MESH

The MESH web conference is currently running in Toronto. The conference explores the confluence of the social sciences and technology - the how's, but's and why's of our combustively complex relationship with the int0rnets.

Being relatively new to the web in any professional sense, I find myself entralled by the attendees themselves.
What first struck me at the MESH conference?

About 70% of the audience is on their laptops.

To clarify: they aren't all journalists. Some, yes. Not all. And a quick glimpse around confirms that they are all clearly multi-tasking. One man in front of me was supplementing the lecture with:

playing Yoshi's Island

lurking on Facebook

blogging

checking email

checking the MESH schedule

This is a complex relationship indeed.

I'm not mentioning this as an sort of disdainful aside. On the contrary, this is a group of peole who clearly love the internet. They navigate it as naturally as if it were a part of their breathing patters - without skipping a beat. They learn and do in perfect harmony.

And then, one of the lectures today proposed this question:
Are we becoming a generation of grazers? Is the sheer scope of the web undermining our ability to 'go deep'?

I won't pretend to judge the intellectual rigours of the webgen. I am part of it. It's my livelihood. I, frankly, love it. As one of the speakers noted today - it's the next step from the printing press and radio towards a 'ubiquitously connected world'.
Also, I don't have psychological profiles to substantiate an arguement.

But this MESH collective is a smart-as-hell sort of a group. And they were definately grazing.
This isn't a question of content though, it's a question of multitasking.

For all the philosophy and technology addressed in the sessions - I walked away, more than ever, with a sense of a new psychology. We are evolving to process a staggering amount of information, at any given moment. And, more intriguingly, it's not an exercise in 'must's'. We seem to want this - a seamless ability to work, socialize, reflect and anticipate..simultaneously.

I mean..
How many windows do you have open right now?
Be honest.

It wasn't extinct before, but it might be now..


This is all over the news, so I'm blagging a bit. But the idea of a fisherman hooking something that supposedly died 65 millon years ago is intriguing. What if its birth was triggered by the tsunami, Encino Man styles? Or, really, what if it is in fact 65 million years old?
That would be something, eh?

Old fish, yo.

Read the whole fishy news item here.

"Dude. That's like, super old..."

A fun article on the sense of discovering an internet something that everyone around you is already well-aware of. The author has dubbed this sensation 'web lag' or 'blag':

Blag (noun): 1. A mistaken sense of novelty. 2. A state of discovering something that is not even remotely new.

Make clicky here to read the rest

The Bavaria Ads I Wish I'd Made

Green the Ungreen Byways



Some may think that designing around our naturally destructive inclinations is submissive. I prefer to think of it as optimistic pragmatism: where stop drop and reverse tactics may fail, we could use a buffer zone into better environmental practices. The very least we can do is ease, baby - ease. Herewith the idea: Design highways as green energy generators.

The proposal would involve mounting horizontal wind turbines above the roadway that would be driven by the moving air generated by the passing traffic. The electricity generated by spinning these turbines could be fed back into the grid. Joe's analysis indicates that based on vehicle speeds of 70 mph each turbine could produce 9,600 kWh per year.

Enough tomfoolery. The source!

Oh God Yes


I don't quite know where to begin. This is awesome from tip to rat tail.

Left Hand Poem

My CD, Dre, issued a challenge: write two poems: one using only left hand keys, and the next using only the right.
For the left hand, this means that I had to stop at 'h' - I tend to type 'y' and 'n' with my right hand.

Here's the first of my left hand poems:

We saw each drafted face
Creased, red.
Each dead as dead rafters -
we swear.

As we treaded, fears grew.
We wear grave faces,
are dressed as dread.
We, the reverse-brave crew.

Oily, Oozy Exhibition Design




I love the mysterious, oily feel of this exhibition. It feels as if children's book characters escaped, and plunged into a puddle of tar. Or as if an oil slick had developed a sense of asthetics, and went out to fulfill a more noble artistic destiny.

I'd like to write a story about shadowy black characters like this - like in Peter Pan, when Peter's shadow escapes him and Wendy has to sew it back on. Some kids' tale about a tribe of people that looked like black, shadowy smudges - finding their way through our colourful, 3D world.

Anyway. Here's the link to this exhibition page. There are more images there too.

Yar! Avast ye Balloonery!



This is just plain fun - and now I don't have to sideswipe children at carnivals to pillage theirs.

Optical Inch


Yes, I'm aware that it's nearly a year old. But the Canadian site just launched, and we want hits ;)

The cheeky monkeys at TribalDDB New York originally devised the concept for this Philips Bodygroom site - a walk through the unexpected perks of the Philips bodygroom razor. Slei humour and yucks all around.

Visit shaveeverywhere.ca

Just - wow..

So Kate Moss is launching her own line of fashionable girl-about-town togs.
And yes, it promises to be big.
And that's what a fashion-forward model should do - own that territory. Fine, good, fun.

But then I find this associated quote from Peter Saville, who's helping to formulate the identity for said Kate Moss line. And I gape - because honestly, this is some really incredible language to be throwing around.

“Kate is in an exceptional territory of her own,” explains Saville. “She is an icon to everyone, in that young women can relate to her and aspire to be her. She’s an accessible icon, and similarly she’s not intimidating. She’s synonymous with possibility for young women – she’s not impossibly beautiful, or alluring, or mannered. It’s that that’s made her such an astonishing role model for her times. Plus Kate has never denied or denounced her roots; she hasn’t moved on to another world. All this has endeared Kate to a generation. She’s a brand. And this next stage for her is the inevitable product realisation of that brand.”

Now don't get me wrong. I'm not opposed to Kate Moss per se - nor the modelling world at large. I'm obsessed with shoes, and I love pretty clothes, and hell - I work in advertising. But when you're discussing 'astonishing role model'...well. Am I missing something here? Are there Kate Moss stories of courage and international activism that I haven't heard yet?
Has our sensibility of role model become so twisted with celebrity and iconicism that they're now indistinguishable?

Additionally curious is the observation that "she's a brand". The notion of a brand as an "astonishing role model" for our times is captivating. What sort of brand could that be (aside from the obvious Kate Moss response).

I put it to you, British tabloids. What do you think?

One of These Days...



You really want to know what captures the popular imagination? Baby fekkin animals.
This video slays me for two reasons:
1. Baby bun bun.
2. 207,400 - odd hits...That's enough to constitute the entire population of a small city.

I was laughing with Freddy about one day filming a series of these and slapping a brand on the backside of it. Then I remembered Telus.
My dreams are dead.

Fire day Monday

I posted earlier about flaming furniture. There's a reason why, and here it is:
Dave's house was on fire earlier today.
He was inside on his computer when the pounding and shouting began. He asked the question that everyone would likely do - "what should I grab in case it's all true?"

The obvious things are: yourself and sundry people/creatures. Thassall.

His cat had beaten a hasty retreat. And Dave ran out to see what was going on.
And it was the third floor apartment - very much on fire. Smoke, shattered glass, firemen, shocked expressions. And then silence, leaving the man upstairs with black belongings. Dave's apartment and cat remain blessedly intact.

Have you ever had a fire?
I was eleven and at Sunday school. I remember my parents wordlessly rushing me into a January jacket, and then into the car. I didn't realize why or what until I saw the sharp pitchforks of flames stabbing out the windows of our house.
The cackle of walkie talkies, the hiss of hoses - all of it was muffled. For kids, it's all roaring fire and sloppy wetness first. After the fire was done ransacking our home (it would take 3 months to move back in), we soggily trudged through the mud of charred family photos on our way up the garden path.

Half burned memories are seared into my mind.
It would have to be sundry people/creatures and photos - if I could.

and I'm sorry for that poor man.

Fiery Furniture of Fury


Satan's Ottoman.

I can think of a dozen hilarious scenarios involving this piece of furniture, and most of them involve hapless cocktail party attendees.
It'll set you back a mere £900 (which obviously excludes life & homeowner's insurance).

From ohgizmo

Why Is the Green M&M the Horny One?

Mars Company has been producing M&M Chocolate Candies since 1941. Various rumors have since been attached to different colors of the candy: the green ones are an aphrodisiac; if the last candy out of a bag is red, make a wish and it will come true; if the last candy out of a bag is yellow, you should call in sick and stay home; orange M&Ms are good luck, but brown ones are bad luck. M&M/MARS notes that all these rumors were developed by consumers, not the company.

The rumor that these green candies are an aphrodisiac apparently started or first gained prominence in the 1970s, when students reportedly picked the green ones out of packages to feed to the objects of their desires.

Very key article on colour legends. Here's another:

“There has been a great diversity of opinion on the subject, but the generally accepted rule is pink for the boy and blue for the girl. The reason is that pink being a more decided and stronger color is more suitable for the boy, while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl.” [Ladies Home Journal, June, 1918]

Our Game is Live (w00p)

Jess and I created this little site feature to promote Glad ForceFlex bags. You have a minute to catch all the items your friends toss out the windows. Good fun, if we say so ourselves.
And we do. Frequently.
To as many people as will listen. ;)

Play it here

Abandoned Places


People love abandoned spaces. Old, unused subways stations, desolate factories, overgrown temples in remote pockets of the jungle. Even if these places were never really used, like this hotel complex, they have an undeniable aura of mystery. They're populated by ghosts, because they silently exist.

I love this complex. It's very retro-futuristic - and screaming to be restored to the land of the living.

On the outskirts of Taipei, in Taiwan, is this abandoned resort. It looks so cool. Imagine if it was a functioning hotel! .....We would love to restore it. But the story goes they were trying to create a luxurious vacation spot for the affluent and rich streaming out of Taipei. But, apparently things got weird including many accidents during construction.

Learn and see more here.

Poem Art

This is not a new idea, but I heart the surrealism and visual loveliness that brings these poems to life. Billy Collins was the poet laureate of the National Library of Congress, and otherwise a literary figure and professor at various universities. His spoken word pieces are interpreted by various animation houses - each stylistically different, weirdish and hypnotic.
Wouldn't it be nice if advertising occasionally looked more like this? Or if art pieces were sponsored like ad segments - like a random piece of prettiness to stare at for a few seconds.

The above image is from the poem titled 'Budapest'

The above image is from the poem titled 'Today'.

See them all here.