results in all 16 LEDs lighting up because it comes from multiple countries in Asia, whereas scanning a ready-made lasagne lights up only 3 of the LEDs, because it is made from Scottish beef. (Lambent by the way means having the property of moving lightly or flickering gently over a surface – which our handle does rather than being in your face.)

At a glance, a shopper can compare the same product for different brands, for example, two types of chocolate, bottled water or apples. The price might be the same, but the salt or sugar content or whether it has been locally sourced varies. While much of this information may be available on the food packaging it is often in small print or presented in such a way that it takes ages to find and can be confusing to the shopper. We make it compelling and easy to read off. Some might argue that smartphone apps do the same job. We showed empirically that this is far from the truth; they are often fiddly and tedious to use, and can overwhelm the shopper who is holding their phone in one hand, a product in the other while trying to scan it and navigate a complex store environment, usually in a hurry.

The lambent shopping handle was just one of several new gizmos being filmed intended to make shopping easier and more enjoyable. So, we got to watch Richard Ayoade (the british comedian, actor, writer and TV presenter) in the flesh for the whole morning act out various scenes with the latest gadgetry. When not being filmed, he sat or stood calmly in the store reading a book. He was happy to let me have my photo taken standing next to him. How cool is that?

richard aoyade
Our approach to enhancing shopping is to provide just enough information about certain product properties in order to help shoppers make more informed purchasing decisions. It is lightweight, playful and simple – enticing you to think rather than accept what others recommend. Quite different from much contemporary thinking about how we should use technology which promotes deciding for the user. For example, only this morning I was listening to a programme on Radio 4 about “Silicon Valley’s vision of local high-tech shopping”. The vision was same old, same old. An example of the future was of Jenny walking into a Burger Bistro, where upon her smartphone is recognized by the Point of Sales that then flashes up what she ate last time. The waiter on seeing her and the information about Jenny picks up a plate of fried sweet potato fries and takes it to her table saying in a cheery voice, “Hello Jenny, I thought you would like some of these again!” without asking her. This kind of personalized service is likened to ‘Rockstar treatment’. Just like Justin Beaver or David Beckham never have to decide or ask but always get the food they want. But sometimes even they might want change…

Whereas the likes of PayPal, eBay and other retail companies are pushing for more of this kind of personalisation in restaurants and stores, Isabelle Szmigin, a professor of marketing at Birmingham University, offered a refreshingly sceptical riposte, pointing out that just because Jenny ordered sweet potato fries one day, it does not mean she wants them every time she goes back to the same restaurant. While many of us maybe creatures of habit, most of us crave new experiences, tastes, products and surprises. We don’t want to be stuck with a Groundhog Day mindset. The model of personalized shopping based on your past experiences and purchases is set in the past. High tech retailing needs to break out of the automated recommender way of trying to please and nudge people. We can do much better when thinking of how to enhance shopping and dining experiences with technology.

A brand new Waitrose opened last month in Hove. It is the talk of the town (we have been waiting years for one) and it seems a destination in itself to visit judging by the line of cars queuing up for the car park. My fellow commuter regaled to me how it was the highlight of her weekend. She went with her chum on a Saturday afternoon and sat down at a table in the middle of the store (next to the wine section) and they both ordered a glass of house wine and some tapas. Whilst enjoying their repast, they merrily selected their shopping by tapping icons on a tablet, craftily positioned on their table. A minion then went on their behalf to do their shopping, that was ready for them to collect on their way out. No hassle, no queuing. There is a premium for this service but what a fun way to while away an hour – quaffing while doing online shopping in an actual bricks and mortar supermarket.

Which Sauce?

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sausage-sandwichI’ve started listening to the Danny Baker show on Five Live that goes out on Saturday mornings. The delectable Danny explores everyday topics in his distinctive style; quirky, witty and maundering. You never know where a conversation with a caller might end. He has the knack of moving it in unpredictable and very funny ways. The pièce de résistance is the weekly Sausage Sandwich Game – that is now legendary amongst his fans. A guest (such as a former footballer, or a singer) is invited to answer questions about him or herself that are innocuous but personal – such as when did you last climb a tree (this year, in the last two years or over 10 years ago) or where did you live for the longest when you were a child – on a street, road, lane, close, avenue or other. The kind of unique questions that banks should come up with for their security questions instead of what is your mother’s maiden name or the primary school you went to (since now you can lift that information so easily from Facebook or LinkedIn).

Two call-in contestants are also invited to represent their football team (say Arsenal or Berwick Rangers) and have to guess what the guest would choose as their answer. They have to make their choice based on what they have heard about the guest in the introductory banter.

So, on very little information they have to decide, for example, if the person is a tree climber (and hence climbed up one recently) or even more random, they seem like a person who would have lived on a road rather than an avenue. Having tried to work it out and explain their reasoning the guest then reveals when, where or whatever the answer. Whoever gets the right answer scores a goal. The last question asked is the sausage question – do they take red sauce, brown sauce or no sauce when eating a sausage sarnie. The suspense is brilliantly timed. We hear the clock ticking and then the contestant’s think aloud reasoning behind their choice (e.g. ‘oh she is definitely a brown sauce person, given she is from up north’, or ‘he does not seem like someone who would take any sauce’ so a no-saucer). As Danny says, this question reveals something about a person in ways that an interrogation could never do. The bon homie and self-deprecating humour that exudes from Danny throughout keeps you laughing and looking forward to the next game the following week. It is masterful, phone-in radio.

We often have to guess something about someone else, their likes, dislikes, what presents they might like, writing something witty about them on a ‘miss you’ leaving card, which restaurant or café they would like to meet at, and so on. For many it can be hard work, especially if they don’t know the person that well. There is a mismatch between the individual things we know about a person and the high level categories offered by retail. Buy for him or her; that special present for mum or dad, and so on. What if you could go to an online site and instead answer a few sausage sandwich type questions about a person you need to buy a present for, say a 40th birthday. The underlying system could do some clever pattern matching and suggest something original and unexpected for that person. That would be smart shopping – and entertaining for the shopper instead of being a chore.

Maid in Hong Kong

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hongkonghighrise Hong Kong is now one of the most densely populated cities in the world. Every square inch of the island is made use of and valued like gold. High-rise blocks are squeezed in everywhere, dotting the landscape, that makes me of think of rows of x-rayed teeth – long, close together, uniquely stained but uniform.

It is easy to think you are still in the airport when surfacing via the Express train at Hong Kong station. A vast, multi-leveled shopping mall welcomes you – that looks just like the one you left at the airport. There are rows of expensive boutiques interspersed with ubiquitous phone and electronic goods shops. All enticing and packed with wealthy shoppers.

I had arranged to meet a couple of friends, who are currently living here, outside a Prét-a-Manger (that ready-to-eat sandwich shop with the same fillings everywhere). Rather than drink their frothy coffee from a brown polystyrene cup we chose to go upmarket to a Tea Boutique (sic), called TWG further down the mall (there is also one in the UK based in Harrods). They claim on their website that they “will carry you away on a journey of sensations, spiced with elegant samovars, brass weighing scales, Italian marble floors and hard wood tea counters.” We discovered from the menu that they also serve over 800 different types of tea from all over the world. How surreal is that? I thought there was only posh tea, builder’s tea and herbal tea. It made choosing just one from an endless list of exotic sounding teas nigh on impossible. I was tempted by ‘sexy tea’, ‘desert mirage tea’ and ‘dancing tea’ but in the end selected a Jasmine tea (being in China) that had a few other nice sounding adjectives added to it. Someone in the marketing department must have had a field day.
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After drinking our fine Grand Crus tea we walked out onto one of the many ‘walkways in-the-sky’ – that provide covered spokes to other neighboring high-rise buildings. It was mobbed with Philippine girls, huddled together in small groups, sitting on the concrete, demarcated by makeshift walls made from cardboard boxes. These are the maids of the wealthy and the middle classes. At first glance, it looked like they had set up market stalls but, on closer look, it turns out they have colonized the concrete paths, turning them into temporary living/dining rooms. In each one, you can see them chatting, laughing, sleeping, reading, texting, playing, eating, drinking and grooming – as if in their own homes. This is how they spend their one day off from serving the natives and the ex-pats, bringing with them their umbrellas, blankets, food, drinks, magazines, Scrabble sets, iPads and mobile phones. Because they live in terribly cramped apartment spaces – barely enough room for a bed let alone a kitchen – they decamp to the shopping Mecca’s many arteries to socialize and relax with their fellow maids, against a backdrop of Gucci shoppers and gourmet tea drinkers traversing from one tower block to another. What struck me, was how they had appropriated the cardboard boxes to make their living spaces; the flimsy barriers providing them with just enough height for a level of dignity, privacy and territoriality whilst low enough to be seen and to see. A creative way, indeed, of horizontally inhabiting a vertical city, whose earthly goods are mostly out of their reach.
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Tech Talk

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tedtalk I’ve been invited to give a TED talk in May, admittedly, only a TEDx talk but nevertheless the idea of being on stage talking to 1000s of viewers, potentially millions, is nerve wracking for me. To get me in the picture, I have been watching some of the more popular TED talks already out there. Trouble is, every topic I think about has been presented already, and often very well. Nearly every angle about the good and bad effects of technology has been covered. The key is to make the narrative sound fresh and original and use your own research findings to make the points. Here is my first attempt at an outline.

I want to talk about how smart technology makes us stupid and how simple technology makes us clever. The question is one of framing. Make technologies that do things for us and we forget how to do them ourselves. Design technologies that encourage people to make better decisions in their lives and enable them to be happier, more engaged and empowered.

Every week there is a new book, blog or sound bite that espouses a view on how technology is making us, on the one hand, dumber, shallower, addicted, more alone, and overloaded, while on the other, it is assumed it can make us better informed, more connected, resourceful and more aware. Some argue that it is improving our brains, others that it is destroying our cognitive faculties. It seems many of us can’t write anymore, let alone remember our phone number. And yet a multitude of apps claim they can help us to make snap decisions, be more creative and have richer and more satisfying lives.

An adjective that has been much bandied about, but in my view is well past its sell by date, is ‘smart’. From smart phones to smart cities, smart cars to smart meters, and smart homes to smart grids… Everywhere you look in the tech world, you see smart this, smart that… The list of smart gadgets is mind boggling. There are smart pillows that analyse your sleep and smart shoes that tell you to stop being lazy. There is even a ‘smart dog’ Wandant device that tracks how far your pooch has walked and its stress levels. It claims to be “the world’s first obesity monitoring system for dogs” and, yes, it has a “smart-collar” that uses mobile phone sensor technology to do the monitoring and measuring.
wandant
Tech companies, governments, researchers and the like are all trying hard to make people, the environment and the world smart through these kinds of technologies. But who are they kidding? They are not smart. They don’t think for themselves or walk the dog for you. Somehow we think by using the word smart we have elevated the technology into being clever, intelligent and autonomous. My colleague Adam Greenfield, poignantly noted 7 years ago in his prescient book Everyware: “We simply don’t do smart very well yet.”

Moreover, those that act on our behalf can make us mentally lazy. Gadgets and apps in the form of cognitive aids, mean that we no longer practice certain skills, be they our multiplication tables, our map reading skills or are ability to remember birthdays, numbers or appointments. “I’ve lost my dart’s faculty” I joked to a colleague the other day, when trying to work out how much a meal split three ways would cost each of us. There is a worry that our increasing reliance on GPS/satnav to tell us where to go will mean we lose the ability to read proper maps – most of us only use ones with cars and people icons that jump along yellow moving road lines. How many of know how to use a compass? There is also the problem that we may soon lose our ability to remember numbers, lists, birthdays and so on. Gone are the days of reciting.

So why does the relentless move to make technology smart persist? An article published last month in the Wall Street Journal by Evgeny Morozov, cleverly entitled “is smart making us dumb?’ splits technologies into bad smart and good smart. Bad smart includes gizmos that suppress behaviours that are considered undesirable, such as vibrating forks that tell us to not to eat so quickly, cars that tell us to drive slower because it is raining and toothbrushes that tell us to brush our teeth more. Good smart leaves us in control of our actions and where gadgets are designed to empower by providing the right kind of information at the right time – just enough to nudge us in the right direction. I was pleased to see that Evgeny Morozov mentioned one of our projects as an example of good smart – where we developed the lambent shopping handle that is intended to enhance decision-making by informing shoppers of the nutritional benefits and food miles (or other dimension someone cares about) using simple LEDs and smiley faces, representing social norms. Instant information presented in a playful and useful way. No overloading, no pressure and no atrophying of the brain. As our tongue in cheek video below shows it boils down to designing simple interfaces that can facilitate fast and frugal decision-making. Our philosophy is less is more and simple is powerful. That is how you can make people clever.

Barking Service

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I visited WHSmith again at an airport terminal. This time it was at T5, Heathrow, on my way to New York. I had quite a different experience, however, from my previous visit through Gatwick South. Instead of everyone queuing for the human-operated tills, they were all swiping away at the self-service checkout ones. The way the store had been designed led you to the bank of automated tills and the assistant (I swear he was the same one I saw at Gatwick) herded them in with an arm stretched out – shielding the only manned till at the back of the store from view. I held my head high, ignored his arming tactics and walked straight to the human till (there was no queue) and handed my magazine over to the human assistant to scan.

Meanwhile, behind me was a cacophony of bleeps, and Siri-sounding voices – “please insert your card, please press cancel, please don’t do anything I tell you not to but do make sure you pay. Have a nice day…” bleep, bleep, bleep!!

The young lad behind the till ‘transactioned’ me, and I put my credit card in the box machine and while waiting for it to be accepted, asked him how he coped with the incessant automated voices in front of him. He looked at me, and said “oh that, it is easy. You just tune out. You have to, otherwise, you would go insane.”

But then he added, “what really bothers me is the air con above.”

I looked up and saw a large white box shuddering and bleating, hovering overhead.

“It keeps blasting out cold air and after an hour my hands are completely white. Freezing. The noise is pretty bad but the cold, it gets to you.”

I wanted to reach out there and then and rub his hands together. White finger syndrome is not pleasant – especially 8 hours of it every day.

Meanwhile Mr Frogmarch continued to smugly cordon off the air con zone coercing people towards the automated barking voices. The machines continued chirpily their non-stop chatter with obliging but more often frustrated customers.

I thanked Mr White Finger profusely for his humanity and wished him well but refrained from saying ‘have a nice day’.

It wont be long now before real shop assistants will be a thing of the past. There will only be human marshals populating our stores, patronizing those who deign to make a mistake at the alter of the all-seeing Almighty Computer.

Athlete’s Dressing

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Nike’s online and bricks and mortar stores have always been at the leading edge of technological innovation. They have experimented with new cinematic, media user experiences; pioneered customer design, and encouraged users to creatively personalize their own pair of trainers through selecting from a digital palette of options.

We entered their new physical store in the sparkling, mega-shopping mall, Westfield East in the heart of Stratford City, with anticipation. The spacious, two-story, store did not disappoint. It was immaculately dressed – not just the windows but throughout the interior. We were immediately confronted by a cast of larger-than-life, headless male mannequins; clad in tight, white Nike underwear and GB football tops. They were very sexy-looking, triggering a primordial urge to kick a bulging football. The clever marketing people had lined up many brightly, coloured ones in the vicinity.

Ktchung.

Further back in the store, we spotted more headless mannequin models, but this time female, wearing top-to-toe black gear with shocking-pink, running shoes.

They make me want to run very fast.

The sports gear for sale was hanging on dinky things or neatly piled on back-lit surfaces that made you want to touch, hold and wear it. I am not a Nike fan – it would be a bit like mutton dressed as lamb – but after a few minutes of enjoying the eyewear candy, was easily able to see a younger version of myself encased in the latest tick logo, techno-coloured attire. It was all, too, seductive. I commented to one of my companions what a contrast it was from the jumble sale piles that are now commonplace in the cheap and cheerful ‘made in China’ labeled high street shops.

As my eyes continued hoovering the clothing spread, I was surprised by the lack of any TV or other digital screens. We’d noticed how in every other shop there are multiple vivid, large screens embedded in the walls – attracting and luring passers-by with swaggering, pouting beauties. Nike seems to have gone retro: letting its tops, bottoms and shoes walk the talk.

Having feasted on the first floor, we rode up the steep yellow-lit escalator for dessert. Our by now, large-pupil-ed eyes were drawn to an enormous cloud of bright orange shoe boxes, hanging at different heights over the edge of the escalator – they glowed in semi-darkness, giving you a warm feeling.

I eventually turned around, and at last spotted two tiny touch screens, discreetly placed on a back wall, next to a modest-sized flat screen, that flashed up images of Nike running gear. A direct feed from their website; blurring clicks and mortar. We walked up to them and behaved like toddlers; finger-tipping the screen, assuming it was us that were cycling through the images of watches, runners and visualizations.

Out of the blue, a human being appeared besides us, wearing a big badge saying ‘Athlete Michael’. It seemed as if he had just transmogrified from our screens, clad in the latest Nike running gear – black tights, baggy shorts, pyro-technic trainers and an assortment of layered, lurid tunics and vests. We all stared at him, fixated by his badge, wondering if he was really real and who he was. He began by patiently explaining how nearly every Nike running shoe now has a chip in it and when Blue-toothed to a wristwatch transforms the running experience. This unlikely combo has become a huge success among joggers and runners over the years; enabling them to see on the go how many calories they are burning, number of steps taken, and, with the deluxe-iPod GPS combo – even the route taken, when they are slowing down or speeding up, how much sweat they are dripping, etc.

Athlete Michael got into his stride, as we cooed and nodded, marveling at Nike. He liked the wristwatch best because he can see at a glance how many x’s he is doing and how it is really easy to download this onto the Nike running website and see how his x’s are faring compared with the rest of the world’s Nike joggers.

For some reason, I was reminded of the TV commercial for UK’s Directory Enquiries service 118 118, that features men parodying different sports gear costumes to the Ghostbuster’s tune.

Rather than walking away Niked, I was left with an irritating ditty repeating itself in my head. Maybe a big video screen might have worked better on me.