How do you market Viagra in Saudi Arabia? That might sound like an uphill, if not impossible task. Fortunately, creativity loves to gobble (real or imaginary) constraints for food – there is simply nowhere creativity can’t penetrate. Check the video out!
Looking for a new car? How about this one – at 230 miles per gallon, it’s got quite some good fuel economy (relative to most cars which range between 15-30mpg). Seats two and guarantees stares down the street as you drive it. For me it really looks like someone’s vision of the future came true – the overall look of it would quite closely match what some futurists have sketched out some time ago (except cars still can’t fly…).
Jan Chipchase spotted over at his blog the usage of digital pricing tags in a supermarket in Tokyo. As he noted, there are many possibilities enabled by this new pricing information:
Why? The ability to dynamically change prices based on contexts such as time of day, customers in proximity, levels of stock, or the weather that you experienced five minutes ago creates so many opportunities. Small sign. Big implications.
Of course there’s also additional other conveniences like electronically updating your price, which means your staff won’t have to manually switch tags; or maybe prices of all chains of megamarts are fed back to a central server in real time, to make sure the there are no errant pricing in franchisees; or perhaps they mega ‘cheapest here or else’ marts can upload prices in real time to a social website for comparison.
But, if you have the power to dynamically change price, would you? Would the feeling of certainty and constancy be more important than the perceptively fluctuating or shifting price, which tends to lead to insecurities? Would the customers think they’re getting gouged when they have to pay a higher price responding to a certain context (even though they could’ve chose to think the other way – they got the discounts on other days)?
Food for thought…
With the idea of ‘Mine is better than yours’ as a central theme, Superest is a funny, continually running strip of comic in which two main comic artist draws a super hero that is better than the previous. Like scissors-paper-stone, except in this case, the subject are superheroes, and the loop isn’t closed at all.
This led to some wildly imaginative and funny characters, possessing a bizarre range of powers. Shown above are just a small slice of all the heroes. You’d probably want to head over and start at the very first hero, just to see how this whole thing unfolds.
This video serves up survey results of what is typically in a student’s life. The description doesn’t sound all that interesting, does it? Growing up, go to school, party, study a little, go online a lot…we probably think we know this age group pretty well already. Yet, there is something fundamentally different about students in that video that made it thought-provoking for me.
It could be the way this video was made and conceived – the survey questions themselves were mass-authored by all the participants in the survey itself – kinda like, Wikipedia asking itself questions. It could be how much ‘non-traditional’ learning and communication tools – like websites and emails – dominate the average student’s life as compared to ‘traditional’ tools like books and assignments.
In our face is a fundamental shift in the way we learn. Rigid and orthodox methods, like formal textbooks and school lessons, are rapidly giving way to much more flexible mediums. Indeed, as Sir Ken Robinson pointed out in this fantastic TED Talk, in the rapid development of the world what we learnt in school would have been obsolete the before we even graduate. Those who recognize this first (and act accordingly) would stand to gain.
The world record for speed cubing – solving the Rubik’s cube in the shortest time possible – is currently held by Thibaut Jacquinot from France. The guy in this video did it in 10.56 seconds, which is certainly not far away, and shows some really nimble fingers and a good Rubik’s cube (I’m sure the one that I played with didn’t turn that smoothly, and would probably get stuck half the time).
And check out the timer that he uses – pretty cool eh? Based on the text printed on the device, it seems like it was developed for another seemingly trivial but no less speed-obsessed sport: speed stacking.
Concept car shows are often reserved for stylish sports cars or next-generation hybrids, but Mitsubishi Fuso is showing all the love to a vehicle we commonly prefer not to see – the dump truck. Sleek, futuristic and dare I even say – glossy silver – are hardly the keywords one would associate with dump trucks, but Fuso’s Eco-D concept may just change your perception of what it could be.
What better way to turn your tots into design addicts and connoisseurs than this Alphabet of Design Classics series by Blue Ant Studio. Or simply as a great decoration in the spirit of humor and fun. The likes of apples, bananas and cats fades out to give way to Aalto, Bertoia and Castiliogni – each with a nicely done silhouette of an iconic design piece. Personally for me I would have put the LCW molded plywood chair for Eames, and perhaps Panton for P. Perhaps you’d have a different take too.
After publishing it on their blog and receiving great feedback, these posters are now available as prints too!
Wacom is about to roll out is the Cintiq 12WX (seen above). Depending on whether you’re an optimist or pessimist (?!), you can either think of it as a younger brother of the earlier Cintiq (a gorgeous 21inch sketch-able monitor), or a Wacom Intuous with a screen. Either way, it plugs a gap in digital sketching product line-up – the Intuous and Graphire tablets can be rather difficult to learn/master, as users are forced to adapt by sketching on one surface while looking at the monitor. The Cintiq, however, can be heard to maneuver, not portable and expensive. As expressed in their website,
All over the world, creative professionals use sketchbooks to express their first ideas. This is why the Cintiq 12WX was developed as if it was a sketchbook: With a smooth, flat surface. And with a light weight that enables you to use it on your knees and to show it around to others. As you would do with paper – digital paper.
No matter whether the Cintiq 12WX is on your desk or in your lap – just plug in and visualize your thoughts immediately with Wacom′s patented pen technology on a high-resolution LCD monitor. Which can be part of a multi-monitor environment, too.
I think Wacom might find itself hard-pressed explaining their reference to a designer’s sketchbook and ‘digital paper’ bit though. Few would doubt Wacom’s expertise in being able to capture and sense the motion of the pen to a high degree – with great tilt, pressure and rotation sensors, Wacoms are recognized as the best in industry for digital sketching inputs.
However, to live up to being a ‘digital sketchbook’, it still has a long way to go, because no matter how you spin it, this is still an input device only. Spontaneity is one of the key requirements in a sketchbook – inspirations may come quickly, perhaps even while in transit – having to boot up a laptop (remember, this is an input device – it has no independent power, memory or sketch programs), connect it (yes, cables and ports!), and start sketching, you’d be wondering why you’d want this as compared to other tablet laptops instead. Add the hefty price tag (estimated at about S$2500 or 1700US) and the appeal starts to fade rapidly.
So if you think of it as an improved input device, you’d probably be delighted if you can spare the moolah. But it’s nowhere near being a digital sketchbook. As a product design though, I thought it was very well executed – it carries the sleek and ergonomic design language that distinguishes Wacom’s product as a professional tool. What’s your take?
Following right on the trail of leveraging sun-and-shadow, here’s a really clever and engaging VW ad that also cleverly uses the sun. Pitching for the new EOS convertible automobiles, the shadow poster was mounted horizontally so that when the sun shines through the message is revealed – a message saying “Perfect day for a test drive.”
