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

Visions to Steal

Ideas for new products. See also: Quick Ideas for quick & dirty ideas.

Idea for file sharing with an iPod or iPad

Transferring and syncing files between multiple portable devices needs to be made easy and direct.

Where’s the Voice UI?

When will we get proper voice command of smartphones?

Blending the best of desktop and web app user experiences

Why must we have internet-based apps OR a modern user experience?

The Network Heater

If you need to generate all that heat anyway, why not do something useful in the process?

Idea stolen: Ansel Adams in one click

How to transition online newspaper readers to paying customers

If newspapers are going to attempt to charge for content, how should they go about it?

Make websites readable on small screens

Accurate webpage renderings on mobile devices are nice to look at, but unacceptably hard to read.

GM’s brand: Save it or squelch it?

Brand reputation is ultimately determined by the customer’s experience, not brute force PR.

Reinventing higher education

Should the institution of the university be protected from disruption?

Ansel Adams at the click of a button

Is there any innovation yet to be done with with digital cameras? Of course!

Tweaks to streaming music

Streaming music like Pandora is awesome. Here are some things to make it awesomer.

Web-based visual voicemail

Why shouldn’t we be able to access our voicemail from a web browser? Or our email clients?

One phone number, many phones

Why must we be limited to only one cellphone per phone number?

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The Return of the Kitchen Computer

Has the time of the kitchen computer arrived yet?

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Long Live the Desktop in the Era of the Internet Appliance

Rumors of the desktop’s demise are premature.

Open, yet encrypted Wi-Fi

Why must we sacrifice security when opening Wi-Fi networks?

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Hosted vs. Local applications

There are strong scenarios for both types of applications and a possible bridge between them

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DabbleDB, FileMaker Pro, and Innovation

Breakthrough innovations in generalist user databases

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What’s on your mind, humanity?

Wikipedia knows what is on our collective mind, but it’s not telling.

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The Dynamics of Micropayments

Micropayments still are not mainstream. What will be needed for them to succeed?