Johnny Chung Lee is one awesome creator. Over the past few months he’s been banging out some sweet Wii-mote mods for a “Minority Report” like interface, a low cost “Multi-touch white board”, and most recently a sweeeet “VR Headtracking” concept that will make any Wii fanatic jealous. Nintendo’s gotta hire this guy for R+D. He just plain rocks!
I’ll post a 3 of his whimsical tutorial videos after the jump, otherwise, hit up his web page for some other sweet tricks up his sleeve.
The 2008 TED Conference schedule of speakers has just been announced! This years event will take place in sunny Monterey CA as well as a new simulcast lounge in snowy Aspen CO for some lucky individuals!(major party!)
Lots of big questions, unknown exciting speakers, and ideas to numb your brain!…this should be good!
If you have not heard of the TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) Conference, catch up to their videos on TEDtalks , my 2007 TED recap, or some of my favorites.
I love it when artist question definitions.
Artist Michel de Broin guts out a 4 person car and adds pedals to it rendering it a 4 person bike to some extent with a skin like a car. Is it a bike or a car? Car’s need a license plate, bikes do not.
The trekkers ride it onto the streets and get stopped by cops eventually. The best part is that during their stop a fleet of police bikes pass by.
Rules and definitions are meant to be broken, questioned, redefined. I love it when these instances are documented!
via Glumbert
Thought of the week: What happens in Vegas never happened! 😉
Goal of the year: Be a design disruptor!
Funny: Best Wedding Dance Ever!
Read: Time Managment eBook for the Creative!
Tech: Aptera Car(300+mpg) Test Drive via PopularMechanics
Consumer: 5 yrs, 6 ipods, $1495!
Neat: A worthy travel pillow!
Art: Nice drawing!
Cool: Scissor Bracelet via Notcot
Challenge: National Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge
Have you ever wondered what $315 billion dollars looks like? If so, check out this link visualizing $1 stacks in comparison to a person and car!
This comparison reminds me of Chris Jordan’s photography on consumerism comparing our horrifying means of waste in smaller numbers we can understand…amazing work. It disturbs me that we consume “60,000 paper bags used every 5 seconds”, “2 million plastics bottles consumed every 5 minutes”, or “130,000 aluminum cans used every 30 seconds.” Also reminds me of the recent news about the dude that saved his trash for 1 year!(video)
The visual guide might be a bit deceiving though when compared to the famous $207 million drug bust some time ago. Either way, I’ll imagine being Scrooge McDuck in DuckTales swimming through it all!
315$ billion visual dollars via necromanc
Chris Jordan on Consumerism (pbs video)(poptech recap)
207$ million cash drug bust
Pictures after jump
For those of ya’ll that smiled throughout the hilarious viral video collection “Internet People” comes another sweet video poking fun at the widely successful web2.0 world titled “Here Comes another Bubble“.
These videos are fairly true, and gives any non-web geek a quick run through of this past years web2.0 and viral video world.
I mentioned a bunch of incredible speakers during my safari over to Pop!Tech2007 …and now a few of those lectures are available for watching at Pop!Casts here.
Above is the lecture by Van Jones who is an activist in urban poverty and environmental peril…a must watch!. He’s incredibly talented, smart, funny, and great at speaking that all should learn from!
A few other videos released:
– John Legend: his music and his campaign on global poverty.
– Jessica Flannery: Kiva.org, a must do Micro Funding site.
– Chris Jordan: Photographer on consumerism
– Christian Nold:Bio Mapping/ Information Visualization
– Steven Pinker: The thinking behind conversation and language.
– Louann Brizendine: The emotional behavior of the brain, men and women.
– Daniel Pink: Insights on business and how Artists rule the future!!! (awesome for us creatives 😉 !)
– Caleb Chung: Pleo, Furby, and otehr fun inventions!
I’ll post the videos after the jump!
Continue Reading
Ben Underwood had his eyes removed at the age of 3 due to cancer. Overtime, he’s taught himself to see objects in space by using “echo location” to navigate the world around him.
Simply amazing and inspirational! It makes me wonder about what us as humans are actually capable of. How acute can our senses be, what is our potential, how can these elements be unlocked? (this phenomenon also reminds me of Phantom Limbs;feeling and controlling limbs that no longer exists! TEDtalk Video lecture by Vilayanur Ramachandran)
Seeing instances likes Ben makes me want to dive back into my fascination with synesthesia; the ability to use one sense though a secondary sense… or as I called it back in college, Cross Sensing.
All 5 videos of Ben after the jump, including the phantom Limb lecture.
(thanks v)
Continue Reading
Thought of the week: Sometimes ya gotsta take 2 steps back to go one step forward!
– Image: “Car Parts“.
– Video: Train runs through Bangkok Market Place.
– Cool adjustable emotional stamp.
– Video: Chimpanzees smarter at memory games than humans?
– Odd: Born with feet backwards!
– Article: Who clicks on Ads!
– Tech: NEC develops first translation phone!
– Product: Self Balancing Tray
– Web: Online Word Processor, BuzzWord!
I’ve mentioned previously one of my favorite quotes during my journey over to TED2007 and it’s finally on TEDtalks here.
World famous designer Philippe Starck states “I believe in general that my job is absolutely useless; but now, after Carolyn(Porco) and these guys, I feel like shitâ€.
Watch the video… it’s somewhat funny to watch him, and charming. I’m not sure if what he says is anything new to the design community, but hey, it’s always great to hear it from icons such as himself.
Being a bit bummed I couldn’t make it over to this years wonderful EG conference gathering (the Entertainment Gathering) which started last night, I’m glad to see that their (matt) live blogging it. It’s very textual and less visual but hey, it gives the scoop on the awesome line up of speakers and hopefully they’ll release some kind of video archive if they jump on the bandwagon of conferences alike. I think Matt’s going to add pictures and videos since he’s live blogging like a mad man with spell checks then fixing it all up in the later hours enhancing his posts with images etc.
If your at EG, send me some updates, otherwise, I’ll be reading up on the live blog and searching for any incredible stories for the next 2 nights!
Thought of the week: If pennies did not exist, would we be more productive hence actually save more money?
– On/Off coffee Mug– color changing Mug from off to On.
– Procrastination Flowchat
– Behind the Scenes: A look into tricks and tips of the industry
– ElfYourSelf: The classic ElfYourSelf web card I sent out to friends last year!
– The naked teddy bear suit.
– Severn Suzuki giving an incredible speech on the environment at age 12 in 1992!
– 10 most expensive cities to live in. Tokyo drops out of top 10!
