It is amazing what good design can do for a product. Griffin Technology has a product called the iMic that is basically an external sound card. It is an excellent product (read my full review here), but it might as well been called the iSore. Not only was it ugly, it also had a confusing interface. By “interface” I mean it has one switch. You use the switch to change between using the iMic for a microphone or a speaker. When I bought my iMic I thought it was broken because when I plugged my microphone in I pushed the unmarked switch towards the mic icon. That is the only logical way it can go, right? As crazy as it seems, in order to use a microphone with the iMic, you have to push the switch towards the speaker icon. I wonder how many iMic’s were returned just because Griffin failed to put any thought into the only switch on the entire product.

Fortunately, the new design appears to correct the fatal design flaw. Also, it is now an object worthy of proudly sitting on your desk next to the rest of your Apple gear. There are so many great products trapped in ugly or non-functional shells. Hats off to Griffin for finally recognizing the value of good design.

My agency has a visitor this week. She’s a freelancer doing production and finish work. She is very awesome, very competent, and very funny. She’s a very good fit for the group. And she’s also very deaf. She speaks through ASL, written notes, and emails. Last year I taught a hearing impaired student, but the college provided a translator at all times and I got lazy and relied on that. Now I’ve pulled out my pocket dictionary of signing and I’m learning my abc’s all over again. But that’s neither here nor there. Let me get to my point.

I buy The Office from iTunes every week. I then hook my iPod to our conference room big-screen TV (it looks pretty good that size, you’d be surprised) and we watch it over lunch-as a big group. So for us to do that today, we’d need to turn on closed captioning on the iPod. Except that Apple doesn’t support closed captioning on the iPod, or iTunes videos in any capacity.

Oh sure, you say, because deaf people probably don’t listen to a lot of iPods. Well sure, I assume they wouldn’t. But with their foray into video, Apple and their partners (ABC, NBC, Disney, etc.) have a pretty solid and obvious responsibility here. It has been proposed by others on the web that a specific feature in iTunes, probably a Preference, could simply be turned on for videos to be watched by people who are hearing impaired and deaf. My iPod asks me everytime I watch a video if I want to send a signal for a TV hookup, so a similar Settings feature could surely be implemented.

I can understand Apple, in the rush and excitement of launching a video revolution, accidentally forgetting that the hard-of-hearing might still want to download LOST. Hey, sometimes I forget to spell-check documents, too. But I always have to go back in and fix the things I’ve overlooked, and it’s time for Apple to do the same.

“That’s the smartest thing I’ve ever heard.” ‚ÄìJennifer Philippi, Omaha

Today, Apple announced not only their newest iMac G5, nor just the prophesized iPod Video, but a groundbreaking step in digital home entertainment. Partnering with both ABC and Disney, you are now able to purchase episodes of your favorite televison shows – to keep, not stream – for a scant $2 apiece.

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Today, Apple has unveiled its newest (yes, even newer than the nano) iPod: The iPod Video. From apple.com:

“Time for the world’s best music player to take the stage for another encore. In 30GB and 60GB models that hold up to 15,000 songs, full-color album art and up to 25,000 photos, the new iPod makes the most of your music and more. Yeah, you’ve heard that tune before. Only now, you can watch it, too. With support for up to 150 hours of video and a 2.5-inch color display, the new iPod lets you take music videos and TV shows on the road.”

BeADesignGroup will update with more information as it becomes available. ‘Till then, we suggest talking about how much you want one.

A bit overshadowed by the release of iPod nano, iTunes 5 was also released last week. Although you can’t exactly call it a redesign, there were some design changes to the interface. As has come to be expected from the Apple faithful, let’s dissect the changes…

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