200 discarded objects from a dump in San Francisco, meticulously catalogued, researched, and documented by Jenny Odell. The result is something more revealing than most pre-planned time capsule projects …although this project may be somewhat short-lived as it’s hosted on Tumblr.
A deep dive into Pixar’s sci-fi masterpiece, featuring entertaining detours to communist propaganda and Disney theme parks.
The newest Gary Hustwit film is a documentary about Dieter Rams, featuring plinkity music by Brian Eno.
Rams is a design documentary, but it’s also a rumination on consumerism, materialism, and sustainability.
Prompted by his time at Clearleft’s AI gathering in Juvet, Chris has been delving deep into the stories we tell about artificial intelligence …and what stories are missing.
And here we are at the eponymous answer to the question that I first asked at Juvet around 7 months ago: What stories aren’t we telling ourselves about AI?
From Designing Products with Sound by Amber Case and Aaron Day:
Sound eases cognitive burdens.
Sound is also a powerful brand differentiator.
Sound is emotional.
Finally, sound impacts productivity.
But also:
Not every product needs sound design.
Nick Foster has put the audio of his fantastic dConstruct talk together with his slides.
It’s a terrific, thought-provoking presentation, superbly delivered …and it even has some relevance to progressive enhancement! (you’ll know what I mean if you watch/listen to the whole thing)
A deathwatch for Google products.
See also Charles Arthur’s historical data on Google shutdowns.
A nice profile of BERG’s Little Printer. That Matt Webb is a smart cookie. He is also a very thoughtful cookie.
Inspired by dConstruct, Ellen is going to start exploring the world of smart objects.
These are like chindogu, but they’re all available from Amazon with accompanying reviews.
A spot-on analysis by Khoi of the changing perception of the value in product design, as exemplified by Apple.
Those lovely BERG chaps profiled in the New York Times.
A rallying cry from Russell, urging us not to rely too much on the intangible.
How does an object’s character and/or behaviour tie in with communicating its purpose in life, how it looks and how it should be used?
A great article about the rising prevalence of "rough consensus and running code" in the real world.