New advertising campaign by T-Mobile

At 11 o'clock on Thursday 15 January around 350 people broke into a choreographed dance routine in London's Liverpool Street Station for the shooting of a new advertising campaign by T-Mobile.
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Watch the TV ad

The Invisible Force Powering Today's Most Visible Green Brands

"Green" has gone mainstream, and for many companies caring for the environment is not just a philosophy, it's a marketing strategy. So how does a company that's genuinely committed to green principles differentiate itself from its greenwashing competitors?

Click image to enlarge.

Brand expert Richard Seireeni interviewed over two dozen "ecopreneurs" from a broad range of industries - home improvement, transportation, household products, food and beverage, energy, real estate, finance, and fashion. The collective experience of leaders such as Gary Hirshberg of Stonyfield Farm, Jeffrey Hollender of Seventh Generation, and the grandsons of Dr. Bronner, as well as other green experts, are a rich source of wisdom for green businesses getting off the ground or for any business aiming to improve its environmental performance.

The result of these interviews is the discovery of "The Gort Cloud" - a term coined by the author that describes the vast and largely invisible network of NGOs, trendspotters, advocacy groups, social networks, business alliances, certifying organizations, and other members of the green community that have the power to make or break new green brands. Read more...

MIT's Sixth Sense Machine Makes Reality Better

By: Kit Eaton
Augmented reality on smartphones may well be a killer app, but MIT's Fluid Interfaces group is already moving beyond the confines of a GPS-capable cellphone to create a data-driven "Sixth Sense."
The group, part of MIT's Media Lab, designed a device that gathers data on the environment around the user, searches for information using the Internet as a data store, aggregates the results and presents it back to the user via a display. Think of it as a meta-data system for real life.
Dr. Pattie Maes demonstrated the system at the TED conference. It comprises an off-the-shelf webcam, mirrors, smartphone and a pico-projector all hung on a lanyard. The device recognizes the movements of the user's hands via the webcam (and color-coded finger-gloves worn on index finger and thumb,) enabling gesture-commands like the classic "frame" gesture which makes the device snap a photo.
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Wireless Electricity Is Here (Seriously)

I'm standing next to a Croatian-born American genius in a half-empty office in Watertown, Mass., and I'm about to be fried to a crisp. Or I'm about to witness the greatest advance in electrical science in a hundred years. Maybe both.

Either way, all I can think of is my electrician, Billy Sullivan. Sullivan has 11 tattoos and a voice marinated in Jack Daniels. During my recent home renovation, he roared at me when I got too close to his open electrical panel: "I'm the Juice Man!" he shouted. "Stay the hell away from my juice!"

He was right. Only gods mess with electrons. Only a fool would shoot them into the air. And yet, I'm in a conference room with a scientist who is going to let 120 volts fly out of the wall, on purpose.

"Don't worry," says the MIT assistant professor and a 2008 MacArthur genius-grant winner, Marin Soljacic (pronounced SOLE-ya-cheech), who designed the box he's about to turn on. "You will be OK." Read more...

By Paul Hochman, Fast Company

Fast Company sets the agenda, charting the evolution of business through a unique focus on the most creative individuals sparking change in the marketplace. By uncovering best and "next" practices, the magazine and website helps a new breed of leader work smarter and more effectively.

Comics grammar and tradition

Comic book lettering has some grammatical and aesthetic traditions that are quite unique. What follows is a list that every letterer eventually commits to his/her own mental reference file. The majority of these points are established tradition, sprinkled with modern trends and a bit of my own opinion having lettered professionally for a few years now. The majority of these ideas have been established by Marvel and DC, but opinions vary from editor to editor, even within the same company. I'm often asked to bend or break these rules based on what "feels" best, or more likely, the space constraints within a panel. Read More...

by Nate Piekos

Special thanks to Todd Klein, Clem Robins, Scott Allie and Jason Arthur for their time and contributions.

DESIGNING *for humans: Ergonomics for Interaction Designers: Part 1

Firstly, this is not about adjusting your chair so that you're not slumped over the screen when working on a Flash prototype (although office ergonomics is a very important subject). Rather, the topic of discussion is the increasing value of ergonomics knowledge to the interaction designer. Ergonomics is necessary for 3-dimensional, tangible product design where issues of physical fit and comfort are critical. But for interaction designers in the 2-dimensional world of the display screen, ergonomics has largely been...irrelevant. For example in most cases, interfaces are designed for existing, defined hardware that are out of the control of the interaction designer. But things are changing... Read more...

Ergonomics for Interaction Designers: Part 2

Ergonomics for Interaction Designers: Part 3

Welcome to the Human Factors Professional Interest Section of the Industrial Designers Society of America website. This is one of several IDSA professional interest section sites.

The aims of the Human Factors (HF) section are to promote interest, knowledge, and responsibility for the cognitive, ergonomic, and perceptual aspects of product design and use.

The Next Digital Experience--Davos Session.

I’m sitting in front of a panel with Chad Hurley of YouTube, Mark Zuckerber of Facebook (wearing a tie unde a fleeze sweater), Shantanu Narayen, of Adobe, Hamid Akhavan of T-Mobile International, Eric Clemens, Wharton, Mike Arrignton of TechCrunch and Craig Mundie of Microsoft in a session of social networking and the future of mobile. It’s a packed room with a mob outside wanting to come in. Read more...
Posted by: Bruce Nussbaum on January 30

About Bruce Nussbaum

Want to stop talking about innovation and learn how to make it work for you? Bruce Nussbaum takes you deep into the latest thinking about innovation and design with daily scoops, provocative perspectives and case studies. Nussbaum is at the center of a global conversation on the growing discipline of innovation and the deepening field of design thinking. Read him to discover what social networking works—and what doesn’t. Discover where service innovation is going and how experience design is shaping up. Learn which schools are graduating the most creative talent and which consulting firms are the hottest. And get his take on what the smartest companies are doing in the U.S., Asia and Europe, far ahead of the pack.