“Game Center lets friends and soon-to-be-friends in on the action. Invite someone to join, then get a game going. Or go up against people you don’t know, from anywhere around the world, in a multiplayer game. It’s your world. Everyone else is just playing in it.”

Game Center has been an amazing idea which is implemented almost flawlessly. But there is just only one problem. None of my friends know how to add/invite their friends. If I add them (provided I know their apple id), they don’t know how to access the request if the initial notification is missed.

Once you have added all your friends, it works almost silently. Updating your scores in the background and getting your friends’ highest scores. Games like TempleRun have implemented Game Center in such a way that you can see other high scores while you’re playing the game. It gives you a feel of playing together.

How it should be?

Game Center needs a social graph. If Apple knows the potential here, they’ll work out their differences with Facebook to collaborate on this front. Apple needs Facebook. Without Facebook, Game Center is nothing but a very powerful engine without power source.

Facebook needs Apple as well. Google is reportedly working on a one stop solution for games. I do not have any idea how it is going to be, but if it’s any good, it is going to take Facebook for a ride. Facebook needs a foothold in mobile space which they do not have right now. Providing its social graph to Game Center is going to get them permanent roots into millions of users lives.

Let’s see if any one, either Apple or Facebook, of them has senses to work it out.

For music, we currently have many options. We can upload all our music to Google Music, or we can use iTunes Match or use amazon.

But what about movies. I think we need a service which can do the same what companies are doing for music. Either by matching the movie or providing us a software to reap it and upload to cloud.

For example, If I have DVDs that I want access on my phone, tablet and any other device. I can use the service to upload that DVD and use on all my devices. No questions asked. Since this is my own copy that I am uploading, it shouldn’t be a copyright issue.

A service like this helps me get rid of the physical media altogether. Because I know my movies will be available when I want them. On whatever device I want to watch them on.

How long will it take for some company to bring this service to market?

OnLive

OnLive explains the service as,

OnLive delivers top-tier video games on demand to your TV, PC, Mac® or tablet—whatever you have on hand. Sign in. Play. It’s that simple.

We have already seen “OnLive Desktop” app for iPad that let’s you login to a remote Windows 7 machine and work with it like it’s installed on iPad. It’s superfast, it’s responsive, it feels like native. It plays video, displays slideshows full screen, works with AirPlay.

OnLive performs extensive processing on server side and displays the service as video on client side. This reduces client side processing dramatically.

The same technology is being used in it’s gaming service which allows user to play games on a low-power consoles. The game runs on the server and a video stream is delivered to user’s client.

Now, I think if Apple can work with OnLive to get this on Apple TV and allows iPhone/iPod Touch to be a controller, it becomes a killer gaming platform. It puts Apple directly in league with Xbox and PS3. In fact, it puts them ahead of Microsoft and Sony.

Here’s how. Since Apple TV is not just gaming console, it performs all other tasks way better than other gaming consoles. iPhone/iPod Touch makes a better controller with many more sensors then gaming consoles’ default controllers. Apple TV can be the low power client to all OnLive games. There is no need to upgrade console every 3-4 years since processing is handled on server side. An app like OnLive makes Apple TV much more attractive and opens it up to a vast user base. So Apple definitely needs OnLive on it’s Apple TV platform.

On the other hand, OnLive can use Apple’s cash and connections. Apple can negotiate with Game Companies to get latest games on the platform. Also, Apple’s cash can be a valuable resource to keep OnLive servers running.

But I know that this is wishful thinking and I wouldn’t see this tomorrow.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_HTC_phones

My head starts spinning when I read that list of phones from HTC. It confuses a user. I cannot figure out what’s differrent in each one of them. Why do I choose one over another.

The problem:

HTC has started making devices with so little difference that at the end, it just come down to the looks of the phone and nothing else. Users get confused and end up choosing a phone from another manufacturer like Samsung or Apple. Because they’ve heard about iPhones or Galaxy SII. There’s not much to choose.

How it works?

When I ask somebody, which phone do you use? IPhone and Galaxy SII have better chances of being in the answer. That creates an impression on my mind. Next time, When I am in market shopping for a phone, I am going to remember those 2 phones from Apple and Samsung, and 10 others from the likes of HTC. It’s easier for me to choose a phone from Apple/Samsung.

Solution:

Reduce the number of products being released in a year. Like Apple did when Jobs took over again. Pay attention to one product. Ask marketing team to focus on fewer products. It’s going to create a brand and not confusion. There is no need to take away choises from user’s hands. But give them choices in terms of inbuilt memory, color of device or application packages (Not bloatwares). Give them reliable services like backups and sync. They go a long way.

Printers have been the same way for ages now (in technology years). There hasn’t been any major updates to the way they work or the facilities they provide. Recently, we have started seeing all-in-ones which can do print, scan, fax, copy and they are wireless. So they can sit in a corner until there is a use for them. You print/scan or copy and you’re done and forget about it until you need to use it again.

Since we have so many MacBook Air clones (UltraBooks) in the market now or coming soon (all were seen in CES 2012), there soon will be an entire class of laptops without any kind of optical drive. And we already have tablets, phones etc which cannot read any thing from optical drive.

So this creates a very good opportunity for companies like HP to add optical drives in printers. Now assume that we have these optical drives which can read/write in any kind of optical media including CD, DVD and BluRay.

Once we have this printer online on our local network in our home, we can use it as a shared drive on the network and any device would be able to make use of it. If say it’s a video DVD, you would be able to stream the content over local wireless network to any device on the same network.

Right now, My XBox, computer, BluRay DVD player all have drives in them. But going forward they can be removed and all of them can use the same shared drive. And we add more devices like tablets, phone on the network that can use the drive. 

The same kind of implementation can be done for USB drives as well. User can plugin a USB drive to the printer and that is shared over the network. Now, depending on the model/price of the printer, it can have more functionalities like streaming etc.

This is a very good oppurtunity here. Let’s see which company thinks of it first and implements it correctly.

Necessity is mother of all invention.

 
When people find problems with existing products/technology that they are using, they think of ways to improve them. That’s how people invent. It’s the most basic rule. If you’re comfortable with what you’re using, you’ll never think of ways to improve it because you already think it’s perfect. You’ve to fill the sluggyness, the giganticness, the complex UIs first in order for you to fix them.
There are some basic parameters that you can measure this.

• Size – Size matters irrespective of how big or small the product is. People will always need smaller phones, bigger houses, bigger cars, thinner TVs etc. So as product manufacturer, you should always be driving your company towards making a product better in terms of Size.
• Strength – This is important when the product is more of a mechanical one. In gadgets etc, there is a certain expectancy above which strength becomes irrelevant. We expect our phones shouldn’t break/crack but above that they are not expected to be strong enough to break stones. On the other hand, we’ll always expect our cars to be indestructible. Even when 2 of them go head to head, we would expect them to bounce off before bending/crashing.
• Speed – This is important in terms of physical speed (cars, etc) and operating speed (phones, computer, cooling of refrigerator).
• Complexity of use – When a device/product has an interface, it has to be easy. Starting from unlocking your cars to flying jets, from opening your laptop to editing video on youtube. Everything comes down to how easy it’s to use. If it’s not easy enough for mom/dads to use, make it easier. And if possible, automate. That’s the most easiest way of doing things. For example, if the car unlocks when I reach near the door but stay locked if it’s somebody other than me. Laptops that can wake it self up right before I am about to use it and phone that are ready to take snaps the second I see something amazing are the dream products. When the technology advances, the devices should become easier to use. No mater how complex the science is behind proximity sensors, they’ll always be used to shut-off screens of touchscreen phones so that users don’t accidentally press something.
• Process of creation/production – This is the final parameter that each creator/producer should look at. It shouldn’t be a rocket science to produce anything. Keep it simple and efficient. Remember that the product being created is larger than the company being built. Products and ultimately the consumers should, no MUST, always come first.

If you master these parameters, I guarantee you’ll not fail in any business. And as a user of any product, you should always evaluate them against these parameters.

iEar

This would be a complementing gadget to our ears. It is sort of headphones but with some added functionality. Some of the cool features, I have thought of, iEar will have.

• Wireless (obvious) – So that there are no dangling wires. 
• Automatic Battery Charging – So that we do not have to take them out to charge. They can stay in permanently.
• There is no over the head or behind the head strap. Both pieces of headphones are independent.
• With in-built mic to capture voice inputs
• 2 Modes. Noise-Cancellation and Surrounding Awareness. The first mode is self-explanatory. The second one works like hearing-aids. It plays the sound from your device in addition to the sounds from your surrounding. So that if you’re watching movie and you have an infant, you hear the crying.

This kind of gear would be used everyday and would not be removed at any point of time. It would work as performance enhancing skeleton and would improve our abilities tremendously.
 
Do you have any ideas for the features that can be added to this gear?