Sorry ? Okay , everybody all set to start the meeting ? Okay , we've got half an hour for this one  to  discuss the  functional design . project manager:  so hopefully you've all been working away , and I've put the minutes of the last meeting in the project folder .  kind of  got to know each other a little bit and  got familiar with all the equipment and started to discuss  a bit about the project , you know , cost-wise how much how much money we had to s  just want to tell you that you have three new requirements , which is the The first one is that   the company's decided that teletext is outdated  because of how popular the internet is . Nobody uses teletext very much anymore , so we don't really need to consider that in the functionality of the of the remote control . project manager:  they've also suggested that we  we only use the remote control to control the television , not the V_C_R_ , D_V_D_ or anything else . I think the worry is that if the project becomes too complex then it'll affect  how long it takes us to get it into into production , the time to market . So  , we're just gonna keep it simple and it'll just control the T_V_ . project manager: And the other thing was that the company want the corporate colour and slogan to be implemented in the new design . marketing: And the slogan , like the actual written slogan , or just to embody the idea of the slogan ? project manager: Well that's the thing , I'm I'm not sure   th because on the the company website ,  what does it say  something marketing: 'Bout putting the fashion in electronics . project manager: Yeah ,  do they Is that something they want actually written on it , 'cause it's quite long . So those are the three things , just not to worry about teletext ,  only control the T_V_ , and  and  incorporate the  colour and slogan of the company .  so is everybody okay with any of that , or do you want me to recap at all ? industrial designer: Nope , we're all set . user interface: Alright  , can I st steal this from the back of your laptop ?  project manager: Oh yeah , of course , yeah .  Right to do the  the design I have I've had a look online , I've had a look at the homepage , which has given us  some insp inspiration from previous products . user interface:  I've had a look at the previous products to see what they offer and  I would like to ask you guys for  your ideas about the design at the end of the meeting . user interface: having a look at the existing products , I found out that  it tends to come in sort of two extremes , there's either  a very complicated one that's got lots of buttons , lots of colours , very confusing , you don't know what you're doing . That one's perg and that one's prog , and it doesn't really tell you what it does . It's got only the basic functions  but  it's the same size as the the hard to use one .  so I believe the the advanced functions should maybe be hidden in a drawer , or something like tha from the bottom of it . marketing: M yeah , like a lot of a lot of what I've  read and prepared for this meeting fits in really closely with what with what Craig's just gone over . So in part I could I could give you some of my personal preferences but I could also th add some to this which is just about sort of  sort of market research . marketing: But anyway , project manager: Shall we sh well we'll stick to kind of your area for now . industrial designer: Which which is the clunky one , the one on left or on the right?. marketing:  clunky in what sense , like  h heavier ? Larger ? user interface:  I think it's supposed to be the same size , but  it's got much fewer buttons . It's , you know , it's very spread out marketing: I see , so it's more just basic .  like the one on the left looks quite  quite complicated , and that P_R_T_ p P_R_O_T_ thing is incredibly confusing .  so I see I see why yo you know you might prefer the simpler design , but yeah you don't want to lose out on , you know , what it does , so maybe you know marketing: project manager: you know you get a lot of remote controls where you kind of flip the thing open , industrial designer: project manager: I think that's a good idea . user interface: do we have any functions that  we'd want on it ? marketing: user interface:  so far I've got  on and off ,  switch the channel up and down , and put the volume up and down . user interface:  they're just the the very basics you could use for a T_V_ .  , you say that's a h a required one or a requested one ? Would you like marketing: Which was that ? user interface:  the channels like the the numbers on thing ,  marketing: Up the numbers , or the up down ? project manager: God , I wou I would say that's required , marketing: project manager:  there's no way anybody's gonna buy a remote control these days when if you can't actually individually select channels , marketing: Yeah . project manager: what else ,  So don't need to worry about teletext , marketing: project manager: don't need to worry about V_C_R_ ,  any kind of like display controls at all do you think we need to worry about , marketing: We don't ? No ? project manager: you know like brightness and contrast ? marketing: Yeah . Well I think I think es essentially what we're doing right now is we're categorising . We're saying well we want this to be a product that offers all the sort of more tricky features but we want them to be in another area ? project manager:  . marketing: We're kind of like sorting them an Or are we actually eliminating things we just don't want the product to have ? user interface:  project manager: I think are you are you maybe kind of thinking what we absolutely have to have and what would be nice ? user interface: to start with  sort of a bit both ,  we need to find out exactly what we have to have project manager: Well , do you wanna maybe just , at this point decide on what we absolutely must have as a p as a function of this . project manager: so so far , just to recap you've got volume and channel control and marketing: Yep . user interface: There's  on and off ,  volume and channel , and skip to certain channels with the numbers .  marketing: Well , one one way I would look at this  would be that we a approach the different controls in terms of  like control types , so that for the user it's very clear what they want to do where they go . marketing:  and also think maybe a little bit about sorta w w what would just wanna be acc easily accessible . project manager: Oka marketing: For example if we had audio controls , those could be something people set up very rarely . Maybe they're un they're they're they're in a little area but covered up  , project manager: marketing: things like channel and volume  are used all the time , so we just have them right out on top ,  very just very sort of self-explanatory .  so maybe we need to think about having three or more groupings of controls , you know like one which are just the the habitual ones that should be right within your natural grip . project manager:  well , just to to wrap up quickly on this this little section Have I just lost Oh no .  ,  do you think maybe that's the only kind of  essential requirements , and then maybe just things that would be nice if it could do would be things like audio set up and display set up and things like that , maybe like a mute button , that sort of thing . project manager:  okay , industrial designer: project manager: if we can move on to next presentation then please . project manager: Do you wanna user interface: Do you want to switch places ? marketing: Can this can this pl reach ? Can this plug come across ? industrial designer: No . marketing: Here , I'll just Why don't I just user interface: Just just switch them . marketing:  er , can you go up behind me ? Kinda This is so This project manager: bit complicated . It'd be nice if everything was wireless , wouldn't it ? marketing: I'm all in a knot now . So I can I can say already , I dunno whether this is for good or for bad but there'll be a lot of kind of  redundancy in the in the the issues and the the  the things . marketing: Which is ma not necessarily a bad thing , but may what I've already started doing is cr I created a slide in in my presentation here so  so that we kind of think well what's the cumulative effect of what we've taken from your ideas and and mine , because certainly I I have a hard time separating separating things completely . marketing: Obviously obviously what you've just told me what you've just told me impacts a lot on what  like market research  that that I've been project manager: Okay . marketing: So how do I how do I get this up ? industrial designer:  function F_ eight . Just  Before I bring this up what I'll just say is  what I've what I've done is tried to collect some information so that I can then relay this to to you guys so that it's now becomes a collective thing . And then kind of lead us in the direction of deciding , 'kay what what are our options , what should we decide and do you know what  , so . So  does that make sense ? So what I basically got is I just looked into some information and sort of th tried to think about how how we could review it and how we could and what kind of decisions we could take away from it and then maybe by the end of just looking at some of these things we can think about what are our priorities . So  I'm thinking here about  primarily about customer needs , that we start with the customer , and w you know , what they want and what are issues with with  existing products .  to think about trends and also about try and connect that as you see with the company vision which is about fashion in electronics .  and then , as I say  w we'd like to prioritise our design features from this and  project manager: industrial designer: Bouncing on top . marketing: So this is what I've found here ,  a lot of this is new to me , so we'll just read through together .  the vast majority would spend more money for it to look fancy as well , we'll see later , the vast majority would spend more money for  slightly more intuitive control , such as voice recognition . So I guess what we're looking at here is people want this h technology , they tend to use the most simple controls and overall they find remote controls to be something they don't doesn't really appeal to them . marketing: So I think what we're doing is we're trying to take like if for me this is sorta like three different different  inspirations , you know , one is that we want  something that's high-tech but we want it to seem easy . And in spite of the primitive side of it and the very high-tech side , we want it to just be an appealing piece of equipment in people's hands . This is  why I mention when Craig was  showing us some ideas that we actually try and group controls , so d it doesn't just look like a big panel , kinda like when you you look at , you know , a new computer keyboard , or something that is quite explanatory . industrial designer: Is installing a new remote control something that people marketing: no , that did not come up at all . And and again here as we sort of move m sort of thin start thinking about how we wanna sell and market this , I think a recurring theme here is the company wants it to be wants us to make something that's fashionable and sleek and trendy . marketing:  people  additionally aren't aren't liking the appearance of their products , so we wanna think about as we take all the sort of the techie features how we can  put that into a unit which is which people like . marketing: Yeah , so you know just c looking at what what Craig  Craig's i  ideas are s sorta tell me that maybe what we wanna do is try and  separate the different things that we wanna include in this . So if we do say well we want there to be all the technology will we try and make that almost be like optional technology . You know , it's like like I find a lot of T_V_s these days , something really like about 'em is if you wanna just turn 'em on and off you can , but they have little panels where you click and there's just like tons of features you go through . That's s that's sort of the  But I I'm my hope here is that I'm putting out this information so that we can then say okay , well how do we collectively move on with it . marketing:  I I haven't brought out one specific marketing idea , although my sense is that what we should try and think about is what are the current trends in materials and shapes and styles , and then use that . marketing: So Alright ? Any  comments on all of that ? project manager: Well ,  one of the things that we have to decide on by the end of the meeting is who we're gonna be  who's our our target audience , our target market . marketing: That's  project manager: so if we want something that that looks good and is easy to use , but has y is fairly powerful product , whatever , who do we really want to aim that at ? marketing: Yeah . Well i if if like twenty five Euro is our is our selling price then you can imagine , marketing: Yeah . project manager: well I don't I'm not really sure how much that will retail at . project manager: But you want it's somebody who's not gonna just use the remote that comes with their telly , I suppose , they're gonna actually go out and buy one . industrial designer: I think it'll be the mid range to the high end market , in terms of people . 'Cause twenty five Euros for a remote , how much is that lo locally in pounds ? project manager: It's about sixteen , seventeen pounds , I think . industrial designer: Is that too is that a lot of money to buy an extra remote or a replacement remote ? project manager: Yeah , marketing: industrial designer:  so maybe not the high end range , but maybe middle , middle up-ish . industrial designer: You know how much ? I dunno I guess you pay , what , ten ten quid for a remote ? project manager: Okay .  if you lost your remote and the first thing you just wanna go out and get , project manager: Yeah . industrial designer: would you how much would you pay ? marketing: This this kinda touches on your comments there , David . marketing: and these are this is a table of h what people would pay more for a certain feature . project manager: Okay marketing: Just gives us a rough idea of where the w the will to spend money on T_V_ equipment is . project manager: Yeah , so do you think we're we're aiming at a fairly young market then ? industrial designer: Yep . user interface:  project manager:  do you think then  voice recognition is something we should really seriously consider ? What what do you think , Craig ? user interface: Well , did you not say it was the the adults that were going for the the voice recognition ? Sort of the the older group . user interface:  f marketing: It does it does fit with the market that we're sort of identifying , project manager: N yeah . marketing: in terms of project manager: I think we are gonna have to narrow it down , to say let's target these people and give them what they want marketing: Okay . project manager: and 'cause you know , there needs to be some kind of selling point to it . project manager: Just kind of young professionals ,  th like if we are going to include speech recognition , it's kind of between fifteen and thirty five seems to be like a really high response to that . industrial designer: I I think twenty five to thirty five is is is fair to add that in as a group as well project manager: Yeah . industrial designer: because that's more than half your group of people who are willing to at least try and use your technology . project manager: You know , they have bit of expendable income to spend on this sort of thing . industrial designer: I think perhaps that age group is significant as well because those are people who use the computer , marketing: industrial designer: I think people who are maybe about I wouldn't say thirty five , marketing: industrial designer: but people who are about forty-ish and above now would not be so dependent and reliant on a computer or a mobile phone or something like that . industrial designer: So these are people who are gadgety , right ? project manager: So marketing: industrial designer: People who are u growing up used to , you know in schools and in universities , project manager: Yeah . industrial designer: when you go on to their working lives , people who would you know regular project manager: Yeah . project manager:  okay , so  industrial designer: project manager: so shall we make the decision  to include speech recognition marketing: If we can . industrial designer: I I think one thing we should try not to avoid is not to say we have to use speech recognition right now , project manager: if we can . industrial designer: because  , based on what you've go y everybody's saying , right , you want something simple . Why is that ? industrial designer: You want basic stuff and you want something that's easy to use . marketing: Could it be an on off thing ? industrial designer: marketing: Like if you want it on industrial designer: but what I'm saying is that we're we're trying to lock ourselves into a s particular kind of technology , project manager: Where you can activate it and deactivate it ? marketing: Yeah . industrial designer: rather than focusing on on exactly what are the features that we're gonna say , and then , you know , say speech recognition is good for this , speech recognition is not good for this . industrial designer: anyway it's a it's something that can be used to fulfil a function , but at end of the day we don't look at the technology , but we look at the function first . project manager:  might have been a good idea to all deliver our presentations and then discuss , but this is this is how we're marketing: Yeah , it's good well it's good to get ideas out while they're fresh in mind . marketing:  project manager: Oh it's something that's just occurred to me as well is if we make it  speech reco if we incorporate speech recognition , that's appealing to people  maybe with a physical disability as well . marketing: like we're kind of what we're b sort of getting in into here is mating different  design features together project manager: marketing: that they user interface: I reckon one problem with speech recognition is  I've actually seen one of them used and  the technology that was in that one wasn't particularly amazing , so you end up yelling at the control for hours . project manager: Do you think maybe we need like further advances in that kind of area until it's worthwhile incorporating it though ? user interface:  I think it'd probably quite expensive to put in .  I guess I try to define like what we're doing now , try to define what we're trying to get done . industrial designer: We've used it , we're familiar with it , but we're we can't n we haven't narrowed down  exactly what the things we're trying to fulfil , like Besides the basics , I think back in the back of our minds we know what the basics are . Has to change channels , has to change volume , but in like specifics , right , which one of the basics are you trying to target .  are there certain parts of the basics that are more important or less important than the basics ? marketing: industrial designer:  and I just the idea is just to get everybody to  I usually have a have have a design that's there as a basic , so , you know , things that to start everything going . But I guess everybody does have some idea , so I don't think  there's a need for that . industrial designer: from the basic technology point of view , the basic steps that you need  in the diagram and in this slide probably works better . industrial designer:  and that power source is important because it ties you down to  how long the device will last . That might be constrained because that you might need to power a microphone , you might need to power other things , so that's one perhaps constraint there .  Th Okay , the basic thing is there's a user interface where people punch a button or talk into it or smile to it or blink their eyes , whatever . industrial designer: You know , and that  picks up an input from a user ,   a logic a series of logic has to decide what the user is telling the device , and the device has to r you know , based on you push button A_ , so I will do something with button A_ . industrial designer:  and then it needs to be able to send the signal out to the device itself which is the receiver here . It's fairly general ,  and I guess the purpose of this is also not to restrict you in in the way you're thinking , project manager: industrial designer: like  voice recognition , right , if it's something which is important then we just add more power rather than having a thing that we don't have enough power . industrial designer: but  these are functionally , you know , the base , marketing: industrial designer: I think we should maybe you you wanna go back to what the functions are ? I think that's more relevant to a discussion ? project manager:  . project manager: Well , do you wan do you wanna finish up your your whole presentation then ? marketing: Sure . Ps Oh , it's just putting the rest of it into words , but it's essentially the same thing . marketing: And like on the means b industrial designer: I guess this would be marketing: Since we're on the topic of the technology ,  are there any like what are our options ? industrial designer: Yep . marketing: Alright , what's what i in Is this the only way that we go about it , or are there other thin industrial designer: these these aren't technology options in that sense . industrial designer: For example , if you needed  if you needed to add  a voice recognition , right , then your user interface would be split , project manager: industrial designer: but I think the basic functions are the logic , the transmitter ,  and the receiver , okay , project manager: industrial designer:  and those are things that based on what your user interface requires then we'll add more functionality to it . industrial designer:  there might be one other consideration which would be that the the transmission between the remote control and the T_V_ for example . industrial designer: Okay ,  are we gonna restrict ourselves to using the traditional technologies of infra-red thing ? project manager: Okay . project manager: Well well a worry that was was expressed in the new requirements was that if we made this too complex it would e it would effect  how long how long it took us to get this to market , so I th suspect it might be a good idea just to restrict our kind of our creative influence on this on the user interface and not worry so much about  how we transmit it industrial designer: Yep . project manager:  because  it it's tried and tested intra-red , so we could stay with tha industrial designer: There might be one other problem with the transmission ,  in particular right now , since we're talking about voice recognition .  if somebody's gonna h talk to the device , you ideally want them to hold it to them . industrial designer: it's something very natural , I guess , you know , to hold it , to signal to the user , project manager: Yeah , industrial designer: Then you need to send the signal out , so because if you're using infra-red , the line of sight  say the T_V_'s at that chair , and I'm standing in front of here and the transmitter is here , it blocks it . industrial designer: but it's something which you may have to think about later on in the process .  does c is our controller is it have the option of being  on a standard  frequency as all of the other equipment , so that the one controller can control several pieces of equipment ? industrial designer: There's there's not much specific specific information , project manager: W industrial designer: but I think that  one indication of infra-red mean that you're just targeting traditional devices . project manager: In the new requirement spec they said just to focus on the T_V_ , industrial designer: marketing: Just to T_V_ , okay . project manager: is it worth considering like having like a charging unit as opposed to just regular batteries ?  is that something we really want to go into , do you think , industrial designer: There's a there's project manager: or should we just consider running on regular batteries ? industrial designer: Okay , from from a from a component point of view there's added complexity , and you add cost to it , project manager: -huh . marketing: project manager: Okay , industrial designer:  and most users are very f use already used to the idea of buying batteries and putting it into the controller . industrial designer: But unless the controller's gonna consume a lot of batteries , like he's gonna run through like twenty batteries a month , project manager: Yeah . industrial designer: then I don't think rechargeable is something we should you know , we really need to care about . So basically the  I'm just gonna just recap  what I said at the start , was that  the the whole point of this meeting was to f absolutely finalise who we're gonna aim this at , industrial designer: project manager: and what exactly the product's gonna do . project manager: Are we all happy about the idea of  aiming the product at  the fifteen to thirty five bracket ?  and also the funct the the actual functions of what it's gonna do . project manager: user interface: I think we just say that it was gonna be the the most basic stuff possible . marketing: And is it going to include any of the  the more advanced features , or are we gonna eliminate those ? user interface:  I think we include mute , but apart from that  I think we just we'll go for the simpleness . R is it is it is it s is it not an option still that we include some things just as a sort of under like sort of under a door or some project manager: Yeah , it's as optional functions . marketing: 'Cause what what I'm I'd be a bit worried about is if someone was h had previously developed habits of expecting to control surround sound or this and that with their controller and then and then they , you know , w they get ours and w it's doesn't have that . industrial designer: Another thing that you were saying about categorising the controls ?  maybe I could suggest we we break them down into three simple categories . industrial designer:  this may not map very well to advanced functionality especially , but I think that  from a manufacturer's point of view , from a person designing the device , marketing: Yeah . industrial designer: but I think from a point of view of a person using the device , you know a T_V_ is something they see and something they hear , project manager: industrial designer:  it's something they do other things to like turn it on and turn it off .  like so what we could have is like three buckets , right , where we could throw things into , project manager: Yeah . project manager: industrial designer: like if we want this feature , let's throw it into there , and then from there decide whether it's basic , or it's non-basic .  so  I guess just to just to confirm that we know what we're doing in the next well in the thirty minutes after lunch anyway , marketing: industrial designer: project manager:  for  our Industrial Designer , you're gonna be thinking about the components concept .  User Interface Designer gonna be thinking about our user interface , and marketing you're gonna be thinking about trend watching . So  I dunno , just just to to ask now if you've got anything else you've thought about while we've been talking . Andrew ? marketing:  yeah , just I just wanted to ask then before we wrap up , shall we agree for sake of  sort of clarity and when we when we r resume that we'll u use this idea David's proposed , where we think of these three sort of buckets and anything anything we discuss about them is sort of , okay , we're talking about this . user interface:  just about the three buckets ,  what would go in the the device functions one ? industrial designer:  things like on off . Because the on off also goes , you know , like on off like power , not on off sound . Although you don't turn off the video on your T_V_ , but  you might wanna you know turn off the sound , project manager: Okay . industrial designer: say you wanna pick up the phone , there's a mute button , right , so you you have you have a choice of putting it on to  others or a device . project manager: Okay , so you're gonna have  audio which is gonna be like you know your bass settings and actual volume hi marketing: project manager: Okay ,  marketing: And then k I suppose quite likely what would happen is in the d device category there might be some which are just like the habitual standard and then others which are maybe a bit more industrial designer: Like random which we have no other place to put , but we need it somewhere there . industrial designer:  even even if it doesn't map very clearly what happens is that people at least have some in their mind . industrial designer: It's easy to use , I think that's one thing that  and I guess from the component point of view it's easy to build as well project manager: Okay . project manager:  so yeah , I guess just things to think about are you know like the fact it's gotta look good , industrial designer: project manager: because of who we're we're , you know , targeting this at


industrial designer: 'S to do now is to decide how to fulfil what your stuff is , marketing: Yeah . project manager: Okay , well marketing: It kinda does make sense , doesn't it , because when we get into the end of meeting we're kind of talking about action and design as opposed to background . project manager: Well how  on the in this meeting then if we  I'll just just recap on the minutes from the last meeting . project manager: and we decided that it was gonna be non-rechargeable battery-powered , that we're gonna group our audio-visual and other functions into into those categories ,  . And I told you guys about the three new requirements about ignoring teletext , ignoring everything except the T_V_ , and trying to incorporate the the  corporate colour and slogan .  so if we have the three presentations , and then if you have anything to kind of that you know you're gonna want to discuss , maybe just make a note of it , and we'll have all the discussion at the end . project manager: And so if we start off  with Andrew and then Craig and then David , marketing: Okay .  what did  how did we leave it with speech recognition now ? We did we say we were gonna try maybe incorporate it but we hadn't made a definite decision on that ? industrial designer: Oh I should also point out that  the you know the kind of final objective of this meeting is to reach a decision on the concepts of the product .  basically what I wanna do here , before we get into it  too far , is I want to show you all the background information I have that I think we need to acknowledge if we want this to be successful . marketing: And  and then sorta g go through some of the way that I've dealt with that information , and then sort of bring us all together into it to see sorta see how this fits in with the overall vision .  so I've tried to take a whole lot of market research and summarise it for us , and then ide identify  trends that are are sort of in sync and are important to our our  p project plan that we have so far , and then  initiate a kind of discussion on design options so that it sorta helps us to to narrow in on on aspects that will inform other  other elements of the of the project . marketing: I thought that that will impact on the rest of what we do , so that's why I suggested we get in this . marketing: Okay so out of  different  figures and ratings ob  of people in general ,  consumers in general , the number one thing that was found was that  the br t television remote control , a fancy look and feel , okay , and not , it specified , not a functional look or or feel ,  b f f fancy . marketing:  however , this is where we kinda have to be very , I think , creative about it . Okay so that tells me that we have to find a way to be innovative without a adding just unnecessary  sort of functional bits to it .  and third priority  for ease of use , so again that kind of gives us a general picture of how it has to be ,  quite user friendly while still having technology . So it I'll just say right away as a bit of a foreshadowing into how we proceed with this in terms of m marketing , is that I think  what we should think about is how the  about how the innovation  contributes to the look and feel , and not so much to the functionality of it . marketing: For example like when you pick it up and push it like it all lights up or something , you know what  , like , or it's got something else to it that just seems innovative project manager: -huh . So how do you make innovation make something more more easy to use ? Well that's I guess where we're gonna go with this . marketing: Okay then there's the other aspect of the back the the market  research I have here is on fashion style , okay , which as we've agreed is a priority .  top European fashion trend  that I read about says there's this emerging theme of fruit and vegetables , okay , industrial designer: project manager: marketing: especially in clothes and furniture . And when I first saw that I thought  , well do we want to actually try and think about this trend and how we add something to it , or we get right into it , or we completely steer away from it , project manager: Okay okay . marketing: do you know what  ? So my my feeling is that we w do want to observe this trend , but we want to think also about the fact that it sort of has to fit in with something which is not specifically electronics .  'cause I think what we're in what we're in is partly sort of home decor , partly something like a computer ,  so I think we might wanna be careful about how you know how quickly we create like a remote control in the shape of an apple or something , project manager: marketing: I think that would be pushing it . industrial designer: marketing: And then in terms of m material trends are for things to be soft and spongy and sort of , you might say ergonomic or or friendly to handle , which is which also in indicated that last year this was this was not the case . So  probably a lot of the competition on the market will be still in last year's mode , so if we try and really capitalise on that , I think that'll be in our favour .  innovative design technology's also a must in that it's seen it'd be seen to be  cutting edge ,  but ease of use t has to be insured throughout . And then at the end there are vibrant natural colours  that's the way I interpreted it anyway , softness in materials , shape , and function , and so I've written at written at the bottom to give us sort of a context of discussion , Mac iPods , project manager: marketing: something which is , I'd have to say very high-tech , ten gigabytes , whatever , but when you hold it in your hand there's like no buttons . marketing: You know what a Mac iPod is ? I'm thinking however Mac iPod is sort of last year's because it's very hard and sort of glassy and glossy , so I'm thinking if we imagine that we're taking some of the features of a Mac iPod and we're then making it s more of like a more of like a comfortable type of or more of like a maybe more vibrant to friendly thing to have .  and then so this is w with all that information what I'm what I'm suggesting in this slide here is that we we take these ideas , and as we get into more the more  techni like sort of production side of things , that we think about shape , materials , and themes or series that go throughout . Sort of like a I dunno like  we think of some kind of a thin theme that unifies it all , that we agree on ,  sorta like a marketing identity . So so like I threw out a few ideas there just to kinda get us thinking along those lines like lemon , lime , I dunno , green colours , pe whatever , it's just an idea , 'cause I'm thinking that some of these ideas will seem quite coherent if we use them in terms of their what people associate this them with in terms of texture , shape , colours , things like that . marketing: Like  the ones the ones which I'm most fond of in terms of giving like a theme to it would be like  like lemon or something like that , you know something which is , like you see a lot in in other areas . Like I see lots of websites and things that seem to associate with like lemon and lime and project manager: Okay . marketing: I'm thinking maybe we could incorporate some of these features into a fairly  into something which is which seems to have something to it which is almost gimmicky because like  like something to do with like lighting within it . Like you know just within the simple sense , when you pick up a phone and touch a button it  lights up , q usually the buttons light up . marketing: How can we build on that ? Maybe like it could light up in different colours or something or or people could buy the buy the control and then it comes with different like covers or something so . marketing: but  hopefully we can we can revisit those ideas when we get into project manager: -huh .  there's a wee bit of discussion about the other existing ones there ,  so I've taken the  suggestions from them and tried to incorporate them into this  So then this we're looking for  suggestions on size th  size of control and the buttons ,  the shape of the control , and whereabout the buttons should be located on the control . user interface:  what I found from the research is that most the current controls are just basically big bricks with loads of buttons all over them .  they're not very attractive to look at , and they're not very comfortable to hold , they're I just hold 'em like big bricks , and they're very easily lost .  they tend to be very dark colours , so if there are shadowy places down the side of couches you can't really see them .  I'm not sure if there's any other examples of that , but something to look out for .  there's a problem that I've I've got couple of preferences for the the end control  I get 'em with the the red colour button for stand-by and s the other examples of that  The buttons should be large .  one of the examples given on the homepage was  there's an up and down volume button but both of them have a V_ on them , project manager: user interface: so the up volume button looks like it should be a down volume button , that's kinda confusing .  if the the corporate colour scheme allows it we should have a very bright colour so that it can be easily identified anywhere . user interface:  obviously trying trying to avoid being tacky there , but it could  tie-in very easily with your your lime and lemon idea . Okay , do we have a corporate colour scheme ? project manager: I think it's yellow marketing: I didn't know . project manager: because like the website is yellow and there's a band at the bottom is yellow , marketing: Okay . user interface: any extra features we add beyond the basic ones should be m hidden , they shouldn't be on the  shouldn't be visible without something be opened or some sort of special extra effort . user interface:  if we did decide to go for voice activation there sh should always be a button as alternative , possibly hidden in the the opened up section  making that something is wrong with it or with somebody's voice , maybe they got a cold or  we should definitely avoid the big square block look . user interface: And  we got an email  from I think it's the the research department , and they've said th the voice control  can now talk back if you ask it a question . user interface: So it sh it could be good to have them  confirm any action you take project manager: Aye that's a good idea , yeah .  you say you wanted the the corporate colours , but they don't say you know if we can use any other colours at all or marketing:  . marketing: It's a shame the cable wasn't just in the middle of the table , project manager: I know it'd be handy , wouldn't it . project manager: Do y do you wanna sit in the the line of sight of this  industrial designer: Yeah okay . project manager: marketing: It takes a second , doesn't it ? industrial designer: 'Kay , that should be it . marketing: industrial designer: So just so you guys have some idea of what's involved in my process ,  and then you can just work through it marketing: industrial designer: and we 'll either modify it or start from scratch  depending on what your needs are . industrial designer:  I think , like what you guys said ,  the most input that's needed is basically in the user interface .  like you said time to market was a problem ,  and how many components are physically in there in cost .  and the lower components , the power , the logic , the transmitter , and the infrared ,  they affect you in terms of the size of your device ,  and that would have some inte impact on how y I think more how you hold rather than  the actual use using the the remote control because  like we've said we've defined , like we only want the basic things that to be visible , and the rest of them we try to hide .  these are the options that are available to you ,  I'm not very sure about the voice thing 'cause I got another email and it was in fact quite sketchy on what n the voice options are . industrial designer:  it said it could talk to you , but it never said anything about being able to listen . industrial designer: well I could see the other email that they sent you ,  'cause they got back to me with like different requirements , or different offerings of what components availa Okay so your basic components are buttons , user interface: Right . industrial designer: okay and you have a wheel available , like a mouse scroll wheel , project manager:  . industrial designer: okay there's an L_C_D_ display , marketing: industrial designer:  I think these are quite standard things . marketing: They're standard , aren't they ? industrial designer: No  they're well in the sense that these are all the options available for you . It can actually be flat or it can be curved ,  and then the different types of materials that you can use ,  I don't think you can use them in a combination ,  but  project manager: industrial designer: I could check back for you , but I don't think you can actually use them in a combination . project manager: We you couldn't have like plastic and rubber ? industrial designer:  I think plastic and rubber would be fine , but plastic , rubber , and wood , I wasn't I'm not very sure about the titanium . industrial designer:  the rubber was a restriction on the kind of power source you could use , project manager:  'kay . industrial designer: but the titanium had a different kind of things on the shape of the thing , project manager: Okay . industrial designer: so I think that there is some restriction on  I think you could probably group plastic and rubber together , wood and titanium , project manager: industrial designer: but you know it might be easier from a cost perspective and a complexity just to use one . industrial designer:  and the other components are logic chips ,  again I'll I'll go back to the component chips . The com how complex or how easy the logic is , it depends on how many functions you have on the on the unit  and that impacts cost .  I don't think the logic chip has a issue about size 'cause they should be about the same size . Okay the second one I think is more of a gimmick then actually a useable thing , it's a wind-up you know , a crank . industrial designer: Yeah but that that might be something I think that's more of a look and feel decision because I don't think you can have one power source if you're using the alternative power sources . I think whatever it is you still need a battery 'cause I don't think anybody wants to keep doing one thing . industrial designer: which may not be a great idea in Europe or any country that has seasons 'cause half the year you'd be dead . user interface: industrial designer: So like what I said , you probably need like a battery and something else . industrial designer:  and the kinetic one I guess for me is the most interesting one project manager: industrial designer: because it's movement and people like to fiddle with their and it's a nice sales gimmick I think . industrial designer: From a marketing gimmick it it's a technology thing , marketing: industrial designer: it's a shake it it doesn't work , shake it , knock it or something . industrial designer: you have you had those balls , you know those stress balls where you bounce the ball and it and it lights up and it goes , project manager:  yeah yeah , I see . project manager: marketing: industrial designer: you know that might be a gimmick combined with rubber . industrial designer: You know just to if you get frustrated wi remote control you can throw it , project manager: Yeah . industrial designer: my from my role , I don't think that personal preferences but role preferences , I think  something comfortable to hold ,  small and slim marketing: industrial designer: I guess that's more in the sense of small and slim in terms of comfortable not so small you can't , you know like a phone or something , too small phone . industrial designer:  and the other thing is from a production point of view  the less components we use and the simpler the components means you reduce your cost and you increase your profit . industrial designer:  The user interface restrictions basically means that if you use more complicated features , like the buttons are standard okay , the L_C_D_ panel and the scroll wheel you need more complicated logic . industrial designer: Okay with the titanium case , let me just check that  , marketing: industrial designer: titanium case can't be curved , it has to be square . industrial designer: Okay  there's no restriction on the plastic , and marketing: It can't be curved . industrial designer: So that's again , I don't think you can use them in a combination ,  especially the titanium project manager: Okay . Right can I marketing:  question on can I ask a question ? project manager: Yeah well yeah it's just I'm quite keen to get the discussion going with the time we've left so but yeah you c ask away . Can we  power a light in this ? Can we get a strong enough battery to power a light ? industrial designer:  I think we could because the L_C_D_ panel requires power , and the L_C_D_ is a form of a light project manager:  . industrial designer: so that marketing: So maybe one of the things we can just try and include is a really good battery . project manager: Why what kind of light do you want are you thinking of ? marketing: Well  I'm thinking it might be That for  this to be a high-tech thing it's gonna have to have something high-tech about it project manager: -huh . marketing: and that's gonna take battery power , and to make that to make that a realistic goal I think one of the issues that will come up later is , can the battery power it ? industrial designer: Are you thinking are you thinking of of a light in the sense of  a light light , or a light in the sense of it glows kind of you know Frankenstein , it's alive . Well m I'm thinking along the lines of you're you're in the dark watching a D_V_D_ and you  you find the thing in the dark and you go like this , industrial designer: Okay . marketing: and  y you just touch it , or you just pick it up , and it lights up or something . marketing: We're gonna need to put in a really good battery so people don't have to charge their r remote control every few days . industrial designer:  that's why I think the option of the the kinetic thing which basically means as long as you shake it like a watch , like an automatic watch project manager:  . marketing: But are people gonna wanna shake their movie controller ? industrial designer:  it's probably sensitive enough when you fiddle it . industrial designer: like I said the bouncing ball thing , or you could trigger that to use that to power the light project manager: Okay . industrial designer: so when they pick it up , right , and then that that sorta triggers the marketing: Right . project manager: let's just go right back to the marketing ideas for a start , and just giving an id idea on the time , we've got about fifteen minutes to play with at most . So  yeah so just t to bear in mind that the ultimate goal of this meeting is to reach an decision on the the the concepts of the product . project manager: So back to your idea about  incorporating the idea of like fruit and veg , and the corporate colour , and things like that . project manager: Does anybody have any ideas of about how we can fit all that in together ?  that's kind of the user interface type of thing , what are your thoughts on that ? user interface:  I think we could go for like  maybe not a p a fruit shape but a very sort of curvy type shape . project manager: So maybe do y are we thinking something that like s could sit in your hand comfortably , or do you th you'd hold onto comfortably or user interface:  probably something that s sits in your hand comfortably , sort of feels right in your hand . Colour-wise  you made a re  was it you or  I can't remember who made the point about how if you've a nice bright colour you'll not lose it , was that industrial designer: I think he made that . project manager: Whose user interface: marketing: What's that ? project manager: about how if you have a bright colour you'll not lose it so much . project manager:  and when the corporate colour is yellow ,  maybe we could think about about the colour of the whole product being yellow I don't know . project manager: And then obviously the  the materials when it has anybody got like an overall picture in their mind about what what might work ? That's all . marketing: Well  I'm thinking that what we need to do is have something that kind of unifies a lot of the different concepts , project manager: marketing: and if we think that what we are w our number one marketing motive is  the look and feel . marketing: So for the look and feel to seem coherent and not just sorta bits and bits and pieces of of concept and technology or or whatever or fashion , then we should have it kind of come back to one thing that we kind of all sorta can visualize .  maybe what we could do is t th think about a concept which touches b back to the on the  the colour , project manager:  if we think of something , like I was saying also lime and lemon you know , project manager: marketing: what can we come up with something where we we try and associate it with with like the series . We just come up with something like that we kind of use it as a theme to inspire the project manager: Okay . industrial designer: Is there a particular shape that you're interested in ? Like does marketing have any research on does it need to be long ? marketing: industrial designer: Does it need with a square thing wha project manager: Oh you know like in circular in shape or industrial designer: Yeah 'cause that will n help narrow down the choice of marketing: Yeah . project manager: 'Cause I I I was kinda thinking about as well you know how you get these shock resistant mobile phones , user interface: See I'm project manager: and they're plastic but then also have like rubber on the outside , and it kinda feels it feels kind of warmer to the touch . And then then we could have curved shapes , 'cause wood or titanium , yeah , it's gonna have to be boxy and rectangular and I think we might be moving away from that you know so  Well I'm do we really want it in like the shape of a lemon or marketing: No no no not at all . marketing: It's more more just that we we think about like what it is we're trying to achieve , so and then we have one one sorta theme that we stick with . project manager: Okay right well  marketing: Do you know what  ? project manager: so thoughts about the actual shape of the thing . project manager: A snowman shape ? user interface:  so a p sort of larger bit sits in your hand , and then you got maybe another bubble at the top for just any other function you need . That's quite a distinctive shape , marketing: Right , project manager: that would be good marketing: sure . project manager: so yeah should we go with that ? marketing:  can we yeah like to and wha like do you have a project manager: Do you wanna draw it on the board ? user interface: marketing: Can you like yeah just t we can visualize it . user interface:  something like that  you got two groups there  maybe it could fold up and you get a third group inside project manager: Ooh that'd be good .  and  colour-wise what does everybody think ? I think it is quite important to get yellow in there somewhere . user interface: So I reckon it'd look quite nice if we just had  this here , had a sorta background yellow , marketing: project manager: -huh .  and also  how are we going to incorporate the slogan in ? The fact that it talks to you ,  it might be quite cool if when you first start using it it says , what is it , putting fashion into electronics or something , I dunno . Or when you like or if you turn it off or something if it can speak if it could actually say the slogan it might be a bit more powerful than just having it written on it somewhere . project manager: I d I d any thoughts on that at all ? user interface: I think that'd probably scare me .  unless an a  if you also would that work if we wanted to incorporate  an L_C_D_ display , where would we put that ? Would we put that on the inside or industrial designer: Do we need an L_C_D_ display ? user interface:  industrial designer: What what's the functionality of that ? project manager: It's bound to increase the cost of it a lot , I would've thought . industrial designer: Yeah but the question is what are we using it marketing: What would it achieve ? industrial designer: what would we what would we achieve from it ? Putting in lights is cheap but putting in an L_C_D_ panel just to make it glow is a bit of a marketing: Well L_C_ well I'd when you used to mention the L_C_D_ I'd think I wonder what that would be about . And the th the thing I could see it helping with would be if it was somehow connected with  listings . marketing: So as you scroll through , 'cause we said we might have a jog dial , so as you scroll through your stations you can y it actually tells you what it is . I think that will be a problem because we don't have an input device to get the listings into it , marketing: Right , okay . industrial designer:  I I'm not saying there's no need for an L_C_D_ display , but  it's what's what what would it tell the user , project manager: I think that would make it very complex . industrial designer: 'cause the L_C_D_ tends to be an output as  as opposed to an input so  does the remote control need to talk back to the user ? project manager: Yeah . marketing:  not real industrial designer: We have the option of the speaker as well the sa the same thing goes for the speaker , is there a need for the remote control to to talk back ? marketing: project manager: I don't know if there is really , marketing: project manager: no  industrial designer:  project manager: I would say no need for a talk-back . project manager: so you're gonna have the three different sets of of functionalities ,   do you wanna group them into s head of the snowman , body of the snowman , inside of the snowman , is that what you're thinking ? user interface:  well I think the advanced ones the the ones you don't usually use could be hid inside . user interface: B  I think the we had were fairly basic ones , they'd have to go on the the front somewhere . project manager: Okay right  what else do you need to talk about ? marketing: Well i I was just industrial designer: Where would you physically position the buttons ?  I think that that has some impact on on on many things . project manager: So I'm just gonna  pop this in here 'cause I have a slide about decision making which I'd forgotten about .  energy what do you think that's suggesting we're how we're powering the thing ? I really like the idea of this kinetic thing where you'd have the back-up of the battery , but have have kinetic power , marketing: Yeah , sure . project manager:  what does anybody think about that ? marketing:  I've had kinetic things before , and the the the one issue we need to keep in mind with them is that you're committing the user to moving it , industrial designer: No , like I said we have a h hybrid kind of thing , so it's not gonna charge the battery , it's just marketing: and watches yeah Sure , okay , right , okay . marketing:  just it's just worth pointing out because like I've I've known I've known people to have kinetic watches that they wear all the time , project manager: marketing: and it's just like magic because it's always powered and there's no battery . I've also known people to have things like like a jewellery watch they wear from time to time , and they eventually just say it's just too much of a nuisance because I don't wear it all the time . marketing: Like remote control is similar , you're away on vacation , I dunno whatever , you something , and it just starts to get worn down . Well I suppose that if you're if you're away and you're not using it , then you're not using any power either . marketing: So we should think about project manager: So you'd have the battery as the kind of to keep it ticking over idea marketing: Yeah . project manager: I'm really sorry we're gonna have to wrap up quite quickly , we don't have as much time as I thought . project manager: Chip on print , is that that's an industrial design thing , is it David ? industrial designer: Yes yes . project manager: Okay  as for the case , kind of discussed that marketing: And this size here , I'd suggest this be small , like quite small . marketing:  just a a lot of the   one of the things running through my mind right now , I realise we're being efficient to wrap up the meeting and have lots of decisions made , project manager: marketing:  but we are leaning quite a bit to the side of being low-tech , rubber buttons plastic frame , it's almost like we're reproducing the same old remote control that's out there . marketing: Should we think about how we are actually getting this high-tech user friendly   theme like what is it that we're u we're using to to achieve those goals ? project manager: Could have things like backlighting the buttons and stuff like that .  you know a a glowing a a glowing yellow type case where the yellow is showable , marketing: Yeah clear , project manager: Aye that would be a good idea . project manager: S so like cur slightly transparent case , so it's yellow , like tinted yellow , but you can maybe see through it . project manager: Is that what you mean ? industrial designer: You know you have cordless mice and they don't eat that much power right . industrial designer: but because the case is transparent so it gives it a little bit of a glow , doesn't make it freaky .  and then the other thing that we we're s we've committed ourselves to achieving is simplicity , and so I'm thinking maybe should we try and think about having something like  some kind of an innovative concept about how the  the volume and the channels are controlled , 'cause that's the main thing people will f wanna do . marketing: Could we use like a jog dial , like a nice just sort of round , somewhere on it where you just roll it ? industrial designer: The question is when you're rolling it , how do you wanna roll it ? marketing: Or industrial designer: Do you want 'em to roll it like that ? Do you want 'em to roll it like that ? 'Cause in a mouse your hand's in a position to roll it , project manager: Yeah . industrial designer: whereas the other thing about having it jog dial this way , it tends to get moved accidentally . project manager: Yeah if you are holding it in your hand you could you could do that , couldn't you ? marketing: Well why don't we do it like a mouse then ? project manager: If you're holding it in your hand you could industrial designer: That's a very unnatural motion to project manager: Do you think ? industrial designer: yeah .  it might work for volume , and maybe some of the brightness controls and stuff like that , marketing: Yeah . industrial designer: If you have a Telewest box you've got like , you don't have to buy all the channels , marketing: project manager: okay okay industrial designer:  and I don't think having that you know too quick too slow kin it's confusing to the marketing: Yeah , sure . project manager:  user interface: Well , but then for  for skipping a large amount of channels you do have to  to skip the channel button , the number part . industrial designer: and once they lose out on the user experience they're like Because that's becomes the most accessible thing in front of project manager: Okay . marketing: But that's not a bad thing is it ? project manager: Just marketing: Because when you think about it , the alternative is to go push the button . project manager: we do need to make a decision on whether we want to incorporate a jog dial in nice and quickly .  I'm all for them actually , I think they're quite you know th very quick to m to use . project manager: So does anybody oppose the idea of of incorporating one into the design at all ? No . And the other thing was  can we think of any way of getting the slogan into this thing ? marketing: Yeah like  if we if if we keep coming back to this board here , project manager: -huh . marketing: I wouldn't be surprised if we could take this idea , imagine that , I dunno , that it's within the shape of the hand , it's quite small project manager: -huh ooh okay , we really gotta wrap up marketing: I dunno . It's small , and that we've got like the the l slogan somewhere like on the casing at the side , project manager: Okay well if we can do that , great . marketing: well  isn't that what we just h said said we s just have to decide now ? project manager: Yeah let's let's try and get the slogan on there  , and marketing: Yeah . industrial designer: So you wanna expand the shape of the marketing: And then like a jo And then like a jog dial somewhere that fits in with the shape of it like I dunno like here , in with the industrial designer: That that might have one problem in terms of  in terms of whether you're left handed or you're right handed you might be locking yourself in . industrial designer: Could I just could I just jump in and suggest something quickly ? project manager: Okay . Right I'm gonna have to user interface: marketing: A jog di project manager: I'm really gonna have to hurry you on here 'cause we're we're actually over time . It's kind of yeah project manager: Just for in closing just the next meeting's gonna be in thirty minutes , and so you can see in the screen here what each of you are gonna hopefully be doing ,  I know that the designers are gonna be working with Play-doh on that . Anything at all you think we haven't discussed that we need to ? Is everybody kind of happy about what they're gonna be doing ? marketing:  industrial designer:  I think one thing would be the jog dial 'cause that's gonna have quite a big impact on the thing  marketing: Yeah I think the jog dial , you know it just after you drew that , what if it was flat and you just spun it , industrial designer: Yeah that's what I was thinking the marketing: that'd be great . industrial designer: There's lots of space for it  project manager: That's kind of a design thing that you guys can can discuss , yeah . industrial designer: Yeah but it's also a a marketing and a function user interface: marketing: Sure , yeah , project manager: Okay . marketing: yeah and materials we sorta said we'd do plastic and rubber , didn't we , industrial designer: Yeah . marketing: and I think maybe we should try and stay away from just the big protruding rubber buttons , 'cause that'd just be so standard . project manager: To make something flush with the case ? marketing: Something a bit more flush , yeah , project manager: Okay right . marketing: so that it has and also t plastic I've seen can get really textured , so you can get plastics that actually feel soft in your hand . user interface: marketing: They feel kind of like  , you get pens now and then that you'd think that they were rubber but they're not , industrial designer: No like Yeah yeah . marketing: they're actually just plastic that's textured , industrial designer: Yeah yeah kinda like that yeah . marketing: kind of a little bit like project manager: Okay I'm gonna have to I'm gonna have to call this to a close 'cause we're way over time . So  that's really good , like we've s had much to talk about that  pretty much run out of time to do so . marketing: industrial designer: Okay , can I just swipe your power cable , I don't think it matters . Okay lemme okay , I'm gonna pull everybody out first and then put in whoever needs to be left . I'm gonna take the microphones , 'cause it's too lazy t take them off again