After watching a few of the videos for Microsoft’s Courier Project, I wanted to share my thoughts and my joy.
1. The Natural & Intuitive Design of the Courier Concept
This is the closest I’ve seen to a paper replacement that actually adds features (maybe minus 3d origami-although I’m sure there will be an app for that-Sketch-up Origami Edition?). To the Apple fanboys who say Microsoft stopped innovating I give you the Courier project and Windows Phone 7. I mention user interface so as not to be confused with an application interface that we are still dealing with now. User interface design implies catering to the users and what we have now seems to be more app centric and disposable. We are now witnessing the epic battle between design mindsets of interface design. It comes down to that which is designed to be used versus designed to be bought, clicked, consumed and thrown away. Courier seems like child’s play. Whether you’re 4 or 40, you’ll find it fun and interesting.
2. Zoom in-Zoom out. Digital Medium = Infinite Space
This video reminds us all that the digital medium has infinite space even on a small page. Microsoft’s projects/concepts that have yet to make it to market share something in common. They all rely on treating the digital medium, not as a page, but an infinite space and plane. You can zoom in and manipulate elements in different scales. A user can write in different sizes and arrange elements on the page anyway they choose. They can zoom out and back and transform the hand-held page into a white board.
3. Digital Demonstration of the Infinite Potential and Power of the Blank Page
Courier looks like an orgy of WordPress, Evernote and Picasa with Photoshop watching from the doorway. This is geek porn on its finest. Wait. Porn is geek porn- this is more like what geeks would do when they weren’t playing WoW or watching porn. This opens up the mobile market to a slew of new opportunities. Walking around with a connected, wireless device, smaller than a clip board, that can jot down anything our arms can generate is an amazing thing.
4. The Value of Tactility:The Stylus is Mightier
Hand-writing, what an interesting concept. First of all, we now have pretty decent transcription software to translate the gobbledy-gook that passes for handwriting these days. Second, working in a medium wherein you can differentiate yourself by the way that you mark in your everyday environment is a skill that has been left for dead. In the past, this has been left almost exclusively to the graphic arts. Courier creates value on the digital medium where so many devices, applications and interfaces have failed. Using a stylus as an input device seems like a natural evolution of computing but in previous attempts we lacked the mobile chip horsepower. Palm OS I’m talking about you. Thanks to innovations from Apple, ARM, TI, Intel, Nvidia, Asus and perhaps most importantly the invention of the netbook, we have some serious power for our mobile platforms that can accommodate the creative and written output generated by our hands and wrists. Interacting with a stylus allows our brains to associate and relate the power of pen and paper to the screen and our brains assign more value.
5. Customization-Making Mobile Computing Personal
The Journals are perhaps the most interesting detail about Courier. They are beautiful and take on the form and shape of actual Moleskines and other custom forms. Never before have we seen a mobile platform offer personal organization to this degree. We are visual creatures. We shouldn’t have to purchase 20 apps to make a scrapbook/journal. Yet on the iPhone and iPad- that’s exactly what they expect us to do. Courier allows you to make the creation and the experience unique and share it with others. It allows you to easily create finished products. I could easily imagine writers and artists selling their journals just as we do books. Compared to the iPhone that allows us to have a custom image when we are locked out of our phone, Microsoft gives us something we hold so dear: personal space. This truly is the return of PERSONAL Computing.
5. 2 Screens to Rule Them All
Courier will bring the productivity of dual screens to the mobile market by allowing us to browse on one, clip, create and share our stuff on the other. The folks at Microsoft Research conducted some of the studies the revealed a 9-50 percent increase in productivity when we add a second monitor. They have applied that knowledge to Courier. We are very visual creatures, we like to see things spread out across desks and although there are many good notebook/clipbook applications out there, Courier is more visual, tactile and intuitive.
Reality Check
I don’t expect Courier to make it into a finished product, at least not in this incarnation. It’s like a sexy concept car; too cool to ever make it to the road. We’ll likely end up with a watered down version but the video illustrates something about the power of innovation in design and concept and its ability to inspire.
Why This Matters
The interface illustrated in these short videos will fuel the minds of entrepreneurs and start-ups for years to come. The resulting tools and services unlike 90% of what came out of the app store revolution will be useful to consumers and businesses alike. These are the types of innovations we need to shift our entire culture and economy from blind consumerism (because we can’t afford it anymore) to raw creative output and actual work (so we can get back to blind consumerism). Courier is based on allowing the user to create- journals, drawings, reports, summaries, as well as to interact, play, touch in a more psychologically tactile way the digital environments we take for granted.
Our Past
It’s important to note the road that brought us here. Before Android and Win Phone 7, Apple has lead the way in mobile interface design. They brought us wonderful interactive elements and interface at the cost of our identities and pocket books. Apple’s success lead it away from it’s users and into the dark arts- creating in my opinion trends that are dangerous to consumers and the economy as a whole. They used intuitive design not to empower their interface but to get the user addicted to the marketplace. The interface became about the marketplace, subscriptions and how many different ways they could get users to pay for something they already purchased. The iPad is the perfect example of Apple’s true focus being on the market of the nickel and dime not providing an irreplaceable user experience. Luckily for us, Android entered the scene and Microsoft has been working on a few projects that really get me excited.
Other Thoughts
Microsoft needs to promote the X-Box team and consider muzzling Balmer – he is a scary, loud blow-hard and I’m saying that as a Windows 7 fan. He seems to be out of touch with the consumer market- maybe he’s better with corporate types but Apple didn’t gain market share by catering to large corporations. In the evolution of personal computing, we brought home what we had at work, now we expect more and there is a reversal. I believe the future of business computing will be defined by what we bring to work from our homes. The dominant platform/device for tomorrow’s businesses will more closely resemble what we find in today’s living rooms, purses and pockets.
