Monocle has a great photo feature in May 2007’s issue about “the brands that make our lives work”. In this particular instance, Monocle examines the Finnish fire department, and looks at what brands are represented when laying out the department’s equipment.

In addition to the obvious infrastructure tie, I think it’s interesting to look at the brands (i.e. companies) that are behind our daily lives. That’s infrastructure itself. Of course, it’s from Europe where they have a broader view of what’s behind the scenes, and they aren’t afraid to bring it out into the open…

(Though you can’t see the brands due to Monocle’s subscription requirement, know it’s mostly Siemens and other European companies. No surprise… but do pick up Monocle if you see it!)

I feel it’s a mainstay of any modern person’s holiday experience: returns. You asked for a medium, but need a small, or got a 38″ belt, but need the 34″. At least, that’s my story. As somebody interested in processes and corporate interactions (and making them better), I found two really obvious needs at two separate retailers this holiday season.

Problem one: American Apparel. They have nice products; they are well made, in America with supposedly sweat-shop free labor. “It’s consumption you can feel good about.” I asked for a blue velour top of theirs for Christmas. I got it, but it was a little too big. I decided to take it back to the local A.A. retail store that is ~1 mile from my home to get a small instead.

When I went in (with the receipt, by the way), the clerk told me they could not accept returns of products ordered through the website. “We’re two separate companies. We don’t take returns from the online store. They have to be sent back to the online store returns department.” Are you kidding? “Two separate companies?” WTF? But it gets better…

Today, I get an E-mail that my return has been received by the returns processing center. Rad. The disposition of my return? Backordered. The replacement item is backordered!?!? So let me get this straight: customers can’t return products ordered from the online store to the local retail store (even though every other store allows this), *and* they want me to waste my time, money and fuel sending something back to California (when they are probably going to send another back to my local store eventually to restock), *and* they are going to waste fuel, money and time of theirs sending me something (from California) I could have picked up less than one mile from my home? Wow. That’s a lot of inefficiencies–and it frustrates customers. Seems like a no-win on everybody’s part. The fix is really easy, too.

Problem two: maybe not really a problem, but it could be improved. The story is that I received a 38″ belt from Urban Outfitters for Christmas. I really needed the 34″ belt. I went to the local store and, unlike American Apparel, they accepted the return (without a receipt), and issued me a gift card. Fair enough. I then, conveniently, used this card online to order a replacement in the right size. So far my experience was great, except when I got the belt, it looked sort of “dead”.

Physically, it was in good shape–but it looked “manufactured” and untouched by any human. Intellectually, I think we all know the items we buy are not made just for us–but we like to think so. I think we all yearn for the sense that a product is perfect for (just) us and somehow “special”. That “necessary illusion” is broken when you receive merchandise with tracking barcodes and protective plastic wrappers still on them. When a company like Urban Outfitters tries so hard to make shopping an “experience” (in their retail stores), why do they break the experience this way? I guess the alternative is to remove the wrappers and risk damage during shipping, but how about tissue paper? Or branded wrapping? Isn’t consumption supposed to feel *good*?

A few weeks ago, Alex and I found a Dyson DC-07 in the trash in Squirrel Hill. We, of course, picked it up–it’s a $400 vacuum! It smelled rather musty, and it was caked with mud in a few places; it was also missing the footplate, the hose on the bottom, and the attachments. But it started–and it sucked. So far, so good, I thought.

I took it completely apart (you need a Torx driver to do so), soaked any plastic pieces I could in vinegar water and wiped the rest with the same. I ordered the two replacement parts for ~$30, and put the thing back together. It ran! Sure enough, the canister fulled with hair and dirt as I moved it around the floor. What do you know? Resurrected from the trash to achieve vacuuming greatness once again…

But one question remained: is the Dyson really better than any other “standard” vacuum? Consumer Reports says “no.” But I wanted to try a simple experiment myself. If I vacuum the floor with my regular vacuum, a Sharp “Twin Power” vacuum, and then vacuum with the “much better” Dyson, will I get a significant amount of additional dirt that the Sharp missed?

The results: not really. The Dyson did pick up an additional amount of hair, but I’m not sure it’s enough to warrant spending $400. Consumer Reports says to buy a Kenmore–it’s the best value for the money, according to them. Frankly, I was appalled at how flimsy the Dyson was. Everything on it is plastic. For $400, I wanted to see at least some cheap metal. On top of that, it has *stickers* on it for various notices/warnings. Stickers? Come on, Dyson. I thought the construction left much to be desired. The only innovation I see on the Dyson is the clear dust bin. It’s surely been imitated by every other manufacturer, and it gives you the thought of, “Wow, that was in my carpet?” Previous vacuums assumed you didn’t want to see the dirt, and hid it in a disposable bag. Props to Dyson for figuring out that a clear dust bin sells millions of vacuums.

Back to the test, look at the pictures for yourself, then look at YouTube and Google for others who debate the matter. If it doesn’t help you buy a better vacuum, at least it’s good for a laugh…

I’ve been really busy at work lately, feverishly working on a year-long project that is being shoe-horned into the last few weeks of my employment. We’re working with a design firm to design the interactions and visuals of the site, and I’m building it. Ugh.

One of the things the designers frequently bring up is “open source”. “There’s an open source package that does that, so it should be easy…” is often the predicate to their argument. Open source also came up during my interview with eyebeam yesterday. The director described the lab and process there as “open source”–they like to distribute information openly and freely. Sounds good!

While I agree with many of the philosophies of open source (but not the elitism), I am now starting to shudder when I hear the term. First, the designers just don’t understand how software works. They specify many rich (i.e. AJAX, confirm dialogs, visually rich UI, etc.) interactions–open source packages are usually ugly. Usually. One can *easily* spend as much time required to rewrite a piece of functionality, integrating and modifying an open source package to do the same task up to specification. Open source does not mean something’s been “done”. Open source packages are more like software libraries than finished projects–they provide handy routines/modules, but aren’t usually finished in and of themselves. Unless you are okay with the usually conservative, sometimes useless default UIs and settings they “ship” with.

Hearing the words “open source” from eyebeam made my eyes roll because it’s now also become a synonym for freely, publicly disseminated anything. And I’m not really arguing with that part of it, nor the philosophy behind it. But eyebeam doesn’t open source everything they make, as promised. Take their WaveBubble project (essentially a cellular phone jammer) for instance (here or here). I know it’s illegal, but I want to build one. Lady Ada (the author) says the project will “never be available as a kit due to FCC regulations”. Okay. But I still want to build one. Schematic, please? How about a parts list? I’m pretty technically savvy (not with electronics, granted), but I can’t get the information.

Like most “open source” projects, maybe I’m not in the “committer’s club”, but I ask, “does anybody have the ‘open source’?”

When I went into Sephora (a cosmetics store, for those unfamiliar with it) with Alex, I had a realization: they sell what amounts to dust. Maybe contained in another medium (i.e. a cream), but it’s all essentially “dust”. And they sell it for a lot of money. Thinking further, I thought of laser printer toner, and the similarities between cosmetics and toner: both are special “dust”, and both cost upwards of $100 for one unit/container of it. Is there something about producing this “dust” that makes it expensive, or is it just the markup the manufacturers can achieve because of our ignorance or addiction to style (in the case of toner, addiction to the name brand of the OEM)? And why isn’t there generic cosmetics, analogous to generic toner cartridges?