oneux | designing experiences

Life at the airport

Alain de Botton’s done it again. The author, cultural commentator, and philosopher-cum-ethnographer has just published his new book: ‘A week at the airport: A Heathrow Diary’, offering a unique, I hope, insight into the fascinating world of air travel. As Heathrow’s writer in residence, de Botton spent a week at terminal 5 at Heathrow observing, commenting and reflecting on the world of travel. More on this soon as I am expecting the book to arrive in the post in the next few days.

an ethnographer's view of the workplace

I am sure Alain de Botton would not mind being called an ethnographer. The philosopher/writer/cultural commentator delves into the everyday of our working lives in The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work, his new book.

Why ethnography? Well, it is because the book is a treatise on the seemingly ordinary, with de Botton interrogating and looking for hidden meanings in what we all have grown accustomed to and hardly notice anymore. More when I finish reading it.

visualising data on gestalten.tv

I came across an interview on gestalten.tv with the guys behind of Data flow , a 'comprehensive compilation of infographics from around the world',as Nicolas Bourquin one of the two editors put it. If the video of the interview is anything to go by this is certainly a must read.

You can also subscribe to gestalten.tv via iTunes.

books on mobiles

The Japanese have done it again. They managed to take downloadable books and make a €57m business out of them. As reported in April's Monocle, downloadable novels have proved a massive success in Japan while sales of traditional books keep falling.
So how did they manage to make reading novels on tiny mobile phone screens the in thing to do in Japan?
Apart from the fact that over 75% of the population own a mobile phone and subscribers in Japan have been surfing the internet for years - i-mode after all is a Japanese invention - there are certain elements of the service that have made the user experience not simply bearable but exciting:

• Content written with the medium in mind. No more long and complicated sentences. The novels are written specifically for mobile phones. Sentences are kept short and dialogues are preferred to long descriptive paragraphs.
• Brief reading. Novels are provided in installments and are brief enough to be read during the morning commute.
• Overcome cultural taboos. Some novels contain erotic elements catering for women who would otherwise be embarrassed to buy such titles from a bookstore.
• Easy payment. No credit cards are required since charges are added to users' mobile phone bills.

Well there you have it... a  prime example of how a service can be successful if it is designed around customers' needs. So, Shakespeare on your Nokia anyone?