I was struck by the simplicity of Apple’s latest television advert showing how quickly and easily it is to install software on your iPhone from the internet.
The advert boasted the new 3G model was ‘really fast’ and showed it loading internet pages in under a second.
Keen-eyed viewers would have noticed various ‘small-print’ captions at the bottom of the screen with phrases such as ‘not an actual representation of timescale’ and ‘network performance will vary by location’.
The ASA upheld a number of complaints and has said the advert should not appear again in it’s current form. Apple’s comeback was to say the demonstration was to show the speed as relative, not absolute.
It’s a shame Apple has done this, they could have played on the iPhone’s simplicity, cool-ness and any number of great features without having to over-claim and then add small-print.
‘For a limited period only’ and ‘batteries not included’ I can deal with. Amazingly, last night I saw a supermarket offer for 2-for1 mince-pies. The small print says the offer ends on the 17th December! Merry Christmas!
Remember kids, keep your eyes-peeled for the small print!
Posted by Richard on Thursday 27th of November 2008 at 9:22am
It’s a pretty cheap-shot these days to attack your competitor in your advertising; something the supermarkets do well, and that’s where it should end.
Microsoft’s I’m a PC commercials would like you to think it’s a counter-attack to Apple’s excellent adverts highlighting the differences of Operating System through human characters.
Unfortunately this counter-attack doesn’t hold up. With some humour (and with an Apple-shaped glint in my eye) it actually reinforces Apples message. Little clips of a plethora of cultures from around the globe all stating they’re a PC merely emphasises ‘PC’ as a generic and not as a brand. Which in-turn ultimately says ‘we’re not a brand’, unlike er, Apple.
I’m proud to say ‘I’m not a PC!’
Come on Microsoft, you can do better.
Posted by Richard on Friday 21st of November 2008 at 4:18pm
As an ex classics student this really captures my imagination – a recreation of Ancient Rome in Google Earth. I can hardly contain my excitement, it’s like I’m actually there!
You can view it on Google Earth and the original article can be found here.
Posted by Tasha on Friday 14th of November 2008 at 9:36am
Here’s a fun little tool for finding images of a similar colour range.
Idée’s Multicolr Search Lab browses through over 10 million Flickr images to find those that are similar in colour to those you have specified – give it a go, it’s great fun.
The system works by using visual similarity, a sophisticated range of algorithms to analyze hundreds of image attributes such as colour, shape, texture, luminosity, complexity, objects and regions.
Idée have some great applications in the pipeline, one really useful tool is TinEye; an image recognition tool that will return similar searches, similarity instances and information about that image.
Both of these tools will be great additions to any designer’s utility-belt. I’m certainly looking forward to using them soon.
Posted by Richard on Wednesday 12th of November 2008 at 4:17pm
For me, the biro and the bicycle, go down as some of the greatest inventions of all-time, no doubt you’ll have your own favourites.
Time Magazine have just released their list of the 50 best inventions of 2008. It got me thinking what could be in the list. The much discussed Large Hadron Collider (or Atom-Smasher, as I prefer) is in there at number five. Crikey, what could be better than that?!
Some of the top 50 seems a little odd – a website serving live television? Is there some confusion between invention and innovation?
One of my friends on Digg sent me this link to a fantastic blog that has loads of marketing and sales tips called The B2B Lead Blog. The particular article lists 3 tools which help you monitor your online reputation and can be found here.
I particularly recommend Google Alerts, which emails you updates of particular keywords as they appear on the web. I’m trialling it as we speak.
I also came across Google Alert, which came up with some excellent articles about a number of our clients. Highly recommend it, but it does cost money, unlike the Google programme.
Posted by Tasha on Monday 10th of November 2008 at 2:57pm
Last week was Leeds Digital Week and I had the opportunity to meet and see speak to Stuart Bruce of Wolfstar, as well as attend his excellent seminar. Wolfstar are a unique PR company, in that they have a fantastic understanding of the web and how people interact with it.
What particularly impressed me was how they used bloggers and how they played to the strength of bloggers. A fantastic example of how they had done this was in the new Sony Ericsson Xperia. Traditionally Sony Ericsson phones have been at the bottom of the mobile pile and this is their first venture into the top end phones. Wolfstar created a forum/blog called inxperia, which would allow people to discuss the new phone and actively encourage comments. They also contacted some key technology bloggers and began to change the old perception of their client.
This is pure genius and so simple. The seminar was fascinating and really made me think about how brands can utilise the natural conversation that is happening online.
Check out this picture of the phone as well, very beautiful.
Posted by Tasha on Tuesday 4th of November 2008 at 12:04pm
The videogame medium is, depending on when you start counting, roughly 46 years old this year. Still relatively young compared to other forms of media, but it’s now old enough to start preserving the industry’s rich and sometimes turbulent history.
Launched earlier this month, the UK’s first official National Videogame Archive will house a wealth of consoles and cartridges ranging from the simple beginnings of 1972’s Pong, to the blockbusters of the 21st Century.
The archive has been formed by academics at Nottingham Trent University, in cooperation with the National Media Museum in Bradford. The archive will be located at the National Media Museum, and managed by Nottingham Trent University’s Centre for Contemporary Play.
Along with games and consoles, the archive will also include an array of game-related media, advertising campaigns and artwork.
The Archive’s official launch will take place tomorrow to coincide with Nottingham’s Game City festival.
So what games would you like to see preserved for all-time?
For me (yes, it’s another indication of my age) it would have to be some of the early Spectrum games, Commodore 64 games and, my all-time favorite, Marathon – a Mac-based first person shooter with a great storyline.
Posted by Richard on Wednesday 29th of October 2008 at 2:46pm
Most of us these days are pretty techno-savvy. Children as young as four and five can take a decent digital photo and upload it to our online galleries, we keep our family memories on YouTube, Granddad knows how to use Sky+, and Grandma can use the Nintendo Wii with devastating effect!
It got me thinking where do we go from here? What does the future hold for home technologies? I don’t doubt home-automation is going to grow in popularity, we’ll all have HD Televisions eventually, and the continual integration of the PC/laptop/mobile/GPS all-in-one device will reach a point where it will do everything except make a phone call!
I recently found a couple of YouTube clips with some clever chaps taking some current technologies into new-found territories. These findings are going to have some great knock-on effects for the entertainment, television and gaming industries in the future.
The first is the ability for your television to know where you are in the room. Simple in principle with massive potential. Stick with it – the guy’s a bit wordy but the result is worth the wait!
The next is the ability for a projection to know exactly what it is being projected on to. In real-time, in multiple dimensions.
Following Richard’s blog yesterday about the future of blogging, I was passed an article in the Yorkshire Post this morning commenting on the same article Richard read. It was an average discussion on a topic that was widely discussed online yesterday.
So if blogs are dead, where does printed news stand? One blog that was referenced repeatedly in people’s defence of blogging was Robert Peston’s blog on the BBC website, which is an excellent source of information about the current economic climate. He gives us instant and up to date access to what is happening at a time when a lot of us are struggling to understand. Probably only five years ago we would have had to wait for the Financial Times to get a decent commentary.
Newspaper circulation figures have been tumbling over the last few years and with a massive increase in online readership. The Times Online has 20.3m unique users per month, but its monthly circulation is somewhere around the same quantity. This doesn’t take into account returning visitors to its website.
The Yorkshire Post were late in their comments. In an environment where we can read news as it happens it was late. We had that discussion yesterday with the other millions of people online. I even tried to find it on the YP website to reference it in this post, but couldn’t.
So as news is now readily available online as it happens, surely blogs will take on a more important role in journalism. Newspapers will change and become more like magazines, with a great deal of commentary and editorial. Blogs will change and develop and the future is very exciting.
Are you interested in what I, and others, have to say?
You can see my holiday and weekend photos on Picasaweb, you can view my drunk friends on YouTube, you can tell what mood I’m in by looking on Facebook and you can read what I blog about here. I’ve also thought of starting my own personal blog in the future.
I caught the dying moments of an interview on Radio 4 this morning with a woman who was saying Blogging is Dead.
I’m not so sure.
After a bit of Google-ing I found a few people with the same opinion; Paul Boutin, who writes for Silicon Valley gossip website Valleywag says of blogging – once a freshwater oasis of folksy self-expression and clever thought, has been flooded by a tsunami of paid bilge.
I still disagree, yes thousands have jumped on the social media and blogging bandwagon, some to great effect such as The Guardian Newspaper’s Comment is free.
I for one will continue to blog about things I find interesting, amusing, or quirky. It’s the online equivalent of talking to a complete stranger on a train, but sometimes that can be a life-enriching experience.
So like talking to strangers, if you don’t do it, give it a go. Same for blogging – try it you might like it – the blog is dead? Long live the blog!
Posted by Richard on Thursday 23rd of October 2008 at 2:28pm
You might think that we’ve had way too much time on our hands and so have cunningly photoshopped an ad into the Xbox game, Burnout. Nay, we would say, this is real live footage from the game.
In order to reach the 18 – 25 market his team have already explored many of the tools that are becoming an everyday of digital marketing. Obama has pages on Myspace, Facebook and Twitter. These tools are becoming fundamental to many marketing campaigns, but what is surprising about the US Presidential candidate’s use of these tools is that he’s a politician. Can you imagine Gordon Brown recording his everyday thoughts on Twitter and listing his favourite books on Facebook? These tools will help to capture the imagination of the youth of America, while strengthening the Obama brand.
The highlight of the campaign for me is the Yes We Can Obama Song. The Obama campaign had no involvement in the making of this video and I bet there are brand managers across the world wondering how to replicate this kind of publicity.
Posted by Tasha on Tuesday 14th of October 2008 at 5:19pm
I stumbled across a great website today which allows you to play with fonts and make pictures from them. A bit of fun, but well designed and pretty cool. Check it out at: http://fontpark.morisawa.co.jp
You can also see my first bash at a design. I didn’t have much time as I was just playing, but let us know what you come up with: My Design
Posted by Tasha on Friday 19th of September 2008 at 3:20pm
Phorm have produced a programme that monitors users’ internet usage and can use the information to create more targeted advertising. Unsurprisingly, some people don’t think this is a very good idea: see The Open Rights Group argument. But is it necessary for the ISPs (internet service providers) and online firms such as Youtube, Facebook and even Google to use systems such as this to make money and continue to service their millions of users?
I would say definitely yes. The people who shy away from these systems are fearful of their privacy, which is understandable, but without this kind of targeted advertising I can’t see how the services we take for granted can continue. People hate the new Facebook and they dislike the applications and mistrust the advertising, but Facebook have to make money to continue to supply this kind of service. It’s coming to a point now that people, who for years have enjoyed an internet service where they can happily avoid advertising, are finding that their favourite websites are becoming as crowded with adverts as the London Underground. I think it’s something we’re all going to have to get used to, which is sad, but true.
Finally I get round to reporting on CERN and the LHC (Large Hadron Collider). The science is all great, but what was better was the amount of online hype surrounding the launch. To be honest I’m not sure which I was more excited about!
First off, CERN themselves had a live web feed of the actual event, which was so busy on the morning of the launch that I couldn’t get onto it. They had a twitter page, which meant that those of us who couldn’t watch the webcast could be easily kept up to date via the rss feed. It also prevented too much disruption to work ;)
Google created a special logo, with a link to the CERN website. Have you ever heard of better internet marketing? Their website was actually linked to the Google logo, a science site!
On radio 1 they had a reporter on site who updated us on the world not ending. The BBC’s guide to the project was excellent and very in depth.
It went online on October 25th 1994 and shows how far web banners have come today. But are they effective and as we’ve become inundated with adverts online do we still take notice of them? According to a lot of research a vast majority of surfers ignore banner ads. There’s even a term for this phenomenon called banner-blindness.
However, is this any different from the way in which any advertising works? Many people switch to another channel during the TV ad breaks. People invariably throw away direct mail and completely ignore newspaper advertising. Of course it is much easier to measure the effectiveness of banner ads so companies know exactly what their ROI is. They also know what percentage of people who saw the ad clicked on it.
I suspect that like all advertising, if the ad is targeted at the right people, then it will be effective. There are a lot of bad banner ads and very annoying ones and I find that the decent ads stand out. If I want the product or am looking for the product then I will click.
Posted by Tasha on Tuesday 9th of September 2008 at 12:05pm
Well now there’s a new kid in town that hopes to be next in line. Will this be the browser to end all browsers?
It will be called Chrome and it’s from the guys at Google – you may have heard of them. A browser application seems like a long-overdue logical progression for Google, who already have great applications and utilities such as Picasa and Gmail, not to mention GoogleMaps and GoogleEarth.
Microsoft’s Internet Explorer still holds roughly 80% of the world’s browser population and this is what Google want a slice of with Chrome. Initially launching as a Beta for Windows in over 100 countries, Mac and Linux versions will follow shortly after.
As a recent convert to Firefox (why didn’t I change sooner?), Chrome is going to have to work very hard to seduce me away from my browser but I shall certainly look forward to giving it a trial run.
Lets hope there is more to Chrome than just a shiny surface.
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 2nd of September 2008 at 10:08am
I recently came across a blogger called Kid Tech Guru on digg.com. He had dugg a page that I had also dugg and so I had a look at his profile. He is just 14 years old! So I checked out his blog and was very surprised to find many in depth and well thought through posts. And he only started blogging a month ago!
Reading some of his posts show an instinctive understanding of the net. I especially recommend How to attract 10,000 visitors to kidtechguru. Absolutely incredible, this kid is going to be minted very soon!
Posted by Tasha on Monday 1st of September 2008 at 12:31pm
An unknown Chinese worker has become an internet sensation after her smiling face was left on an Apple iPhone that was sold to a customer in Britain, who then uploaded them online.
The girl, an employee of Foxconn which assembles the phones for Apple in the Chinese city of Shenzhen, was photographed by a co-worker who was testing the iPhone’s camera.
The co-worker then forgot to delete the pictures from the phone and it was then shipped to a customer in Kingston-upon-Hull, who last week posted three images on the MacRumors.com website.
The posting received hundreds of responses, some iPhone owners joked that they were considering returning their phones because they did not ship with the woman’s photo pre-installed!
Foxconn has described the incident as a “beautiful mistake“ and has given an assurance that the iPhone girl and her supervisor would not be penalised, according to a report in the China Daily.
Posted by Richard on Friday 29th of August 2008 at 12:42pm
Not in a refrigeration sense of the word obviously.
It was announced recently in the Wall Street Journal that Microsoft is about to spend $300 million dollars on making their brand ‘cool’.
Probably a similar sort of ‘cool’ to that of Apple.
Call me cynical (and slightly bias) but I don’t think its possible. With Microsoft you’re trying to make an operating system cool. With Apple you’ve got a great looking product, a far superior operating system, and a ‘way of life’ buy-in that Microsoft could only dream of.
Yes, us Mac-users are a little smug and self-congratulatory. What’s wrong with that?
I’m sure the guy with an Audi RS4 is slightly more smug than the guy with a Hyundai Sonata.
Over recent years Apple has used celebrities in its advertising, with the likes of Bob Dylan, who has promoted iTunes, and Jeff Goldblum, who appeared in a number of ads promoting Apple computers.
Microsoft have elected comedian Jerry Seinfeld to boost sales of their ailing Vista operating system. They’ve also enlisted the help of a ‘cool’ agency, Crispin Porter + Bogusky.
Rumours in the Wall Street Journal suggest Microsoft won’t rely entirely on celebrity endorsement for the ‘cool’ campaign, and is likely to include footage of a group of students who said that they did not like Vista and instead were trying out a version of Windows called Mojave.-...
I’m a big fan of ImaginFX, the magazine and website for fantasy artists. Every month I await with growing anticipation the latest installment of my gorgeously produced magazine dropping through the door, and turn each page with increasing excitment and wonder at the high level of the art, and the usefulness of the practical tutorials.
Well, this month’s edition arrived last night, and in it was an article on Illuminated. According the website it’s “a new animated series being created by some of the people behind GNN (Guerrilla News Network), Phong.com (Eminem’s “Mosh”), Pod Collective, Broken Saints, and ConceptArt.org. Produced in true High Definition, the series is inspired by the sensibilities of Hayao Miyazaki, Roger Dean, Alex Grey and many others.”*
The write up was good, the artwork looked cool so I thought, ok – I’ll go and have a look. It’s just the teaser at the moment, but it looks to have potential so I’ll be interested to see how the story develops. (I’m still all about the story at the end of the day!)
The thing that really got me though, was the way they’re integrating the marketing – they have pre-loaded USB memory sticks, a “DJ/VJ” club night, and a page full of codes you can nick to put on your own website, so you do the marketing for them (pretty much like this). All in all, it looks like a pretty slick project.
Following on from my earlier blog entry Do YouTube? it seems that Google and Viacom have come to an agreement.
The deal is that Google will make user information and internet protocol addresses from YouTube anonymous before handing over the data to Viacom in the US legal case.
Google has now agreed to provide Viacom, and a class action group led by the FA Premier League, with a version of a YouTube viewership database that removes user name and IP data that would identify individual users.
So your viewing habits are safe… for now.
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 15th of July 2008 at 4:40pm
Over the past twelve months however, it has become saturated with clips of television programmes from all corners of the globe – I go into the Automotive/Vehicles category and I find loads of Top Gear clips, moving over to music and I find thousands of clips from satellite music channels.
Whilst many programme makers and television channels have released the rights for this to take place, it would seem Viacom, which owns MTV and Paramount Pictures, has alleged that YouTube is guilty of massive copyright infringement.
The UK’s Premier League association is also seeking class action status with Viacom on the issue, alleging YouTube, which was bought by Google in 2006, has been used to watch football highlights.
So, according to US law, Google must divulge the viewing habits of every user who has ever watched any video on YouTube.
That’s every IP address of every computer that has ever watched a video on YouTube!
Many privacy campaigners including the digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation called this ruling a ‘set-back to privacy rights’.
In a funny way I enjoy these fights between massive corporations, as one of several million YouTube users I don’t expect a man knocking at my door telling me off for watching a five minute Top Gear clip back in 2006!
I can only hope the court case between Google and Viacom is televised.
And that someone has the sense to upload it straight-away!
Posted by Richard on Friday 4th of July 2008 at 11:13am
As the internet is evolving it is becoming increasingly difficult to keep up with how these changes will effect us and our businesses. The earlier blog entry, How can we use the internet better?, spoke about a few examples of how the internet is being used well. The key question now is can we predict how the internet will change and how we can use it effectively, while planning for the future.
Epic 2015 is a short film explaining how the media landscape will change. It takes you on a journey from the beginning of the internet to where we will be in 2015. This will make you think about how much our lives are changing and how the information we access is on hand. The question is, how do we take full advantage of these changes in the world of design and marketing?
Posted by Tasha on Wednesday 25th of June 2008 at 1:54pm
Orange are launching the first ever virtual balloon race on Monday. Not only will this be fun to participate in, I have two balloons, but it is also another example of Orange’s growing mastery of the internet.
At the moment few companies are properly harnessing the power of online marketing, since it is difficult to understand the potential. A few people are starting to tap into how smaller businesses can use marketing channels to sell their services. Frank Rumbauskas is an excellent example, he gives away a lot of free information, via regular email bulletins and websites, which all lead to buying his book. By the time I bought his book I had bought into his way of thinking and was happy to pay for more information.
I think that the key reason for SMEs struggling to utilise the internet is that it is time consuming and fairly difficult to give away information for free. Going are the days of banner ads and pop-ups. Even paid advertising on search engines is beginning to wane. The answer is to be more cunning, and I don’t mean cheating. It is about adding something of value to the online experience of potential customers.
(Look out for our site on the balloon race route if you decide to join in.)
Posted by Tasha on Friday 20th of June 2008 at 11:46am
Last night I was passed by a Google Streetview car (apparently, this also happened to Tasha and now she’s really excited!) so look forward to browsing the streets of Leeds soon!
Streetview has been around for a while over in America and has become quite popular – check out these interesting sightings
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 17th of June 2008 at 9:19am
It’s a pretty regular phrase I hear from my fellow social-networkers. As we ‘mature’ (if that’s the right word) through our networking life, the transition from MySpace to Facebook seems a fairly natural one…
But word on the street is MySpace are launching a global redesign next week with improved navigation and search capabilities designed to increase user engagement and broaden the site’s demographic.
It’s a direct attempt to claw back some of ‘us’ that have moved over. According to Comscore MySpace’s unique users have been in steady decline in the UK, falling 14.3% year on year to 8.47m in April 2008.
Facebook remains the UK’s most popular social networking site after experiencing a 7.2% rise in unique users from March to April, according to the latest Comscore figures.
They had 14.35m UK unique users during April, which was up an incredible 288.9% on the 3.69m users who used Facebook during the same period a year earlier.
So keep your eyes peeled on June 18th for the MySpace redesign, which will feature a MySpaceTV player that includes features to make it easier for MySpace members to embed and share videos (sound familiar?).
Whilst I admire healthy competition, surely there’s enough room on the internet for both social networks to survive? After all, we all want different things from our networks, isn’t that why we all ‘moved over’ in the first place?
So will we all be swapping back?
Will our Facebook friends disappear one-by-one?
Only time will tell.
Posted by Richard on Friday 13th of June 2008 at 12:49pm
Stumbled across these mini-people today. Absolutely fantastic! They appeal to my sense of amusement at distorted sizes. A little bit like miniature shoes for kids.
I’ve always been interested in what’s out there and by that I mean space, are we alone? is there little green men or even ladies out there? well this guy’s actually filmed one! Out side his window. Of all the things this alien could do he/she picked to do a little peek a boo.
enjoy the video we all had a good laugh: New Alien Window Video… CGI, Hoax or Real Deal?
Posted by Ben on Tuesday 3rd of June 2008 at 5:19pm
Some spammers have had to pay MySpace lots of money in compensation for spamming 1,000s of users on the site. What about the few people who wanted to find the adult sites and the one’s with gambling addictions who found new more exciting things to gamble on?
I think the heat is getting to me.
Posted by Tasha on Wednesday 14th of May 2008 at 4:15pm
We have all been spammed at some point and the first thing I usually do is hit unsubsribe. But I was suprised to learn today how long ago it was the very first spam went out. Spamming is almost as old as I am!
Just a quick post about the future of the internet. We’ve spoken before about Information Architects and their web trend map (which is now available). They also have released their web predictions for the next year.
Pretty terrifying and exciting if you like this kind of thing. Plus as we’re four months into the year it’s interesting to see what has happened so far.
Posted by Tasha on Monday 28th of April 2008 at 5:24pm
I have recently become addicted to Digg. Following months of stumbling I am now a digger. And while digging stuff I found this global map of happiness. So I’m off to live in Mongolia.
On the serious side though this is pretty fascinating. Just take a look at Africa. And no one would be happy if Roman Abramovich was one of their fellow countrymen.
Posted by Tasha on Wednesday 23rd of April 2008 at 1:41pm
Google are about to change the way that their sponsored links work. Now brands will be able to bid on particular keywords. So if you type in Nike shoe, other shoe brands will appear.
I have to say that I find this really confusing. As someone who has a pretty good grasp of internet marketing and as a consumer I really don’t understand how this makes Google better for marketeers or users. That’s not a judgment on the actual service, but the way that it has been communicated. I really struggle to understand how this will work.
The following statement is taken from Brand Republic:
“We are making this change because we want to give users greater choices to help them make informed decisions.
“Advertisers are accustomed to the fact that users searching for their trademarked terms as part of a phrase may see ads from competitors.”
Does this clear up how this significant change is going to help consumers and businesses? Google need to watch themselves and not get carried away with being the big dogs, tides can turn quickly.
Posted by Tasha on Friday 4th of April 2008 at 5:07pm
Over the past few years I’ve noticed the digital age really come to life. The internet has a multitude of fantastic uses, as well as some dark corners. One thing that really makes me happy about the internet is sharing.
Be it music, a recipe, dog-grooming tips, your holiday snaps, your fetishes, your life. This can all be shared with millions of others who want to do the same.
Personally, I like photo sharing on the likes of flickr or Google’s Picasaweb where one person’s snapshot is another person’s art.
Long may this sharing continue – go on, share something today.
Posted by Richard on Thursday 3rd of April 2008 at 10:56am
Japanese bloggers, Internet Architects, have recently come up with Version 3 of their Web Trend Map. I’ve had v.2 next to my desk for the last six months and often find myself staring intently trying to see the logic.
So check it out as it comes into its final stages – Web Trend Map.
Posted by Tasha on Monday 11th of February 2008 at 5:02pm
A curious title for a post on the blog of a design agency, but check out this example of substance over style and see what you think: www.useit.com
I reckon this was more valid a few years ago and with web 3.0 on the horizon there is no place for this kind of debate anymore. But interesting none the less.
Posted by Tasha on Thursday 24th of January 2008 at 12:11pm
Not a question many of us ask often, but according to a chap called John Titor it is possible, since he actually claims to have traveled back in time from 2036 to fetch something from the past, or rather from our time. He returned to the future in 2001 and since this time people have spent much time discussing whether his story is true or a hoax.
I only found out about this today and we have been busy discussing it since (as well as working hard!) and so I thought I’d blog about it and hopefully get other people thinking about it. Some of his predictions are crazy, but if any of them come true then this could possibly prove the existence of time travel.
During his time during our time in 2000 he joined some forums and chatted with members of the online community about the future and how he acheived time travel. This all seems very unlikely, but what if it is/was/might be/not yet known true?
Posted by Tasha on Thursday 3rd of January 2008 at 4:36pm
A little while ago there was a bit of debate in studio about the moral status of accessing the web via someone else’s connection if they’ve not locked down their wifi connection. This was as a result of someone being picked up and charged by the police for sitting on a wall outside someone’s house, accessing his email via their connection.
Wal-mart and Big Brother have Facebook pages – what is going on?
It is an opportunity that can’t be passed by with an audience growing everyday, free advertising, marketing and PR. I’m beginning to realise the hypocrisy of my position. It’s such a good idea, but I really hate the feeling of intrusion.
Posted by Tasha on Wednesday 15th of August 2007 at 4:42pm
Obviously Adobe aren’t going to be picking any lame ducks for their shortlists in their design achievement awards, but here are some lovely motion graphics.
Created by Benjamin Stephan and Lutz Vogel from Germany, this piece is stunning, true motion graphics, showing the differences between pure animation and graphic design but using the best form both worlds. Jaw dropping stuff.
You can check all the winners and runners-up here.
Posted by Phil on Friday 10th of August 2007 at 2:06pm
I’ve noticed recently that the majority of marketing magazines and websites talk constantly about Facebook and the marketing potential waiting to be unleashed on the poor unsuspecting social networkers. Note the recent debate on Brand Republic about Vodaphone and Direct Line withdrawing their advertising from the site because of the proximity to pro BNP content.
Knowing how much I love Facebook one of my colleagues the other week passed me a magazine with an article about how to use Facebook as a business networking tool as well as a social one. This would appear to make sense as I could mix business with pleasure and spend valuable work time organising my social life, I mean getting amazing prospects and contacts.
The article spoke of big businessmen being able to express their true selves and ordinary people cuddling up to corporations. They had a list of top tips and this is where my Facebook business dream ended –
1. Don’t post silly pictures of yourself drunk or otherwise.
How can you not have silly pictures of yourself? Because people don’t want to deal with people who enjoy themselves outside of work?
Everyday I read more and more about the violation of Facebook – companies checking on potential future employees, schools punishing pupils for posting views on their teachers. Surely this is a question of our right to be ourselves on what was once the haven of social networking, a breath of fresh air after the horror of MySpace.
The problem is if I boycott Facebook how will I know what my friends are doing? Whe…
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