iPhone 5 Concept

A company called aatma studio has decided to construct a CGI video to show the potential features of the up and coming iphone 5. With features such as a lazer keyboard and holographic display, this would be the ulimate of ultimate phones if the features shown on this video were to come true. I don't even think it would surprise me if Apple were to use atleast one of these features on the new phone...I guess we'll just have to wait and see...

Exclusive Rights over Purple for Cadbury

Cadbury has fought off Nestlé over exclusive rights for the distinctive purple colour it has used on chocolate wrappers for more than 100 years. The Cadbury brothers are thought to have picked the colour as a tribute to Queen Victoria.

The group, which has been locked in a legal battle with its rival for three years, was granted a trademark for the tint – pantone 2865c – to be used on certain chocolate goods such as Dairy Milk in 2008. Nestlé challenged the ruling, arguing that the colour was not distinctive enough to receive a trademark.
The Swiss group's challenge appears to have failed after the registrar at the UK Intellectual Property Office this week ruled in Cadbury's favour, saying it had showed enough "distinctive character" for a trademark. One legal expert said that while it was an interim judgment, the decision was unlikely to be changed in the final report. Nestlé can appeal the decision.
A spokesman for Cadbury said the group was "pleased" with the ruling, adding that the colour was something those at the company "jealously guard".
In his ruling, Allan James, the registrar, said the colour purple had built a distinctive character associated with Cadbury. He added that the colour had been used in its advertising campaigns to distinguish the brand. One of the most popular of those campaigns in recent times was the use of a gorilla playing the drums. He rejected claims that Cadbury had registered the colour in bad faith as "absurd".
Fiona McBride, a partner at Withers & Rogers, described the decision as a "major relief" for Cadbury, saying its use of the colour was now "iron-clad and the brand will be unlikely to face further challenges over the use of the colour purple in the future".
Yet, executives at Kraft, which bought Cadbury in a controversial takeover deal earlier this year, will not get carried away with the victory. The trademark was limited to using the colour on its chocolate bars and chocolate drinks. It had not proved such a distinctive character in all confectionery chocolate, Mr James said, or for protection in relation to assortments such as its Roses chocolates. "Both sides have achieved a measure of success, Cadbury more so than Nestlé," he added.
Ms McBride said: "Colour registrations are notoriously difficult to obtain, largely because it can be difficult to prove sufficient use to demonstrate that the colour has become synonymous with the brand in the mind of the consumer."
Cadbury first applied to patent the colour in 2004, although it was not approved for another four years. Cadbury did try to stop the Australian confectioner Darrell Lea from using purple on its packaging. Three years ago, however, its complaint was rejected by the Federal Court in Melbourne.

Source : http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/cadbury-wins-right-to-the-colour-purple-6262717.html

We've got an app for that...

With the smartphone becoming an ever growing part of our world, it's no surprise apps are following the same trend. These days you can get an app for almost anything, and advertising is cropping up anywhere and everywhere for them. As I was walking through the train station the other day I spotted two lots of apps advertising, and only a metre apart! One is the Cross Country Train app, which is used to track trains, book tickets and check train timetables. The other was an app for Swift Cover car insurance...why it was in a train station I will never know. But it just shows the growing trend of apps and how they're going to evolve over the coming years, especially with the introduction of 3D phones and Augmented Reality.

The 'Super'market

Sitting here in Morrisons Cafe pondering about life, and I think I've found a trend in the business of 'Super'markets.
In all the super markets I have been in over the past year, only a hand full of small branches haven't had either a cafe or a petrol station contained within it's dull surroundings. The managers of supermarkets have obviously recognised a need for food areas and petrol stations in supermarkets...but why? Even in a smaller supermarket like this one, they have managed to fit a bigger than costa sized cafe and a 12 pump petrol station. And when the food is relatively cheap in price, and the petrol is the cheapest in the town, i'm not suprised that super markets across the country have turned to this business trend.

Let there be light!

So it's nearing Christmas, and the Christmas light switch on is a common event happening all around the country. Recently I attended the Christmas lights switch on in my home town, as I have done as long as I can remember. This got me thinking...why do we have lights at Christmas? Is it the fact that it gets darker at Christmas, and we need the light to cheer us up? Or is it too remind us of snow and to make us feel 'Christmasy'. Well, after a couple of minutes thinking about it...I still didn't know, so I decided to research where the tradition came from.  

Lights at the entrance to Stone High Street

According to Wikipedia, the tradition of using small candles to light up a Christmas tree dates back to about the the middle of the 17th century in Germany. However, it took two centuries for the for the tradition to become widely established. In the UK we didn't see the illuminated Christmas tree till the reign of Queen Victoria, but then again in 1881 the Savoy Theatre in London was the first to be lit entirely by electricity. From the 1950's onwards, lights were used more frequently in places other than on Christmas Trees. Strings of lights found there way into the home, with lights running across roof lines, door ways and fireplaces. In more recent times there have been grand illumination ceremonies involving complex illuminated animation, such as the Blackpool illuminations. As the lighting technology is so advanced today...what could be in store for the future of Christmas lights?

I bought it on eBay...

I was searching eBay the other day, and found that more and more clothing companies are turning their attention to eBay to sell stock they could otherwise not. Companies like Schuh, Superdry, House of Fraser, Sports Direct and Bench are using their ebay stores to sell old stock, items with slight defects or just as another outlet to sell normal stock. In most cases the companies eBay store page is just like any normal eBay page, but in some cases they just look like an extension of their own website e.g. Superdry (as shown below). 

This just shows how eBay has become a valuable asset people and companies alike, and how using it has almost become a trend in itself. 

Here are a few links to the eBay stores I have viewed : 

Superdry : http://stores.ebay.co.uk/The-Superdry-Store

Schuh : http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Schuh-Branded-Shoes-Online?_rdc=1

Bench : http://stores.ebay.co.uk/bench-outlet

And so this is Christmas...well nearly

If you somehow hadn't noticed, 'Christmas products' have been filling up our shelves for a while now. Even before Halloween items were cluttering up our supermarkets, Christmas orientated products have been creeping in everywhere...especially in supermarkets. In my local Morrisons they've had a dedicated Christmas isle since early November...utter madness! Instead of seeming like a grumpy old man over the matter, I decided to check out how the Christmas designs differ from the 'normal' everyday products, and what changes have been made. The first image, shows the comparison between a normal Family Pack sized Pringles and the Christmas design version.

As you can see from the above image, they are pretty similar in terms of colour and typeface. Only the subtle changes like the snow in the background and to the pringle shape have really been changed, with a few more subtle changes elsewhere. The image to the left is to show a couple of Christmas designs, and in comparing the three the obvious similar theme is snow.