You on Woo Woo?!

Adobe's recent ad is hilarious.


It does a great job of satirizing the marketing panic that occurs when conventional and digital product owners chase the always shifting online populace, but it also does something else-- it supports Bevel creator Tristan Walker's recent statement that the African American "community is the most culturally influential demographic in the world."

When the corporate leader declares "we need an ethnically ambiguous Woo Woo mascot!" he does so as an acknowledgement that he wants to appeal to as wide an audience as possible.

While it's just a silly commercial, in this regard, it unfortunately mirrors all too well some of the places I've worked at. It begs the question-- Why not appeal to the same wide audience when it comes to hiring practices? Build a team that represents your target demo rather than picking up a tip while eaves-dropping on an elevator conversation or acting on unverifyable outside data. Bringing together diverse opinions nad life experience also allows companies to act on a key piece of advice from the most powerful corporate entity in the world: "[to]build the products that [they] want to use [them]selves."

It's not easy, but it's often worth it. Diversity of social class, of sexual orientation, culture,race, etc. could expose valuable opportunities that your competitors, stuck in the mud of 'sameness' could pass by.

Think about it.

iKettle - Beautiful & Pricey. And Pricey.

Sorry-- despite the name, it's not made by Apple. Still, as a geeky gadget dude, I like when "normal" items get the connectivity/app treatment.

Some call it "the smartification of things" or the "the Internet of Things," and while it'll be the norm in a decade or so, it's pretty niche today, which often adds way too much to the price for most items.

There's no guarantee that the connectivity solutions applied to these gadgets are going to work well or even be practical, but hey-- some people like rom-coms-- devices like these are my guilty pleasure. 

With its wifi components hidden inside its stainless steel body and classically simple industrial design, the iKettle isn't just attractive, solves a particularly interesting problem for me. I very much like the idea of timing tea with breakfast from a few taps of my phone in bed, or just picking up my device and telling the kettle to get itself ready for some green or black tea (it's got settings for a couple of types.

It's back in stock. And it's tempting. The thing is, that like all of its smart, connected cousins, the iKettle should ship with two things:

1. A stated promise of firmware and other soft updates. There are a lot of things with wifi, but ha;f the promise of a connective device is that in the event of a useful innovation or security problem, a patch is on its way.
   
2. An API in addition to its app so tinkering developers can integrate it with other services. The more people tinker, the more they'll talk and integrate its functionality with other, companion products.
   
   Besides, with all these devices needing their own apps, smartphone home screens start looking like this, which is not fun.

APIs are part of the solution. Like the "macro" or activity focused line of Harmony remotes, Boulder's own Revolv does a good job of consolidating various systems into a simple interface. But that's a topic for a different entry. 

In the meantime, I'll wait for some more iKettle reviews before I plunk down $170.00 for the appliance. Even if it's not connected, one of these alongside my phone's timer app isn't exactly an awful solution.

Solar Roadways Seems Crazy & Amazing

I hopped on indiegogo this morning to track down a fitness device and happened upon a tech startup called Solar Roadways.

These guys out of Idaho literally want to "pave" the road with hexagonal segments of glass that drink in the sun's energy.

Glass? On the road? What about snow/ice, wind/cold, or weight from huge trucks?

What about lane paint?

Apparently, they have that all figured out. Here are some highlights about the modular system of glass tiles:

• Designed for "roads, parking lots, driveways, sidewalks, bike paths, playgrounds... literally any surface under the sun"
• Built in heating elements keep it snow/ice free
• Captures and sends water wherever you want via cable 'corridors.'
• Hexagonal honeycomb of tiles withstands trucks up to 250,000 lbs
• Built in LEDs replace the need for road paint

Aside from the solar energy the road takes in daily, the roadway can be configured to work in conjunction with specialized electronic vehicles ("EVs") to charge them via induction as they drive-- which would be a great supplement to Tesla's growing network of charging stations. The same principles make these tiles good for parking lots that charge up EV or plugin hybrids vehicles. Imagine a municipality with a small fleet of vehicles out on the road all day charging up at night with a continually diminishing cost to the taxpayer? Again-- crazy. So crazy it just might work. That just covers the basics. For more check out their FAQs.

What about the cost? I haven't doe any independent research but according to their numbers, a nationwide system of these tiles could produce enough energy to pay for the system over time.

They're on Indiegogo but Solar Roadways is not new to the tech scene. They've won prizes and garnered support from competitions and companies the likes of GE, Google and others. 

Didn't the President say something about Green Jobs a few years ago? Aren't all the experts complaining about "our crumbling infrastructure?" And can you imagine how great it'd be for maintaining Internet connectivity across the country? When I come across an invention like this I wish there were some channel that normal people could use to raise the awareness of these innovations to our elected leadership-- like a Quirky system for each state's legislative agenda. But that's another topic entirely.

Back to Solar Roadways. The perks you can get for supporting them go from tote bags to owning a tile. That disappointed me a little. I'd hoped for a driveway installation or maybe a name mention on some segment of road they're testing.