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Twitter related apps and websites.

Not sure where to begin, so many twitter apps and sites and just not enough time. Between location based, the ability to set groups, delay tweets, search tweets, the options seem endless. Twitter is turning out to be pretty awesome and the technical problems from early 2008 seem to have gone away. If you're not into twitter now, i'm sure you will be in 2009.

Article here

See what's happening -- right now.
http://search.twitter.com/

Sling Media to bring live TV content to iPhones

We met these guys last week at CES in Vegas. Sling media is the company that brings your cable tv to your computer. And now they bring it to your mobile device too. iPhone support is coming very soon in the next few months. A little birdy at CES told us that although the they officially support the product on AT&T's 3G Network, it will still work for us "original iphone" owners.

Here's an article about what Sling Media is up to these days.

The Shorty Awards

Check out some of these tweeple if you have time
The best producers of short* content in 2008
*140 characters or less, on Twitter
Finals voting is open! The finals will last from January 12-23.

http://www.shortyawards.com/

NEW URL for Ballista!

http://marketingballista.blogspot.com/

Samsung Flat Screen.

This may be my final CES 2009 posting. I got scolded for taking a picture (or two) of this Samsung flat screen. Apparently the only ones able to take photos of it were those from the press. None the less, here we are. Hit the press for detailed specs, but this 50+ inch flat screen was no more than a half inch in depth. You may get more visual detail by clicking on the 2nd photo.

Clearly moving forward we'll be seeing a whole new world of flat screens. larger, thinner, lighter and using less power. The way these will impact our homes and shopping environments will be huge, no doubt.

Take a wire and make it flat. What do you get?

One of the coolest things I saw at this year's CES was something rather basic in a lot of ways. It's called Flatwire and no surprise, it's wire that's flat. lol

What's genius about this is that from speaker wire to 120v wire it all is manufactured like, impossibly thin.

From what i could tell, rewiring could take on a whole new life as you essentially apply this flatwire to the outer surface of your wall, a little adhesive, Spackle and paint and you are in great shape. Perhaps for a real edgy look, you leave it exposed. Either way, no more snaking wires through your walls.

FlatwireReady.com

Major media in the shopping aisle

Great article named "Major Media in the Shopping Aisle"
A pretty comprehensive overview of in store marketing today. Definitely worth checking out.

Digital Signage Secret.

We came across this very attractive digital signage at the show. It featured a simple dissolve between content and specifications. It was clean and quite effective.

Upon closer observation, we realized that this shiny little object was just some simple, almost store bought technology fabricated to be a bit more useful.

I think the picture below speaks for itself, a basic digital picture frame, but modified. Just upload it with images and walla! Instant in-store digital signage.

Hitachi frames flat screens.

At CES this year Hitachi spent a lot of time showing the public exactly how flat screens will integrate with their homes in the future. I touched on this in a previous post, but here you'll see another nicely designed stand and monitor frames. In theory we should be spending time choosing the frame of our flatscreen, just like we do when we hang nice art work in our homes. This also speaks even further to how technology integrates and blends with our home & work lives.

Consumer design leads to line of limited edition Sony Vaios

The Sony booth showcased custom designed Sony Vaio computers. The
designs were created by consumers and entered into a contest. There
were upwards of 20k entries and you can see below the final winning
designs which were priducednin limited quantity.

These custom designed computers were only available through their
website. Cool stuff!

Eco friendly. Design friendly

Here is a small fan running on solar power. As u can see the solar
panel is designed very nicely, resembling a tile. Perhaps solar would
be accepted more widely if it simply looked nicer, who knows.

Keep your coffee off my table.

I came across this gem in the NBC booth. I don't have much info on it, unfortunately. I know i've seen this before somewhere. This digital coffee table is so interactive and easy to use. It's really impressive. You can see me sorting thru different cards there, each one with videos that can be played simultaneously, either full screen or small.... In short, I want one! If you know what this table is, please let me know. thanks....

i7 processor racing simulator

Intel had a very interactive booth at CES. It showed the many ways that the i7 processor is pushing the limits of computing. This is a video of a racing simulator and all the processing power is being handled by just on i7. That includes the 3 huge LCD monitors, the game itself (the refresh rate was amazing) and also the interactive motion cockpit. It's like driving a real formula race car, bumps and all. Amazing.

Areaware high end design

Areaware had a small booth with some amazingly designed products.  There is a large influence of green, environmentally friendly products scattered throughout the show.  We see a touch of that here with this very old fashioned, yet very contemporary bicycle. You can't help but notice it's unique lines, antique style seat, handle bars, tires pedals, yet it's got front and back solar powered lights built into it's aluminum body.

check out more at Areaware.com

Impressed by Hitachi

I was really impressed with the Hitachi display.  A lot of LCD prototypes, which i'll address in another posting.  The LCD below was just beautiful to look at.  50 inches and you can see how slim this unit is, in person it's amazing.  Hitachi is spending a lot of time doing something that others aren't, which is designing monitors that actually fit into the interior design of homes. 

No big black brackets with big black LCD's hanging off them.  Once you see a nicely designed LCD you realize that the black ones we're all buying really only deserve to be in sports bars.  More on this soon.

One hundred and what inch LCD?

This 108 inch monitor from sharp was pretty impressive until I came across the 150 inch from Panasonic.  The impact these displays can make for a marketer and for a brand is pretty impressive.  They get noticed.

S1 shoulder headset?

Not sure what you'd call these, but it's a pretty cool idea. A speaker
set that airs on your neck. It allows u to listen to music while also
being socially open to talk while u listen. Office setting, perhaps?

The biggest drawback foe me was the most important one. Poor sound
quality, no bass to speak of.

LG wrist cell phone

A fully featured cell phone on your wrist. Bluetooth enabled or
speakerphone. Europe only! Bad luck for us in the states. Launch date
still TBD.