Apple Technology Review, Fall 1997: News

Digital Art

A new concept from Stuart Karten Design in Marina Del Rey, California, combines an old-fashioned artist's easel with the latest in computer graphics. The Digital Artist's System uses an easel that's really a touch-sensitive screen laid over a large plasma or liquid crystal display. Colors are mixed on an electronic palettea separate handheld LCD that communicates with the easel via wireless linkand are applied using an electronic pencil, pen, or brush. The company is looking for a partner to help it build the prototype and predicts that when flat-screen costs come down, the Digital Artist's System will be a hot product (Business Week, 4 Aug 97).

Web Cars

The idea of mobile computing is spreading to automobiles, with both Intel and Mercedes Benz recently demonstrating vehicles with built-in computers and Internet access to go. In the future, says Axel Fuchs of Daimler Benz, these wired cars won't be used just as snazzy, self-navigating indulgences but will open up a whole new market for virtual communities, personalization, and automation of highways. "Drivers and passengers will access a new class of services that will go well beyond classical navigation. These could range from remote diagnostics to locating a teenager who has missed curfew." Such cars could be continuously monitored, because their electronic control units would be addressable through standard Internet protocols. Rather than engineering "smart highways," it might make more sense to engineer the cars insteadputting the intelligence into the cars is a quicker and cheaper way to manage traffic than drilling holes into thousands of miles of asphalt. "Web cars know where they are, how fast they are going, and what time it is. This could make congestion a thing of the past. It could also be a major reason why Web cars are highly likely to become mainstream" (Ted Lewis, "www.batmobile.car," Scientific American, Jul 97).

How to Write Winning Ads on the Web
and Make a Gazillion

A study by one of the leading Internet advertising agencies, a New York company called DoubleClick, found that after the fourth impression of an ad on a Web surfer's attention, response rates drop from 2.7 percent to under 1 percent, creating "banner burnout"--indicating that the banner has a poor return on investment. What are some things that work? Bright colors help, and simple animation tends to increase response rates by 25 percent, and commands and questions like "Click here" or "Looking for a bargain?" increase them by 15 to 18 percent. But although offers of free goods and services can dramatically improve click-through, statements creating a psychological sense of urgency tend to decrease response rates (AlleyCat Information Sciences Inc., "It Pays to Double Click," AlleyCat News, July 97).

Book Industry Under Steady Pressure

For the second year in a row, sales of hardcover and paperback adult trade books have fallen by more than 5 percent, and the average rate of returns from booksellers was about 35 percent this year. Unlike various other industries, the book industry allows retailers to avoid most of the risk that a product will fail. Now, to protect itself from the "returns crisis," publishing companies are distributing fewer copies and limiting print runs in hopes of emphasizing marketing "efficiency." A Barnes & Nobe vice president for information technology says the book industry needs to "reduce the negative financial effects while modernizing the industry's basic business model to enter the 21st century" (New York Times, 7 Jul 97) .