Skip to main content

CES 2017: 50 Years of Being Connected

By

When the CES tradeshow debuted 50 years ago in New York, they presented 14 companies. Fast forward to 2016 and there were almost 4,000 exhibitors and 170,000 attendees eager to interface with new technology. I have personally been going to CES for over 15 years. Each year it gets bigger, louder and more crowded (except for 2009 which was depressing). If there is a common theme every year it is about making connections. Connecting people with technology and connecting technologies together.

This cable throne, similar to the Game of Throne's chair of swords, made quite a statement in Display Port booth. People were encouraged to sit in it and take pictures.

Here are some of the technologies from CES 2017 that will continue to keep us connected:

1) Smart Home Technology. Imagine being at the grocery store and you can't remember what you have in the refrigerator. No worries, check your phone which logs into the camera inside of the refrigerator. Smart home devices are now in 15% of new homes and it will be a $3.5 billion dollar business. Smart "connected" homes will keep you safe and protected as well as anticipate your every need.


2) Drones. There were many different drones but the Hover Camera was drawing a huge crowd. It is small and has a camera attached and follows the user based on facial recognition technology. Some called it your own "personal paparazzi". Their tagline is: "Your Foldable, Self-Flying Personal photographer". For just $599 you can download video of yourself to social media outlets to stay connected with all of your friends and family. It really makes a selfie stick look amateur. www.gethover.com


 3) Self-Driving Cars. CES reports that vehicle tech may be able to eliminate 90% of vehicular deaths in the United States. It seems counter intuitive doesn't it? Reportedly, technology has only caused more automobile accidents because we are busy texting, picking up phone calls and paying more attention to google maps than driving. But this new technology promises to provide parking assist, collision avoidance and emergency breaking just to name a few. Now instead of driving, we can stay connected with other media because we don't need to pay attention to the road.



4) Wearables. This product category was huge in 2016 and promises to continue to grow. Sales last year reached almost 48 million units. This technology goes beyond just tracking your steps. It can track everything from your mood, sleep habits and your pets. You stay connected with yourself and everything around you through an app on your phone or a device that looks like a piece of jewelry.



5) Augmented Reality. AR doesn't just mean gaming anymore. Imagine being able to redesign your kitchen and shopping in a pop up retail store all while sitting behind some goggles. This really stretches the idea of connecting because you are really connecting with a virtual world---not the real world. This is becoming more mainstream. There are 77% of consumers willing to purchase this technology



While all of this technology has the power to connect us all,  I can't help but notice how it also keeps us disconnected and disengaged. Nothing illustrated this better than when I was out to dinner after a long day at CES. We were at a Japanese teppan restaurant. These large community style dining areas are part theater because the chef entertains the diners with fancy knife skills and balancing acts. There was a family of five sitting to my left consisting of a father, mother, grandmother and two daughters. One of the daughters was celebrating her birthday. I couldn't help but notice that the father spent the entire dinner on his cell phone. He got up once to take a picture of his daughter blowing out a birthday candle.

This was a good reminder for me that while we are all connecting and engaging with all of this great life changing technology, don't forget to connect with real people along the way. Soon enough, robots will be taking our orders at restaurants and greeting us at Walmart.

(All of the statistics for this post were gathered from the CES site: http://www.ces.tech/Show-Floor)

Patty Jensen is Vice President of Account Services at JDA Inc, a graphic design firm that specializes in supporting companies' branding and retail efforts with a Unified Marketing approach. To learn more, click here.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Packaging: 10 Steps to a Better Process

By
1. Prioritize. Prioritize. Prioritize. When three people are talking to you, you can’t hear them all. The same is true for design. Visual priority must be established from the very beginning of the design process. If every item is given primary importance, nothing becomes important. The visual priorities are what drive how all creative will be judged. The design firm should include as part of their creative brief, a hierarchy of 5 communication points for the front of the package. This includes 1) brand 2) product name 3) why-to-buy statement 4) feature points 5) product image. 2. Come together. Everyone has an opinion, so clear project objectives are vital to any job. Consensus regarding the creative brief must be obtained from the people expected to judge the package design from within your corporation. Without this consensus, the design process will fall apart. Without clearly stated, agreed-upon objectives, you are not able to provide constructive feedback. As soon as you start t
1 comment
Read more

New and Not Necessarily Improved

By
A story in the March 3, 2009 issue of the LA Times regarding the unfavorably received new Pepsi brand redesign reminded me of another recent unsuccessful redesign—the one for Tropicana orange juice. A few months ago, I was in a Target store buying some orange juice. I usually get the Tropicana brand, and was disappointed when I didn't see any in the cases. I just saw a bunch of unfamiliar cartons that I immediately wrote off as "not Tropicana" and kept looking around. It was only during a second pass that I realized that these new cartons were indeed Tropicana. Wow, I thought, that's a pretty radical new look. Gone were any vestiges of familiarity--the funky old-style logo, and especially the orange with the straw stuck in it. The new carton is dominated by a large shot of a tasteful-looking (not necessarily tasty-looking) glass of orange juice, with the word "Tropicana" in an unfamiliar sans serif font and green color turned 90ยบ clockwise along the side. T
4 comments
Read more

Let Your Packaging Sell Your Product, Not a Funny Name!

By
So I ran across this product while I was traveling in NY and needed some earplugs.  I can't sleep without them. Earplugs are notoriously hard to find on shelf so I had to scan many products. I came across this product and got quite a chuckle. I don't think I need to explain why (To be fair, it was awhile ago, and the package design could have changed since then.): Zim's Crack Creme---we can assume that Zim is the pharmacist who created this all-natural herbal wonder cream (creme) for your crack. Or is that really what this means. Surly it couldn't. We design packaging and I couldn't help but analyze this package as I would for a client. The first thing we help our clients do is to prioritize the elements on the front of the package. What is the most important thing to communicate? The name? The brand? The why-to-buy? The features? Obviously, Zim felt the name of the product was most important. But if the name of the product doesn't really convey what it doe
4 comments
Read more