Crisis antidote?

Calm-vs-exited

Keep calm or get exited? :)

"
Nowadays, of course, it would be farmed out to an expensive communications agency. Back in the spring of 1939, it was an anonymous civil servant who was entrusted with finding the slogan for a propaganda poster intended to comfort and inspire the populace should, heaven forbid, the massed armies of Nazi Germany ever cross the Channel.

This was the third in a series. The first, designed to stiffen public resolve ahead of likely gas attacks and bombing raids, was printed in a run of more than a million and read: Your Courage, Your Cheerfulness, Your Resolution Will Bring Us Victory. The second, identically styled, stated: Freedom Is In Peril.

From August 1939, both posters began appearing all over the country, on billboards, in shops, on railway platforms. The third, though, was held back. This one was for the real crisis: invasion. A few may have made their way on to select officials' walls, but the vast majority of the British public never got to see it. This poster enjoined: Keep Calm And Carry On."

Nokia Maemo 5 promotion video

Vond dit demo filmpje errug gaaf! Ff kijken met geluid vol aan. Dit is het nieuwe mobile os van nokia. Moet het s60 platform gaan vervangen geloof ik?

Animatie is erg lekker gedaan, voelt allemaal super futuristisch.

Wat je kan zien in dit filmpje van het os zelf vind ik er ook goed uit zien. Goed gebruik van de beschikbare ruimte en veel gestures om makkelijk te navigeren.

Wat ik enorm komisch vind is dat je de indruk krijgt dat de hand heel hard 'klikt' iedere keer. De grap is dat dit niet voor de duidelijkheid is, maar ook echt moet omdat het een resistive scherm is (werkt met druk ipv geleiding zoals de iphone) waardoor je dus echt je best moet doen om iets aan te klikken :' )

Imageability: a dialogue between the person and the environment

In The Image of the City, on how people understand and wayfind in cities, Kevin Lynch introduces the concept of imageability (how easy it is for a dialogue between the person and the environment to build into a good mental image) [notes], and five basic elements of these images: paths, edges, districts, nodes and landmarks [notes]. The book is brilliant; Lynch introduces a whole vocabulary for those emergent properties of human wiring and social habitation, then applies and explains. It's going to be enormously useful in thinking about how people learn to find their way around websites (and semantic spaces of all kinds), how we relate to space in general, and, more, how that space is collaboratively created and moulded. This is a modest book, self assured but not declarative or over-confident, quiet. A joy to read. (I also have notes on the book design.)

Heb het gevoel dat die vijf elementen ook voor interaction design goed zouden kunnen werken. Hier nog even iets uitgebreider wat de elementen zijn:

Paths are the channels along which the observer customarily, occasionally, or potentially moves.

Edges are the linear elements not used or considered as paths by the observer. They are the boundaries between two phases, linear breaks in continuity: shores, railroad cuts, edges of development, walls.

Districts are the medium-to-large sections of the city, conceived of as having two-dimensional extent, which the observer mentally enters "inside of," and which are recognizable as having some common, identifying character.

Nodes are points, the strategic spots in a city into which an observer can enter, and which are the intensive foci to and from which he is traveling.

Landmarks are another type of point-reference, but in this case the observer does not enter within them, they are external.

A phone is not just a phone

Smartphones are changing the way we interact with the world and people around us. With the internet access in a device that you carry around with you anywhere you go the possibilities go further than just being able to have a phonecall on the way. This is slowly but surly starting to create all kinds of new uses. Especially in third world countries. See the following links:

Student projects explore innovative cellphone uses in developing world
A cellphone is not just for calling, texting and taking pictures anymore. Several startup business ventures spawned by MIT students, sometimes as class projects and sometimes as independent work, are exploring new ways to harness the increasingly ubiquitous devices. They are using phones to help people, especially in developing nations, to raise their incomes, learn to read, get where they're going and even diagnose their ailments.
...
NextLab is based on trying to answer the question "can you make a cellphone change the world?" says its instructor Jhonatan Rotberg, director of the Media Lab's Next Billion Network - a group, of which NextLab is a part, formed to examine potential applications for the next one billion people expected to become cellphone users over the next three years. With cellphones now in the hands of four billion people worldwide, he says, "we're at the threshold of something important in history."

"Future Perfect is about the collision of people, society and technology, drawing on issues related to the design research that I conduct in part, on behalf of my employer - Nokia."

"A lot of rich qualitative user research loses its soul by the time it's been squeezed into conference and journal submission formats and in addition, with the exception of published patents work involving concept generation tends to remain confidential. So what you see here scratches the surface, nothing more. Media/interviews here."

First Person UIs

Image_8

Luke Wroblewski writes:

In my iPhone with a Compass = First Person UIs article, I discussed how location and orientation awareness in mobile devices opens up a set of new interface possibilities that are designed from the user’s current perspective. In other words, first person user interfaces that are built knowing where you are and where you are facing.

Recently I found three such applications have made their way to Google's Android Market. Though in their early stages, these apps demonstrate the potential of creating user interfaces from a natural, first person perspective: how we actually see the world. 

Very interesting!

Wabi-sabi as a user-experience design approach for Web2.0

Wabi-sabi-as-ux-design-approac

 

other interesting links: 


Wabi-Sabi’s simplicity Wabi-sabi is the Japanese philosophy that embraces a beauty of things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. It is a beauty of things modest and humble. “Pare down to the essence, but don’t remove the poetry. Keep things clean and unencumbered but don’t sterilize,” ... Other tenets of Wabi-Sabi that resonate: The emphasis on subtle details, even if noticed only by vigilant viewers. The importance of looking closely. The effectiveness of small doses. Having quiet authority without having to be the center of attention. Simplicity. Working with a limited palette and keeping features to a minimum. Realizing something’s “interestingness” has nothing to do with how complex it is.

Less as a competitive advantage: My 10 minutes at Web 2.0 I want to talk about the concept of less. And more specifically the idea of using less as a competitive advantage. ... There’s already too much “more” — what we need are simple solutions to simple, common problems, not huger solutions to huger problems. ... I want to discuss five things you need less of that you’re likely to think you need more of. ... 6. More Constraints I said I’d discuss five things you need less of, but there is one thing you need more of: Constraints. All this less is really about more constraints. That’s where you’re forced to be creative. That’s where you’re squeezed to make better use of your money, your people, your time. And out of this squeeze will come better software, more satisfying software, and simpler solutions. The truth is this: There are a million simple problems that need to be solved before you should even consider trying to solve the complex ones. Less software solves simpler problems. Let your competitors kill themselves trying to solve the big complex problems. Solving those problems are really hard, really expensive, and riddled with bad odds. Stay simple, build simple, and solve simple.

Getting Real > the 16 chapters and 91 essays that make up the book

 

top 10 bedrijven lijstjes

via http://www.emerce.nl/artikel_index.jsp?rubriek=404797

Voor het geval je wilt weten wat de rest van de wereld (in nederland) doet ;)

Top-5 Mediabureaus

  1. Mediaedge:cia
  2. MediaCom
  3. Starcom Nederland
  4. SVBmedia (v/h Schreiner & Van Bokkel)
  5. Initiative

Top-5 Full-service internetbureaus

  1. Strawberries
  2. Info.nl
  3. Eden
  4. Lectric
  5. Fabrique

Top-5 ICT Consultancy & Services

  1. HP
  2. e-Office
  3. Info Support
  4. Atos Origin
  5. Capgemini

Top-5 Online campagnebureaus

  1. .bone
  2. Tribal DDB
  3. MediaMonks
  4. Media Republic
  5. Yourzine

Good design volgens Dieter Rams

Jaren lang 'de' vormgever bij Braun. Hij had 10 regels voor z'n ontwerpen.
 
Good design is innovative
It does not copy existing product forms, nor does it produce any kind of novelty for the sake of it. The essence of innovation must be clearly seen in all functions of a product. The possibilities in this respect are by no means exhausted. Technological development keeps offering new chances for innovative solutions.

Good design makes a product useful
A product is bought in order to be used. It must serve a defined purpose – in both primary and additional functions. The most important task of design is to optimise the utility of a product.
 
Good design is aesthetic
The aesthetic quality of a product – and the fascination it inspires – is an integral part of its utility. Without doubt, it is uncomfortable and tiring to have to put up with products that are confusing, that get on your nerves, that you are unable to relate to. However, it has always been a hard task to argue about aesthetic quality, for two reasons.
 
Firstly, it is difficult to talk about anything visual, since words have a different meaning for different people.
 
Secondly, aesthetic quality deals with details, subtle shades, harmony and the equilibrium of a whole variety of visual elements. A good eye is required, schooled by years and years of experience, in order to be able to draw the right conclusion.
 
Good design helps a product to be understood
It clarifies the structure of the product. Better still, it can make the product talk. At best, it is self-explanatory and saves you the long, tedious perusal of the operating manual.

Good design is unobtrusive
Products that satisfy this criterion are tools. They are neither decorative objects nor works of art. Their design should therefore be both neutral and restrained leaving room for the user’s self-expression.
 
Good design is honest
An honestly-designed product must not claim features – more innovative, more efficient, of higher value – it does not have. It must not influence or manipulate buyers and user
 
Good design is durable
It is nothing trendy that might be out-of-date tomorrow. This is one of the major differences between well-designed products and trivial objects for a waste-producing society. Waste must no longer be tolerated.

Good design is thorough to the last detail
Thoroughness and accuracy of design are synonymous with the product and its functions, as seen through the eyes of the user.
 
Good design is concerned with the environment
Design must contribute towards a stable environment and a sensible use of raw materials. This means considering not only actual pollution, but also the visual pollution and destruction of our environment.
 
Good design is as little design as possible
Back to purity, back to simplicity.