heed to artists
Pete Docter, Director of Pixar’s new feature, Up, on Pixar’s success (CNN): “I don’t really think it’s much of a secret,” he told CNN. “I think it comes down to two basic things: one is that we’re run by artists. … John Lasseter is a film director, as opposed to being from a business school...
new combinations
via Ace Jet 170: Uncommon Knowledge in reference to James Webb-Young’s great book, A Technique for Producing Ideas
heed to presentation
While we don’t limit ourselves to strictly visual characteristics when discussing Design here at HEED, it’s an important element within the field of Design and one that warrants close scrutiny. We’re also unabashed fans and consumers of Apple products (I’m also a small shareholder in AAPL). A big part of this enthusiasm for Apple products...
Great Design Cannot be Crowdsourced
There was a bit of a buzz earlier this year on crowdsourcing and its power within innovation, business and design. Garrick Schmitt over at Razorfish asks us if Creativity Can Be Outsourced. Can it? No, it can’t. The reason design, creativity and innovation cannot be outsourced comes down to one thing – leadership. Without strong...
Heed to Currency
Currency is important. At it’s best, a bank note distills it’s countries vision, values and aspects that make it unique from other countries. At it’s worst, a bank note represents a bygone era and a bygone belief system and a bygone aesthetic. In many cases, currency is the first impression people will make of your...
no accidents
No, Watson, this was not done by accident, but by design.- Sherlock Holmes
Uncategorized
Heed to the Davids
Malcolm Gladwell has written a great article for the New Yorker titled, How David Beats Goliath: When underdogs break the rules. The premise of the article is that by their very nature the David’s of the world have to play by their own rules in order to succeed. Gladwell admits that this rule-changing mentality isn’t...
Uncategorized
iPhone – hurting companies, helping Design
A quote from the April 2009 issue of Rutberg & Co.’s Wireless Industry Newsletter (via GigaOm): An under-discussed dynamic with the iPhone has been the impact to carrier subsidy budgets for non-iPhone handsets. In our conversations with handset OEM and carrier executives, we hear that subsidy budgets for those carriers carrying the iPhone are now...
Uncategorized
Designing Educational Experiences
David Merrill: Siftables, the toy blocks that think MIT grad student David Merrill demos Siftables — cookie-sized, computerized tiles you can stack and shuffle in your hands. These future-toys can do math, play music, and talk to their friends, too. Is this the next thing in hands-on learning?
Uncategorized
Style vs Design
I was perusing theFWA today and I came across this link for an open Designer position at Fantasy Interactive. The link took me to one of Fantasy Interactive’s (they now refer to themselves as ‘f-i’) newer endevours – Kontain. Instead of merely posting a job description for a designer, they included a video description of...
Uncategorized
don’t like the rules? make up new ones
Apple Planning Video-Call iPhone Stories like this make me smile and laugh at all the companies that try to imitate Apple’s innovation (yes, imitating innovation is an oxymoron). The key to competing with a company like Apple is not to try to match their products, because what you create will be inherently derivative. It’s like...
