The MPAA's New Look

If you've watched any recent trailers, you might have noticed that the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA)'s splash screen has gotten a 2013 facelift.  

The all-too-familiar MPAA splash screen of olden days

MPAA adopting a contemporary look.

The first thing that stands out here is the obvious change of typeface. From what I can discern, they've thrown out the old and tired Helvetica for a modern looking typeface that is or at least closely resembles Gotham. We also see the removal of the awful drop shadows and a change in which word gets emphasized, from PREVIEW to APPROVED, which is more in line with their business of creating and controlling film guidelines. The MPAA's website reflects the transition toward a more "flat" design, a trend we are seeing more and more of.

I'm happy to see companies and organizations adopting this movement toward a cleaner presentation. While its still the worst four seconds of a movie trailer, at least I know a little bit of care went into it. My eyes thank you. 

A quick comparison shows that the new typeface is almost certainly Gotham.

Initial WWDC 2013 Reactions.

It was a big day for Apple. While the focus of the keynote this morning was on iOS7, I'd like to quickly mention the other great things coming down the pipeline:

Photo cred to ZDnet.com

• The new Macbook Airs as expected come packed with the new Haswell ULT processors that allow "All-day battery life" with 9 hours on the 11-inch model and 12 hours on the 13-inch. While prcing remains the same with the entry-level 11-inch at $999, the internal memory is boosted to 128GB. I would be lying if I didn't say I'm a little envious as I write here on a 2011 11-inch Air with a paltry 3-4 hours. No Retina, no surprise. Shipping Today.
• The Mac Pro received a much-deserved redesign, build entirely from the ground up. The Cylindrical shape reminds me of the old Harman Kardon Subwoofer or the Braun Aromaster KF 20 or even the Simplehuman Retro Step Can. It's a power-user's dream with around twice the power and speed. Did I mention itF's about 1/8th the size of the previous Mac Pro? It's a beauty and will be launching Sometime This Fall.

“Can’t innovate anymore my ass”

— Phil Schiller

• CaiWork for iCloud allows users to work on an iWork document (Pages, Keynote, Numbers) from both Macs and PCs through the web browser. 
• iTunes Radio is out as people expected, but perhaps less than people might have expected. Mirroring Pandora, the music discovery service lets users listen to and create stations of their favorite music and easily add it to their iTunes. The thing I'm impressed with is their decision to pair it with iTunes match. This means that those that have paid their $20 a year for iTunes match automatically get ad-free access to iTunes Radio. Please note: it's not called iRadio, please don't call it that).
• OSX Sea Lion, I mean Mavericks, is packed with features that unify OSX and iOS into a more comprehensive system. Maps on Mac, iBooks on Mac (finally), and iCal has dropped the leather look. Tabbed finder windows and file tagging are two features that may not be used by everyone, but the power-users will be more than happy to see additions such as these.

“No virtual cows were harmed in the making of this app”

— Craig Federighi

Photo cred to ZDnet.com

Now to iOS. Can I just begin by saying that Apple did an amazing job at keeping this all under wraps? It was only 12-ish hours before the launch that any of us seemed to have a clue as to what the new interface would look like. And boy did it blow the crowd away. surely, it's the biggest change since the original iPhone OS. The demo video narrated by Sir Jony Ive was as we might expect sultry to the point that it was erotic. He talks about stripping away the clutter to reveal something beautiful set to panning shots of the UI in all its flatness. The most striking piece of design is the parallax effect of the icons when tilting the device. The typography takes advantage of the retina display with a thinner and more elegant look to it but I'm conflicted about my feeling toward the looks of app icons. It might be that too much change at once can be a scary thing, but they seem more cartoony than seems normal for Apple, but then again, this is the new Apple.

Aside from the look and feel of the interface, iOS7 is implementing Control Center, whereby a quick swipe from the bottom shows settings like Do Not Disturb, WiFi and apps like the camera and calculator for quick toggling and launching. This is something that Android has has for a long time now and it's great to finally see it on iOS. Another obvious need was the ability to view notifications from the lock screen which is also in the latest iteration. Siri has matured with a broader range of search results, but no mention of integration with third-party apps. Shame. Siri has a new female voice as well as a male option. I've only touched on a few of the many features that are coming this fall in iOS7 and we'll see more about them in the months ahead.

 In conclusion, it's a huge leap in Apple's mobile operating system. But it's a necessary one. iOS no longer looks like it is designed by the Apple of 2013 but of a company that exists just a few years into the future. As Apple unifies services like Maps, Notifications and Messages across both operating systems, iOS7 clearly distinguishes itself from OSX and every version of iOS7 that came before it. I can't wait to see what developers will make of the new look. It's a new dawn of design and I welcome it.

App Review: Dispatch

Agile Tortoise's Drafts has revolutionized iOS in its ability to quickly send text from one place to the next. It's clean, fast and it lets you get back to work. Hon Cheng and Junjie have brought a similar sophistication to email with Dispatch for iPhone. 

In my experience, the majority of email that flows through my inbox has to leave not in the form of a response, but as an action. Actions in this case are defined as anything that needs to be somewhere else, either in the form of a todo, an item on a list, or a piece of reference material in a context outside of an inbox. The challenge of implementing a system like this on iOS is balancing power with simplicity. Dispatch's clean and minimalist design presents you with only the elements you need like and keeps everything else safely tucked away to the left ala Gmail. 

Dispatch was built around Merlin Mann's Inbox Zero which stresses the importance of Process and deciding what actions need to be taken to get that email out of the way.

Delete

Admit it, most of the email that you get you would be better off not ever recieving in the first place. To that I recommend unsubscribing from the myriad coupons and alerts that you unwitingly signed up for over the course of your life with email. Do it. For everything else, a partial swipe to the left shows a panel of actions you can take (mark as unread, star, etc.) while a full swipe quickly archives that email and moves you to the next one. 

Delegate/Defer

I'm slowly learning that there is no single system that can do everything that I want. I use Fantastical for Calendaring (although Cal from Any.Do looks enticing), Omnifocus for tasks and projects, and Listacular for lists. Switching between all of them though can be confusing and time-consuming and that's when Drafts and Dispatch become invaluable tools for reducing friction. Different emails require different actions. Currently supporting 14 apps, email content is quickly transferred to a place that makes sense for it to go as a task, an event or what have you. 

Respond/Do

Dispatch's Snippets further reduce friction through customizable automated responses and frequently used phrases. One of the keys to productivity (especially in the case of email), is to cut out all of the time and mental energy that is spent unnecessarily. For those that work in PR or Technical Support, this feature is killer.

Subtle audio/visual cues like the 'swooshing' between pages and a paper-like acordinan fold gives the clean design a personality that avoids being obtrusive. This a well as the focus on Inbox Zero's Process makes Dispatch my new email client of choice.

Update June 14, 2013: Dispatch now supports adding to Passbook and read it later via Pocket and Instapaper two major additions to an already fantastic app.