In response to New York City’s ‘If you see something, say something‘ campaign for mass hysteria, Alyssa Wright has made hero reports, a site where you can say something about all the good deeds that are passing unseen. Right now it only works inside the Medialab building, but she hopes to expand it to Boston, […]
Category Archives: conviviality
one accessory per child
The brilliant Mike Lee invented a viewfinder for the OLPC‘s built-in digital camera (a perfect example of futurecraft) and has already made rapid prototypes – check them out below:
Also posted in blogogracy, children, open objects, product design, universal design
Comments closed
virtual UN
the global vote is a web2.0 site dedicated to providing an alternate means of measuring global opinion with regard to UN resolutions. structured like a blog, each resolution is a timed post with room for comments and a vote. the votes are tallied by country and displayed as they will stand in the UN, as […]
Also posted in blogogracy
Comments closed
design for the (tech-savvy) masses
design democracy is a yearly competition based on the belief that mass customization is a viable alternative to mass production. unlike ponoko, this competition is based on free trade in design patterns that you can then make yourself at your local highly computerized wood shop. but given that finding and manufacturing this kind of product […]
Also posted in 2d, 3d, customization, fabrication, furniture, futurecraft, marketing, open objects, product design
Comments closed
glocal blogs
ethan zuckerman and rebecca mackinnon founded globalvoices, a web site that aggregates and translates news from the parts of the world we never hear from. they tackle the immense task through old-fashioned manual labor: volunteer translators and regional editors filter and organize the content, which originates in local-language blogs. it seeks to call attention to […]
Also posted in blogogracy, universal design
Comments closed
wetiquette
joo youn paek showed the polite umbrella at the sigtronica seamless electronic fashion show last week: an umbrella that shrinks when you pull on its handle to make room for passersby. what makes an object polite is not just the fact that it can be considerate of other people, but that you can express empathy […]
Also posted in art, fashion, product design, soft/glowing
Comments closed
technology for eating alone
when traveling in a foreign country, ordering food can be an adventure. fortunately, japan has a plethora of solutions for avoiding human contact altogether when eating out: the conveyor belt restaurant (above) and the vending machine restaurant (below). in the conveyor belt, a chef prepares small dishes and places them on a conveyor belt that […]
Also posted in evil robots
Comments closed
consumers and the machine
alex rosenberg makes blown glass objects the old-fashioned way, and he made a video comparing his slow, hand-crafted process to industrial mass-production. whereas his objects are hand-crafted and locally made, retailers sell cheap, machine-made glassware at a fraction of the cost of real blown glass. the machines are faster, but not necessarily better. blow-molding leaves […]
Also posted in customization, fabrication, futurecraft, marketing, materials, open objects, possessed products, product design
Comments closed