Wilson, who was formerly global creative director at Nike, used Kickstarter in 2010 to raise nearly $1 million for TikTok and LunaTik, which turn an iPod Nano into a watch. 13,512 people backed the project to create what Wilson describes as “conversation-starting products.” The watchbands are now sold in Apple Stores.

In large part, though, sales have spread through word of mouth. “We’ve heard through the community how people are actually selling our product on the street or in bars,” Wilson told GigaOM staff writer Ki Mae Heussner at GigaOM Roadmap. Some fans have even printed business cards with the correct spelling of LunaTik to pass out to other people. “I’ve been thinking for the last year, how do I pay these people to become the largest sales force out there?”

Minimal is launching an app to “mobilize” people and pay them cash to sell the TikTok and LunaTik. The company is submitting the app to the iTunes Store this week. “Figuring out how to distribute cash instead of rewards or points” took awhile, Wilson said, but eventually the company plans to expand the technology to other brands.

Check out the rest of our RoadMap 2012 live coverage here, and a video recording of the session follows below:

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This clip is part of an interview we did with McCue for our RoadMap book, which we’ll be giving away to all attendees of RoadMap, our conference focused on design in the age of connectedness that will take place on November 5th in San Francisco. Speakers include the CEO’s of Instagram, Pinterest, and Tumblr, designers like Yves Behar, Scott Wilson and Tony Fadell, and many others (schedule and speakers here). We have a limited number of tickets, so reserve yours now here.

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Blankenship sat down with us this month to chat about some of his thoughts on the future of the store and this is a short clip of his thoughts. We’re using the bulk of the interview (including his work with Steve Jobs) for our RoadMap book, which we’re giving to all RoadMap attendees. Come hang with us on Nov. 5 and hear from Blankenship as well as other speakers on design in the age of connectedness, including Obvious CEO Evan Williams, fuseproject founder Yves Behar, ToyTalk CEO Oren Jacob, Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom, Tumblr CEO David Karp, MINIMAL founder Scott Wilson and many others.

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It all started when designer Scott Wilson created the Tik-Tok strap that essentially turned the square-shaped iPod nano into a watch. The success of the project also put a spotlight on Kickstarter and its use as a platform for creating gadgets. Nano watches became somewhat of an obsession for many in Silicon Valley. Apple, too, offered up many watch interfaces, which stoked the fires of imagination and a whole slew of products followed. Many even dreamed up scenarios where Apple ushered a new world of wearable computing. The release of the new seventh generation iPod nano now means curtains for the movement.

Last week when I had a chance to appear on John Gruber’s The Talk Show podcast, our conversation turned to watches in general, and iPod nano in specific. I made it clear in no uncertain terms that while I celebrated the ingenuity of folks such as Wilson who created marvelous products, I didn’t much care for the iPod nano watches themselves.

Actually I don’t really care for any digital watches. I am first and foremost, a lover of mechanical watches, lovingly crafted by hand and with meticulous care.  And to be more specific, I love German-made watches, especially from some of the smaller brands. It is fairly easy to see time these days; from microwaves to mobile phones, time is always blinking at us only a glance away. For me, mechanical instruments of time are not just for telling time, but giving time a heartbeat.

Perhaps that is why you won’t find me crying over the loss of iPod nano watches due to the new design. However, there is an upside to the introduction of the new design: They are now out of production and hence a rare commodity, which means they can command a decent after-market price, much like limited edition time-pieces that see their demand increase in direct proportion with their rarity.

As for the seventh generation iPod nano itself, since it doesn’t have a network connection–either WiFi or Bluetooth–I don’t find it very interesting. The new iPod Touch – now that is something to write home about.

Update: As a reader pointed out, iPod Nano does indeed have a Bluetooth connection and it makes is useful for music playback at the very least, but it is not that interesting to me. That said, error is regretted. 

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The Antik is a nano-shaped quartz time-keeper that comes in one of five distinct flavors. The idea is that you can use your nano-compatible watch bands without the iPod, should you like the design of the wrist-mounts but not the downsides of limited battery life and screens that require a button-press to read. The Antik is cheaper than a nano, too, at $69.95.

I was initially hoping the Antik would work in all my iPod nano watch band accessories, especially the Deckster, but alas. the protective glass covering the watch face protrudes a bit farther on the Antik than it does on the iPod. Likely that won’t be a problem for a lot of accessories, but the only bands it’s guaranteed to work with are the TikTok, LunaTik and LYNK models made by Minimal. Since those are some of the best nano watch bands available, that’s really only a small flaw.

The Antik has no date; features a simple, two-hand design, with a nice cut-out effect for the numbering; and is water-resistant to 30 meters, which is definitely not true of your nano. The designs for the shipping product were chosen by Minimal shoppers, and come in both black and silver finishes to match your band of choice. The black is real black, too, unlike the finish on Apple’s graphite nano, so it’ll better match black wristbands.

All the face designs are better looking than the virtual ones provided by Apple on the nano, in my opinion. And while the idea of wearing an iPod as a watch is still likely to be the primary factor driving nano watch band accessory sales, the idea of a relatively cheap, modular watch face and case system definitely means Minimal’s LunaTik brand has legs to outlast Apple’s notoriously mercurial design tastes when it comes to its iPods.

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