I made it out to Berkeley on Friday for Pecha Kucha, held in the courtyard of the UC’s College of Environmental Design. It was cut short on account of nobody being prepared for the cold. Nobody. But it was great while it lasted. There was a stand out moment when Aurora Mahassine, who played a major role in the Academy of Sciences’ one-of-a-kind roof, described the cement substratum of our urban areas as being perfect for vegetation to take over. Just imagine… though her images were much more compelling.
I attended with my buddy, Omid, a veritable treasure trove of ideas and knowledge about technology, marketing, product and user interaction. He turned me on to Core 77, that I’ve just started browsing. Even looking at what must be the tip of the iceberg I am awe stricken.
Futuristic multi-touch UI's that'll make your skin tingle (via Core77)
Another major thing that I’ll be exploring (other than people yelling from the rooftops that design can save the world) is interest-based and Opt-in advertising. I’ve been trying to get my head around just how one would go about it, but lo and behold, Google is launching this initiative in the next couple of months. You’ll see more on this soon!
And finally, some of my distractions in true Weekly Roundup form (true form after a series that’s one post old…?).
Kutiman has chopped, edited and remixed YouTube clips as different inputs into some pretty fantastic music. It’s gotten serious love on BoingBoing. NPR’s Monkey See has the full footage of Jim Cramer ‘facing off’ against Jon Stewart that turned out to be a lot more sober and reflective than CNBC would have liked… something the NYT picked up on.
Lastly, here’s some XKCD to nerd out to and a little nerd love.
