Vestalife "Firefly" iPod players are on display during a press event for the 2010 International Consumer Electronics Show January 5, 2010 in Las Vegas, Nevada. . The Mantis, Vestalife's newest in it's line of docks for iPods featuring speaker 'wings' that flip out, will be available for USD 179. CES, the world's largest annual consumer technology tradeshow, runs from January 7-10. AFP PHOTO / Robyn Beck (Photo credit should read ROBYN BECK/AFP/Getty Images)ROBYN BECK/AFP / Getty Images
Let me tell you about my favourite product from CES so far.
It's an iPod dock. It's called the Firefly.
From the front, it looks like a robotic bee wearing a fencing mask. Flip it open and it holds your iPod. The black mesh eyes fold out to become speakers.
I'm pretty sure there are plenty of docks out there that will give you better sound quality. It's not that the Firefly sounds bad, it's just that the MIT grads at BOSE do a much, much better job at that sort of thing.
So when I asked the product rep at Vestalife what makes the company's product line any different from the hordes of iPod docks storming the market right now, he just said: "It's the cutest thing there is."
And he's right. Vestalife's iPod docks are really cool-looking.
Beyond the 3D TVs everyone here is trying to shove into your living rooms, there's a real welcome trend going on at CES this year: good design. A lot of it is being driven by smaller firms, who can't compete on size or scope with the Dells and Microsofts of the world.
Another example: the folks at Pure . They make Internet radios. A lot of people make Internet radios, and the Pure PR reps will happily tell you about all the wondrous innovations that supposedly make theirs better. But take a look at their Evoke series, for example. The devices look like what a guy in the 50s thought we'd all be listening to on the moon by now. It may not be to everyone's taste, but it's different, and somebody somewhere thought about how it should look.
It's not just the small firms that are doing good design work. Some of the LG flatscreen TVs are stunning (although there's a bit of a constraint there in terms of what you can do with a TV. To modify a quote from Spinal Tap: "It's like, how much more flat could this be? And the answer is none. None more flat"). But the design trend works really well for smaller companies in some cases.
Take iPod docks: Sure, the BOSE product sounds better. But you pay a premium for it, and a lot of folks have iPods filled with Jane's Addiction bootlegs recorded on a cassette in a nightclub bathroom 20 years ago - that stuff won't really make use of all a high-end dock has to offer. So if a smaller company can come in with a product that does a decent job tech-wise and looks better doing it, there's probably a market out there for that.