This week's announcement that OLPC's conceptual XO-3 tablet computer design would launch late this year, brings the OLPC initiative full circle. It's original vision inadvertently ignited the netbook market for lo-fi, connected computers which in turn begat Chrome OS and iPad, culminating in OLPC's closing the loop with its own tablet. Ironically, the original XO-1 was at times more […]
I’ve long been in two-minds about the OLPC project. As a source of technical innovation, the XO-1 laptop has been a sensation; from mesh networking, clever power management to the dual-mode screen and the Sugar interface, Yves Behar‘s iconic green design has distilled some of the best-in-class electronics into a unique product. Indeed, the price […]
I was recently asked to help a client develop an Arabic language edition of their web product. They have strong brand with a great contemporary aesthetic and some Web 2.0 flava, but there is a dearth of contemporary Arabic typefaces that would enable their brand to retain its design DNA once translated. Aside from Saad […]
Alfonso Cuarón’s Children Of Men was one of the best films I’ve seen this year…great acting, a poignant and hopeful story, a haunting score and a pair of breathtaking set pieces, shot in a single take. Unlike movies such as Minority Report and Blade Runner, the world inhabited by Cuarón’s characters is realised with much […]
Ian forwarded me an intriguing post on rapid product design from Kathy Sierra’s Creating Passionate Users – How to host a product/feature design party. I love the contrast between a dry focus-group and a friendlier social session. The method looks just about complex as a regular meeting, but seemingly more inclusive, and more importantly, fun. […]
I take it back…I was a little unmoved by Matt Webb’s playsh at ETech 2006 and conceded I might not have fully grasped the implications of his work, but after reading Schulze & Webb’s recent The Hills Are Alive with the Sound of Interaction Design, I’m really taken with Matt’s approach to design 🙂 Some […]
In Summer 2005, Liz designed a set of Aqua-esque icons for a proposed Orange Firefox browser that Mark and I were working on. The project was never finished and I’d almost forgotten about Liz’s mini-project until today…Liz’s icons are too good to remain hidden, sO I figured I’d blog ’em for posterity 🙂 If things […]
TDR go from irony to optimistic semi-psychedelia with their Love Being video for Citizen Bird’s Joy…you can download it from Coke’s The m5 design project. The Coke collaboration is intra-ironic, given TDR’s earlier Work Buy Consume Die pastiche of the Pepsi logo. The m5 project also includes contributions from LOBO, MK12, Caviar and Tennant McKay/REX. TDR’s […]
We’re currently in the midst of constructing a two-storey extension and I thought I’d get some kitchen ideas from budget DIY icons, MFI. Using MFI’s online planning tool, I only needed to enter some basic room dimensions, indicate positions of doors and windows and select some appliances…the software then filled in the remaining spaces with […]
The newly redesigned Zopa site, includes a cute visualisation of the service’s borrowers and lenders. Designed by Poke, the visualisation emphasises the person-to-person nature of Zopa’s communal banking – humanising loans for its customers. I remember the ultra-cute Israeli IM service, Odigo, included a similar feature showing a ‘radar’ of all Odigo user’s at a […]