The looks and the lifestyle – Design by Community

GLOBAL – As part of our Design by Community challenge, we figured it’d be a good idea to canvas opinion on what different people want or expect from a concept device. First up, we’ve got Mikey Bee from NokNok.tv with his thoughts on display and user interface. We’re still in the early stages (we’ve barely got going) of this rather mammoth project, but already there’s been some excellent input from readers and bloggers alike. Read on to find out what tickles Mikey’s fancy.

The Looks and the Lifestyle – written by Mikey Bee, NokNok.tv
When you get posed a question like ‘What do you expect from a smartphone display?’ it’d be easy to get wrapped up in the science. After all, it’s part of my job to worry about details such as should it be capacitive or resistive, should it be touchscreen or not? However, while the science plays its part, I started to think how regular folk think about devices and for most people the science doesn’t matter, it’s all about the experience.

Let’s call it the ‘the Looks and the Lifestyle factor’, as the ideal screen needs to deliver on both fronts, not only in terms of size but also functionality. When it comes to looks, size plays a major part, as it needs to push and pull an ever increasing amount of data. The screen needs to be responsive and quick enough to handle switching between apps and Multi-tasking at a flash, as this is no doubt the future for all devices. No matter what size we settle for the interface needs to be instantly intuitive, so people feel comfortable with it.

So far I’ve only touched on touchscreens, as the future, as far as I see it, will be a touchy-feelie one. However I think my ideal device will have space for a non-touchscreen display too. One that comes with as true a colour gamut as possible, deliver Full HD resolution and generally be my portable movie and video chat screen.

The more I think about it, if I were to sit down with the Nokia design team right now, I’d be asking for a dual-screen device, the main display touch-sensitive and lightning fast, with the second my window on a high-def media player. After all, how cool would it be to be discussing you’re favourite movie via video chat on one screen while browsing the web or simply watching a movie on the other?