Rain fell on Amsterdam last week, a 24-hour public transport strike paralyzed the city, and a digital signage application calling itself LOTA crashed in the elevators of the Mövenpick hotel.
Digital signage in elevators has become increasingly common in recent years, replacing the peeling menus and faded posters of yesterday with displays designed to capture the attention of passengers traveling between floors.
Whether LOTA chose to go offline in sympathy with the striking transport workers remains unclear. Indeed, the exact nature of LOTA itself is uncertain, though AG Neovo is known for its digital signage and video wall displays, touting its products as “Future-proof, Reliable and Durable.” A pop-up announcing an app in distress suggests, however, that at least one of those claims may have been somewhat overstated.
On the positive side, Android as an operating system is arguably a better choice than some of the digital signage setups seen in recent years. Consider a Paris elevator that repurposed what would otherwise be a fully functional PC to bombard passengers with advertisements — by comparison, this Dutch hotel opted for a considerably lighter solution. While Android no doubt carries its own bloat concerns, it remains positively featherweight next to Windows.
The elevator did not linger long enough for us to discover what would happen upon tapping the “Close app” prompt. At least, we believe it was a prompt — the vagaries of modern interface design make such determinations difficult (the rule should be simple: if it is a button, make it look like a button). And frankly, we are unlikely to press our luck against a screen on which someone has surely rested a weary head.
It is bad enough witnessing someone rummaging through their nostrils before selecting a floor, or wondering exactly where a finger may have been before it was used to press a button.
Still, there is a certain charm in seeing an Android app reflect the gloom of its surroundings — dark clouds, rain, industrial action, and now even the software itself apparently calling it a day.