http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/1,1249,600125474,00.html

Although this article seems to forget that Motorola is the company that made pagers cool when they started making them in different colors, the core message is still true. Design sells what technology can't.

I got to go on a tour of Motorola's headquarters as a college student in 1997. Our guide told of an engineer at Motorola who one day decided to paint his black pager bright yellow. All of a sudden all his coworkers wanted one and then Motorola started releasing pages in all sorts of colors, and then clear plastic, etc. Still got your pager somewhere? Man, that fad sure died a quick death once cell phones became cheap. I remember when I still had both a cell phone and a pager. I think that lasted a few days.

Now Motorola is making waves with its Razor phone, which I don't think I'm going to buy. For $450 I'll just get a Treo or something. Or more likely nothing.

But the point is that although Motorola has always been known for decent, if not outstanding, technology, in the end it's not the technology selling the devices and putting Motorola on top of the heap, it's design. True, if the technology stunk the design probably wouldn't go too far (probably, but not necessarily, just look at Volkswagen), but put all the technology you want in an ugly package and it won't sell either unless the technology is so compelling design becomes irrelevant. But in this age of quickly progressing technology design becomes the area where a company can develop a true competitive advantage. Competitors may copy your technology, but they'll have a hard time duplicating design or a well-made marketing campaign.

And yet people still think artists can't make any money...

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