Philip Haine's articles on Product Vision, Innovation and Design

Great Designs

This section spotlights some nice innovations that have made it to market.

Innovation in audio volume UI

Wow, the upcoming Chumby has an incredibly simple and intuitive UI for adjusting volume: just turn the dial. No unlocking to make the volume UI available.  No having to ensure that you are in the right mode.  You can feel for it and operate it without even looking, with instant response. What a great idea! [...]

Crash Course in Learning Theory

Valuable lessons for those who profess.

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1995 Palm calendar creams the 2008 iPhone’s

The iPhone has a few things to learn from its grandpa.

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Needs Analysis of Reusable Shopping Bags (plus a holiday gift idea)

MyOwnBags demonstrate a nice clean differentiation. Plus, they make a great gift for stylish people!

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The Potential of Chumby

The Chumby does nothing specific, a lot in general.

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UI Friction and Apple’s Front Row

Reducing the needless UI overhead in Front Row.

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DabbleDB, FileMaker Pro, and Innovation

Breakthrough innovations in generalist user databases

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Marriage Sav-R Toothpaste Tube

It’s always nice seeing breakthrough solutions to mundane old problems that we accept as a given.