Tara Donavan creates some incredibly beautiful textures, environments, and objects out of everyday ordinary elements. Pictured above is a ceiling created by thousands of plastic drinking cups.(I’ve seen the spherical ones in college, but this ceiling is amazzzing!) I’ll post a few other pictures of her projects after the jump, otherwise, check out the site for more.
via mocoloco (thanks kai)
tara donavan at ace gallery
Continue Reading
SellaBand creates an awesome platform enabling fans to invest in their favorite bands and get a piece of the profits in return!!! Yes, the passionate fans become the bands investors, marketing crew (word of mouth), and profits are split between SellaBand, the band, and the fans!!! How cool!!!
So how does it work: fans find artist they like on SellaBand.com. For $10, they can buy a share, or ‘Part’. Once the band sells 5,000 parts, SellaBand arranges a professional recording in top studios. Fans receive a limited edition CD of the recording and splits profits from CD sales, Ads, etc. Basically, the more ‘Parts’ you purchase, the more shares in a band you own from the 5000 available.
This strategy is a step up from Threadless.com’s vote-to-make-real method by allowing anyone to become an investment fan “brand sneezer” in a band they love and believe in! Otherwise, it’s just like the stock market for music fanatics. I’ve been through a few musicians tunes and found some really interesting sounds. Check out the site, listen to some musicians, and invest in the ones ya crave!
SellaBand.com
Here’s another interesting angle to music by the users!
It’s about time some people started working on this… generating power through our footsteps! Yup, kinetic energy! British engineers are converting street vibrations into electricity and predict a working prototype by Christmas capable of powering facility lights in the busiest areas of a city.
“We can harvest between 5 to 7 watts of energy per footstep that is currently being wasted into the ground,” says Claire Price, director of The Facility Architects, the British firm heading up the Pacesetters Project. And a passing train can generate very useful energy to run signaling or to power lights.”
We have the Ocean Power Delivery Systems, Floor and Turntiles in Subways, Solar projects (CA just passed a huge home solar panel law), and finally sidewalks. Wohooo for energy!
via Wired
update: Now a sustainable night club dance floor in which the dancers transfer their disco lovin enegry through the floor to whatever powere the bar, dj, speakers, toilets, or lights need!
If your an entrepreneur craving to hear about ideas and good stories then you should watch this video (90 mins) of Guy Kawasaki and 5 Silicon Valley entrepreneurs talking about the challenges and factors in succeeding in the start up world. The panel included Lauren Elliott of Personal News Network, Reid Hoffman of LinkedIn, Joe Kraus of JotSpot, Daniel Mattes of Jajah, and Alex Welch of Photobucket.
Wow!!!… Watch this video and be astonished, memorized, and creeped out all at the same time. I thought it was CG then realized it was freaking real!! What an awesome experience this must of been watching these master puppeteers work their magic in this festival! I wished I was in London when this event (The Sultans Elephant by Royal de Luxe) happened, but it’s not too late as the show will continue on to Calais (September 28-October 1) and in Le Havre (October 26-29,2006) I’ll admit, my first craving for puppeteers was while watching Being John Malkovich and now this amazing creation! I’m sure everyone felt like a kid again in some mysterious way. I want one! More pics after the jump!
More pics on Flickr here.
The video of the Giant Girl!
The Amazing Elephant!
Having read William McDonough & Michael Braungarts book Cradle to Cradle, then watching Inconvenient Truth, I’ve become more of an environmentalists to some degree. Being an Industrial Designer, I’m familiar with the tons of products, materials, and manufacturing techniques that are incredibly destructive to our environment, but I never knew how major companies ranked in this destruction. Well, Greenpeace recently issued a “Guide to Greener Electronics” report card which offers a detailed ranking of some very well known tech firms based on a criteria. Dell and Nokia ranked well(kudos to them), but tech giants Apple, Motorola , Acer, and Toshiba ranked as some of the worst! However true or untrue this chart is, it puts a definite ding into those brands the next time I buy some electronics. Read the rest of the Cnet article here, or read some comments on engadget here.
Just when I thought my math skillz could not get dumbified any comes a “tip guide” on a recent receipt of mine. I received the bill, and as usual, tried calculating what 18% was, but while calculating this mind exercise I noticed on the bottom of the bill was a “tip guide” that already did the calculations at 10, 15, and 20% of the bills cost. As much as I love this little added service, I worry that I’ll become dumb with math, much like what spell-check has done to my mad spelling skillz as I mentioned in my post about dumbifying tech.
“As well as being aged between 18 and 24 with a knowledge of Korean, skilled in singing and dancing and of “nice appearance”, the new flight attendants will be trained as “part-time security guards” on the flights. “There’s no specific type of martial art we require, it could be kung fu or tae kwon do,” said Cai Chao, a Sichuan Airlines spokesperson.
I’ll let ya’ll make your own thoughts on this airline attendant angle from China to Korea. La la la, pow pow, 360, please buckle up!
Ever since I bought a digital camera I wanted to take a picture of myself everyday for a long period. Well, that long period lasted maybe a week before I broke my routine. If your wondering what the results would have been like, check out Ahree Lees documentation of herself everyday for the last 3 years here!!!(or the full video here) It’s pretty amazing seeing time pass by. There’s this other guy that took a picture of himself each morning for a year, and this Google employee with a photolog of every single meal he had at Google for about a year. Be interesting if you could get a ClickDensity map of some sort over those images…perhaps what parts have changed, where zits appeared and vanished, what you ate, etc. Perhaps something like MouseMiles, to track the distance you mouse travels daily.
update: a guy does it for 6 years here!
What are some of the BEST start-up ideas that investors and VC’s are willing to sink their teeth into? Well, if your an entrepreneur seeking an idea, perhaps you should read this article by CNNMoney which gives insight to what certain big named investors are seeking in their next big catch. For the list, go here.The shortlist version:
– The Ultimate iDrive
– New Tricks for Old Drugs
– Search for the Small Screen
– The eBay of Product Placement
– Luxury Living on a Budget
Whooohoooo!!! That’s the sound of someone blazing down this new slick carbon slide in the Red Bull office in London right before a meeting! Jump-Studios has created a dynamic interactive space pumped full of adrenaline in this 3 floor escapade for employees of Red Bull filled with stimulating features and activities for everyone to experience! Any tie wearing client is bound to transform into a cool craving stunt junkie after a quick plunge here.
I’m not sure when the last time I was pumped to go to an office, but I’d think a fun environment like this filled with a few cases of Red Bull would do the trick! From ping pong table meeting rooms, to floating staircases, a slick slide, to a modern bar and cafe, and a comfy lounge area… I’d wonder if the balcony had a bungee jump bridge for adrenaline breaks.
For more info on the Red Bull HQ and other sweet projects, hit up Jump-Studios website. More sweet pics after the jump…
Continue Reading
I recently mentioned how my trip to London seemed very “kind” because of their proper English accent which also raised the question of what is an American accent sounds like? Well, Rocketbooms new host Joanne Colan does just this in this past episode in learning the American accent.
If you have not heard of Rocketboom, it’s a quirky daily 3 minute vLog, Video Blog (Video Web Log), of internets culture art, technology, news, web drama, and the many more odd happenings around the world. It’s probably one of the most watched vLogs with a bit of spunk.