Dave Haynes - The Exit Interview With Invidis

Digital signage's resident skeptic hands off Sixteen:Nine after two decades

Dave Haynes is handing Sixteen:Nine, the digital signage publication he founded in 2006, to Invidis. Two decades covering a small, once embryonic industry convinced him that usefulness outlasts spectacle and that marketing claims need checking firsthand. That skepticism made the publication required reading for newcomers and shapes his view that LED is turning screens into architecture.

Takeaways

• Invidis takes over Sixteen:Nine as Haynes slows. Long-time content partner Invidis will edit and manage the publication, now owned by Spectreo, with its archive of more than 8,000 posts. Haynes, 67, will write occasionally as a guest editor, keep attending ISE and dial back to side gigs.
• Boring but useful signage outlasts the wow factor. Haynes says eye candy has a very short shelf life. Some of the best screens show queue lengths, telling people one line takes five minutes and another twelve, or show whether washrooms are occupied.
• LED is turning displays into building materials. From around 2011 Haynes predicted LED would supplant flat panels, and he praises it for creating facades. Skylines in China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Seoul show what is possible, while Dubai is just a crazy place. True micro LED remains in its infancy.
• Check factories, not manufacturers' marketing. Haynes visited display factories in Taiwan and China, including a week in Taiwan in October, because manufacturer marketing fudges facts. He faults technical companies whose hired marketers simply repeat executives' overly technical language.
• Sixteen:Nine grew out of frustration with buzzwords. Haynes founded it in 2006 because signage writing was buzzword bingo. A Google ad first earned about $37 a quarter, but inbound advertising grew until it let him cut back consulting. Companies now tell new staff to read it daily.
• Newcomers should learn the business and stay skeptical. Haynes saw early that signage would become mission critical and fundamental to how retailers design spaces, when few understood it. He advises newcomers to read trade press skeptically and ask about business applications.

From rock reporter to signage editor

1. Started in 1979 as a Winnipeg Free Press rock reporter, interviewing Billy Joel and Ozzy Osbourne, then moved into editing and took the paper online in 1995.
2. Left after management dismissed his warnings about the internet and joined Elevator News Network in 1999, rising to vice president of operations before a US merger ended his role.
3. Launched his own screen company in Toronto's underground walkways, an idea he says came ten years too early.