Funkins! - 10/31/2009

Since it's Halloween I suppose I could do a blog about something related to the holiday. Apparently these have been out for a while, but I've never seen them; a plastic pumpkin called a Funkin. A Funkin is basically just a plastic pumpkin that can be decorated better(?) than regular pumpkins. They come in various shapes and sizes and even pre-made "classic" pumpkin carvings. The real up-side is that there is no mess to clean up, other than some plastic pieces, and it can last as long as you want it to. They are also somewhat pricey with a regular sized pumpkin coming in at $20. But hey, if you re-use it the next 10 years then you'll make your money back! Unfortunately it isn't bio-degradable and that could set some people off of it. Now I've seen the foam pumpkins before, and I'm guessing that this is pretty much the same thing, and people can get some really crazy designs with them. Before you know it they'll have pumpkins that can have LED animations programmed into them, with speakers and all. Something along the lines of..."Go to our website to BUY and download new realistic pumpkin animations! It'll be like it's alive!" Ohhh yeah, can't wait.

Candy and its many forms...

Candy has always been in different shapes to appeal to people that eat them, but almost always are aimed at children. On stupid.com they are selling gum shaped as different digital devices and call it “Digital Candy Gum”. They have cds, video games, handheld devices, computer mice, keyboards, and cameras. I’m sure they care about the taste, but the main point of it is to make money off of the kids who use these devices every day and think, “Oh wow, this is awesome!” I’ve worked at CVS for the past 2 years and I’ve seen my share of crazy candy. They had Wiimote pez dispensers last year and this Halloween we even got mini board games contained inside boxes of candy. In a couple months they’ll have those little nasty chalk hearts for all the lovebirds out there to buy. So we have candy made for whatever is popular, candy that “talks” to you, and candy with games. What’s next? How about something along the lines of the wonderball idea except it’s a magic 8 ball. I have yet to see one and really don’t think it would be smart to make, but man would it be cool. We’ll just wait and see what the oompa loompas come up with next.

Mighty Mouse - October 21

A couple of days ago Apple unveiled a whole truckload of new products that they're releasing including this multi-touch, buttonless, wheel-less mouse. It works like this. You simply click something just push down on the top left of the mouse, to right click push down on the top right. Need to scroll down? Just run your finger down the mouse and it will scroll, same with side to side. Something that really sets it apart that other mice don't have the capability of doing is the full 360 degree scroll which you can do by moving your finger in a circular motion. This will make it easier to work with large photos or files that have a size much larger than the window it's in. To zoom in, hold the control key and run your finger up or down the mouse to zoom in and out respectively. And if you don't like any of those features you can just stick with the good ol point and click. And lefties don't need to worry, left and right click can be switched around and customized.

Sounds great huh?! Well it doesn't seem very practical, especially to someone who doesn't usually use a mac. I don't really understand how it's easier to move your finger in an unnatual motion down the mouse to scroll than to use a scroll wheel. This way makes it seem like you almost have to lift your hand up, especially if you don't have the most nimble of hands. While I do think that superscroll feature is pretty cool, how useful will it really be to someone who doesn't work with editing programs? I would hate to be playing a game, accidently make that motion, and all of a sudden I have my grenade out with the pin pulled because I accidently touched the top left to set my hand back down. The lack of feedback is going to absolutely destroy people's experience using this. People are used to instant feed back when they use a computer, if there isn't any then SOMETHING must be wrong. Think about how hard it would be to use a keyboard that was completely touch based, and the only feedback you got was on the screen. This mouse is made for anyone but a normal user. Yes it may lead to better designs, I really truly hope it does, but please leave us the buttons until then.