Little Grey Cells #7… Audiences want things faster. A one-way communication broadcast doesn’t deliver on that

Simon Gunning is Global Head of Digital Media and Technology at advertising agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty (BBH). We catch up with him, taking a good look into his Little Grey Cells…

When did you first get into tech?

I worked in the record business for long time, managing record producers and artists, and it was clear that it was an industry that was getting into trouble. At the same time, billions of pounds were spent trying to prevent the Y2K disaster, and the dot com bubble was growing. So I went to work for a company called Flextech television, which became Virgin Media television.

Quite extraordinarily I was appointed head of business development, and my job included setting up web sites for the four biggest channels in pay TV at the time. I had to set up their presence online, in mobile telephony and red button interactivity, which was seen to be the future of the world as we then knew it. Continue reading

No jargon, people who want to code come from all walks of life

* Blazing a trail based on empowerment through knowledge of code, Kathryn Parsons is co-founder of Decoded, teaching anyone to code in a
day. Little Grey Cells peers inside the mind of a 2012 digital mover and shaker.

Contrary to popular belief people who want to understand how to code come from all walks of life…  

We have had students, teachers, politicians, entrepreneurs, brands, CEOs of FTSE 100 companies…we even had a very well-known Hollywood director get in contact recently (his latest film is going to be about hackers!). Code is not the preserve of a select few, it is a creative and strategic skill too. Continue reading

Little Grey Cells #4… No jargon, people who want to code come from all walks of life

* Blazing a trail based on empowerment through knowledge of code, Kathryn Parsons is co-founder of Decoded, teaching anyone to code in a
day. Little Grey Cells peers inside the mind of a 2012 digital mover and shaker.

Contrary to popular belief people who want to understand how to code come from all walks of life…  

We have had students, teachers, politicians, entrepreneurs, brands, CEOs of FTSE 100 companies…we even had a very well-known Hollywood director get in contact recently (his latest film is going to be about hackers!). Code is not the preserve of a select few, it is a creative and strategic skill too. Continue reading

Little Grey Cells #2… any implied ‘how you should do it’ – you should throw away

* Anthony Rose has been inventing since his teens. Having been hired by the BBC to execute the iPlayer and now having launched the Zeebox, Monty’s Outlook catches up with him for a look at his Little Grey Cells:

Good digital design is all about:

Creating propositions that fulfil their audience’s need, are easy for the man in the street to understand and use, and that never make you feel foolish or frustrated.

I got into technology when I was about 12 years old:

I made a hot belt surface mount reflow machine and a robot pick-and-place machine. It was a robot system to assemble circuit boards with miniaturised technology – probably not something the average school kid had in his bedroom.

I designed circuit-boards for Panasonic and Apple. I made ones that were explosion-proof and that could go down coal mines, and I made consumer electronics. I formed my own one-man company – and then at some point, I figured I needed to grow the company or figure out something else to do.

Maybe I was tired of getting my hair burnt with the soldering iron, but a friend said there was an opportunity to get into real-time 3D graphics, and put together a software team making interactive movies, for the SEGA platform.

In the 1990s I decided to switch from hardware to software. I have been in consumer media propositions since then. First with real-time 3D graphics, then with a digital music store, then Kazaa, then with BBC iPlayer and now on Zeebox. Continue reading

Little Grey Cells #2… any implied 'how you should do it' – you should throw away

* Anthony Rose has been inventing since his teens. Having been hired by the BBC to execute the iPlayer and now having launched the Zeebox, Monty’s Outlook catches up with him for a look at his Little Grey Cells:

Good digital design is all about:

Creating propositions that fulfil their audience’s need, are easy for the man in the street to understand and use, and that never make you feel foolish or frustrated.

I got into technology when I was about 12 years old:

I made a hot belt surface mount reflow machine and a robot pick-and-place machine. It was a robot system to assemble circuit boards with miniaturised technology – probably not something the average school kid had in his bedroom.

I designed circuit-boards for Panasonic and Apple. I made ones that were explosion-proof and that could go down coal mines, and I made consumer electronics. I formed my own one-man company – and then at some point, I figured I needed to grow the company or figure out something else to do.

Maybe I was tired of getting my hair burnt with the soldering iron, but a friend said there was an opportunity to get into real-time 3D graphics, and put together a software team making interactive movies, for the SEGA platform.

In the 1990s I decided to switch from hardware to software. I have been in consumer media propositions since then. First with real-time 3D graphics, then with a digital music store, then Kazaa, then with BBC iPlayer and now on Zeebox. Continue reading