“If only you could see what I have seen with your eyes”
—Blade Runner
Several Hairs on the Body of an Anopheles Moscito Larva viewed through Quanta Family instrument and shot by FEI Company
Quote and image found on But Does It Float
“The more technology becomes complicated inside, the more it has to be simple outside.”
Derrick de Kerckhove—professor, author and expert in the intersection of culture and technology
What is Internet Anyway?
Watch as NBC’s Today Show hosts struggle to explain and understand what the internet is in 1994. It’s amazing to realize how far we have come in just a few short years. Imagine where this thing called “the internet” will be in another 17 years.
The Internet hasn’t gone to College YET! I mean this was less than 17 years ago, I have often said we are underestimating this whole thing and this video reminds me why! I just think people dont grasp how young this whole movement and platform is! Just wait!
—Gary Vaynerchuk
“Good designers must always be avant-gardists, always one step ahead of the times. They should – and must – question everything generally thought to be obvious. They must have an intuition for people’s changing attitudes. For the reality in which they live, for their dreams, their desires, their worries, their needs, their living habits. They must also be able to assess realistically the opportunities and bounds of technology.”
Dieter Rams
KarmaTech - WESC
Several students in the Advanced Interface Design class at Hyper Island created KarmaTech as an embeddable RFID concept for WESC shoes. Once you register your shoes with WESC they imagine using the technology to give you access to exclusive events, automatic location based check-ins, and fun social media interactions. Where a platform like Nike+ is focused on performance and competition KarmaTech is simply social and fun.
If you’re interested in design, digital media or advertising and considering schools, definitely take a look at the Hyper Island program.
See a list of all the people involved in this concept.
Technologies of the Decade
Talented illustrator, designer and writer Frank Chimero was commissioned by IEEE to create illustrations of the top 11 technologies of the last decade. Above are the illustrations for digital photography, social networks and smart phones. It’s amazing to realize how quickly these technological breakthroughs integrated into our daily lives.
See the full set of illustrations on Flickr and read Frank’s original Tumblr post about the project.
Is 2011 the Dawn of America's New Optimism?
Writer and editor Bruce Nussbaum presents the case that we are now entering the “Twilight of Pessimism for America” and finally moving beyond the notion that America is on the decline. Although Nussbaum is writing specifically regarding the perception and attitude of Americans I believe that the same sense of optimism will be true in business, technology and the general view of the future.
Beneath the noise of politics, the Know-Nothingism, the anger, the arrogance of belief and the corruption masquerading as lobbying, another culture is being built in cities where the future is more evenly distributed an far more optimistic. It is where political leaders really lead, Gen Yers build their lives on their own platforms and people wait for the bad movie that is Washington to end. I’m betting that in the decade ahead, the signal that is America’s comeback will grow stronger and replace the current noise.
Here’s to a new optimistic year and era!
SOUR / Mirror
Japanese band SOUR along with a long list of creative, technical, and design credits created this unique music video that combines your Facebook, Twitter, geo-location and webcam data. I can’t say that I’m a fan of the music itself, but the technical execution is well done.
I can confirm that connecting to Facebook and Twitter does not auto-post anything to your accounts.
Apple Destroyed
After smashing an iPod Touch that his two boys constantly fought over artist and former Apple employee Michael Tompert realized he should do something with this piece of technology as liquid poured out of the shattered screen. The series of photographs were recently featured in a small San Francisco Gallery, Small Worms Gallery.
From an art critic’s point of view, the destroyed gadgets contain strains of Dadaism and Surrealism. Everyday products are turned on themselves and made to seem unfamiliar again.
Images found on Fubiz and full story on Michael Tompert and his art on LA Times.
The Internet? Bah!
A 1995 essay in Newsweek predicting that the Internet will end up being a big flop that will never take off.
Then there’s cyberbusiness. We’re promised instant catalog shopping—just point and click for great deals. We’ll order airline tickets over the network, make restaurant reservations and negotiate sales contracts. Stores will become obselete. So how come my local mall does more business in an afternoon than the entire Internet handles in a month? Even if there were a trustworthy way to send money over the Internet—which there isn’t—the network is missing a most essential ingredient of capitalism: salespeople.
Reblogged from Rick Webb
When Ideas Have Sex
Frog Design looks the way that ideas travel, reproduce and evolve in human history in their first essay for Fast Company. They make the case that the ability for humans to exchange ideas is key human invention.
In every case it was openness to exchange, within and among nations, that drove innovation (and predation by chiefs, priests, and thieves that shut it down). The same is true today. Countries that open their borders to the free exchange of goods and services and ideas and innovations flourish, while those that cut themselves off and seek economic self-sufficiency stagnate.
Netflix Instant Accounts For 20% of Peak U.S. Bandwith Use
I’m glad to see the death of “TV”. Since subscribing to Netflix I rarely turn on broadcast television, and it’s been almost a decade since we last subscribed to cable.
“People think that design is styling. Design is not style. It’s not about giving shape to the shell and not giving a damn about the guts. Good design is a renaissance attitude that combines technology, cognitive science, human need, and beauty to produce something that the world didn’t know it was missing.”
Paola Antonelli
Vintage Technology
Collection of 100+ 1970s Vintage desktop and pocket calculators.
Via Cool Hunting
“It’s not rocket science. It’s social science—the science of understanding people’s needs and their unique relationship with art, literature, history, music, work, philosophy, community, technology, and psychology. The act of design is structuring and creating that balance.”
Clement Mok
