EG 2008

Snapshots from the EG self portrait photo booth: Tan Le and Marvin Minsky, Olivia-Eric-Gus-Shelly, Richard Saul Wurman, Teller, Kev and Coley, Michael Hawley, Mr. and Mrs. Wozniak, Mr. and Mrs. Lovins.

Conference highlights: Woods Hole footage, Miru Kim, Joshua Bell, David Pogue, Marc Patcher, David Binder, Emotiv Systems.

Details to follow. Brains are processing.

Reverse Graffiti

Following Laughing Squid on twitter provides a lot of quick access to cool-stuff-right-now. This one in particular is really neato. An eco-friendly cleaning product company teamed up with a graffiti artist to create public murals by cleaning away dirt, instead of using paint. I love this because it gets me to look at the world in a different way, what else can be flipped around like this?

Reverse Graffiti Project
“San Francisco’s Broadway tunnel is a highly traveled thoroughfare in the heart of the city. Over 20,000 cars, trucks, and motorized vehicles pass through it per day. Its walls are caked with dirt and soot, and lined with patches of paint covered graffiti from days gone by. It set the perfect canvas to create a beautiful work of art showcasing the talents of reverse graffiti artist “Moose”, and the power of Green Works plant based cleaner.”

eCommerce Widget

This falls under dual research for both budcozy and my day job. Lemonade is a widget that lets you select products to embed in your blog or social network. It's like a navigable ad. There are a variety of brands including Apple and the Gap and a bunch of categories like electronics, kitchen, apparel, books, movies and more. I found a few products that I have, and can recommend. I'm pretty sure the solar panel is the one my sister took to Uganda with her, and will be leaving several behind with the school she's visiting.

It was a good learning experience to see what they do well with the user experience, and what falls short. Food for thought.

iPhone Earbud Review by Derek

While I don't know Derek personally, we run in similar circles here in SF and I've been enjoying his blog for years. Today he posted a review of iPhone earbuds. He hasn’t found the perfect pair yet, but I may have to try his current recommendation to see if they work well with budcozy. Another friend also sent me a thorough review of his experience trying budcozy with the Sony EX71s. In his opinion it wasn't an ideal match due to the exceptionally long 2-3 feet of wire and a right-angle connector. He got it to work by disconnecting the middle coupler and feeding it through “backwards”. A bit unintuitive, which is good to know and something I will add to product information in the store.

Eco Friendly Envelopes

Wow, now that's an exciting blog title. I figured that while I patiently wait for the Life Box to be available I could look around for other options available now. Tons of recycled post consumer waste envelopes, which is good and what I'll continue to order. But ideally I'd like find something more than that.

Ecoenvelopes
Ideal for mailing things like bills that include the need to send a reply payment. Made from a minimum of 30% post consumer waste (PCW) content and use soy and water-based inks and bio cell window films. Nice blog. And a nice logo, too.

Brown Bag Envelopes
100% recycled using post consumer waste. I started off mailing budcozy with a batch of similar brown bag envelopes, but the glue was horrible and didn't seal properly. But I'd be open to trying another brand like this one.

Paperboard Mailer
These look interesting. Made from 100 percent hand-sorted, recycled fiberboard (containing 95 percent post-consumer paper). This is a more sturdy almost cardboard looking mailer. Especially good for sending more than one budcozy at a time.

I found these envelopes all accounted for on ActionEnvelope. In the short time I searched, they look to be the online resource for eco-friendly envelopes. Plus they practice what they preach.

Paul Stamets's Life Box Packaging

Life Box video stills from TED|Talks.

I've been wanting to package budcozy with eco-friendly materials that go beyond it's first purpose. Paul Stamets's Life Box is exactly it. When will this be available? Anything else on the market like this?

Please, Understand.

A certain someone needs some Understanding smacked into her, with a capital U. I only know of one person who wields an influence over the over achieving and sometimes self obsessed. I've been working at his conferences for the last 8 or 9 years, and have seen his "work" first hand. Can we please arrange for a little Come-to-Jesus chit chat?

"Many of the people I speak with are really serving other Gods: the God of Beauty, the God of Style... the God of Money, Success, Fame, Fortune, and yet there is only one God that I serve and that is the God of Understanding. If you serve that God, all the others will be taken care of."
- Richard Saul Wurman, InfoDesign Jan '04

Sci-Fi Time Traveler Golden Era Superhero Helmut

The Mercury Helmet by Jasmin Zorlu.

This. This, I want.

I tried it on and it was amazing. It is made from fish skin suede and lined in organza. Placing this on my head made me feel like I had magical powers. I could summon Godzilla from the depths. I could cut through any dust storm. Light would shine upon me in a flattering diffused vignette. I could communicate telepathically with the whales.

I am saving up.

Maker Faire Poster

Poster by eboy.

I'm a little tardy for a Maker Fair mention but, I came across this poster today and it's worth mentioning just for the visual graphics alone (one in a long series). And so, my quick review of the faire will be better late than never. Bliz and I went for the second time. We took CalTrain and the faire shuttle bus which worked out 200% better than driving, and we reviewed the schedule in advance to make sure we saw the stuff we wanted but, it was still totally overwhelming. This poster captures it well. The faire seems to have huge momentum and I imagine it'll be even bigger next year. It's really amazing to see a little bit of Burning Man in San Mateo. (As an aside, I grew up in San Mateo County. My parents were both born and raised there. My sisters and I were in 4H and they showed their lambs at the same fair grounds. I spent many summer nights running around the carnival eating sticky sugary foods and trying to win stuffed animals and gold fish. It was so the 1970's.)

A couple highlights:

- My friend Emi works for TCHO, who had chocolate samples you could vote on. It's yummy chocolate from scratch. Always a crowd pleaser. We had them at EG2007.

- My friend Marnia was there with Swarm. It's great to see this Burning Man project still going and now starting to tour year round.

- Mike with BlinkM, of course.

- David with Making Things, of course.

- Steampunk Squid, Robot Girafe, Tesla Coil, Cupcake cars, Never Was House and The Treehouse.

- The Mento-Coke guys did a show. Was fun to see in person.

For a more thorough review, Wired has a great blog write up complete with photos and videos.

How It Works

Came across a great series of How It Works videos. Super clever and super cute. Budcozy needs one of these. The video below explains the difference between regular incandescent light bulbs and CFLs.



More videos about things like Social Networks, Wikis, RSS and Zombies here at Common Craft.

Giving a damn

This is to remind me to go spend some time at Good Magazine. I found it via this chart, "Who Owns The Organic Food Companies?", on Cool Infographics.




"Welcome to GOOD, media for people who give a damn.

We see a growing number of people tied together not by age, career, background, or circumstance, but by a shared interest. This revolves around a passion for potential mixed with fierce pragmatism and creative engagement. We sum all this up as the sensibility of giving a damn. But to shorten it, let's call it GOOD. We're here to push this movement and cover its realization.

While so much of today's media is taking up our space, dumbing us down, and impeding our productivity, GOOD exists to add value. Through a print magazine, feature and documentary films, original multimedia content and local events, GOOD is providing a platform for the ideas, people, and businesses that are driving change in the world."

"B" is for Budcozy

Photo by Urbanwide.

Who knew. Wiki has entries for (I think, but I didn't check) each letter. Entries cover topics such as: History, Typography, Usage, Codes for computing, and References.

On Auto-Pilot

For a majority of designers this is a really obvious list of links to mention but, I find myself utilizing most of these (and more I haven't listed) on nearly every one of my projects. They're great design resources that are so basic to me that I probably take them for granted. It got me thinking, what other online resources do other designers rely on? What might I be missing that might help me break out of old habits?

Font ID, search by sight

Free Vector World Maps, just in case you ever need one

Lorem Ipsum, for when you're waiting on content

Silk Icons, free family of 700 tiny icons

Silkscreen, free tiny font

Best Brands of the World, EPS files of most corporate logos

A List Apart, for people who make websites

iStockPhoto.com, a great resource for affordable graphics and icons

Frilly Things, a collection by Cameron Moll

To outer space and back to the couch

It was one of those busy-fast weekends and we were excited to get everything accomplished. D has been swamped at work so this was a necessary break to get recharged by seeing some great stuff other people are up to. We started the day off with a hike up to Twin Peaks with Lucy. We are really lucky to be able to walk right out the front door and just keep going up until we've reached the top like the surface of another planet. Spring is so here with butterflies, birds, alien weeds and flowers. It was so windy up there that Lucy's ears flew back like she was riding a motorcycle.

Once we got back down to earth, we bused into town to load up with a super taco and horchada and head to the historic Armory building. It was open to the public for the Mission Bazaar, an exhibition of art, design, music and performance. We drive by that place often and someone usually makes a comment about what sordid things go on in there. In 2006 it was purchased for $14.5 million by an adult production internet company, giving the ominous Moorish Castle style building on a edgy intersection an even grittier presence. So we have been really curious to see the inside. It was like walking back in time into an old airplane hanger, lots of brick and steel and huge windows with bright sunlight streaming into the dark space. Most of the vendors were clothing and accessories, with a burningman-steampunk-hippie aesthetic. I got a super cute red and cream striped wrist band made from a vintage tie, with a single silver snap. D tried on a tiny victorian top hat, which made him look like something out of Alice in Wonderland. I think I should get him one. We bumped into a friend who makes films. A favorite local clothing designer of mine was there, Miranda Caroligne. I'd really love to get to the point where budcozy could be part of an event like this. I was inspired to get back to work on some new limited editions themes. American Cupcake sent me a link to the Union Street Faire in a couple weeks, which happens to be an eco theme, but it's hard to swallow the $650 booth fare. Being creatures of habit and feeling a bit overloaded by the bazaar, we walked over to La Copa Loca for waffle cones of hazelnut sorbet and sat on the sidewalk to charge up for evening plans.

The rest of the weekend went like this:

Wes Scoop at the Marsh
Hard to cover the 90 min show, I kept wanting to write things down but didn't want to miss anything. One thing I remember him saying is the answer to our nations problems is to acknowledge our predicament and engage in an intentional decline with a Reverse Peace Corps, to learn how to siesta and make tasty dishes from rice and beans. Remember to breathe. Unlearn our overachieving.

icanhaz
An honest attempt to icanhazcheezburgers but gravitational pull of the couch won. Instead we went to witness with our own eyes a really big crossover moment between the internets and reality.

Opera.

That butterfly
More collisions between worlds with the butterfly from the hike now firmly embeded in a mural. It stopped me in my tracks.

Free samples
In between giant boxes of cereal, a moment of bliss at Costco: toasted ham-n-cheese croissant sammie samples.

iPhone
A new iPhone case that goes real cute with the Pow budcozy. But I find myself looking at my iPhone wanting to take a picture of my phone with my phone. Need to track down the camera.

Series of amazing events
D got 2 pairs of jeans and 1 pair sneaks, without even trying. Do you know how amazing that is? We were so tired and hungry but you just can't stop when shopping karma strikes. Nutella-banana crepe post spree prepared us for MUNI home. And then the most amazing series of events happened. The J arrived immediately. Only one crazy person on board talking into a cellphone with no one at the other end. It did not break down. I do not kid. Then as we sat waiting for our transfer on the 48 to take us home (estimated 17 min), Hoshi appeared out of nowhere in a skid and waved us aboard to deliver us to our door.

More couch.

Friends of Budcozy

Budcozy is my pet project that I'm having a lot of fun with. I've been inspired by people who have taken a chance on their own ideas and are making a go of it. I have some friends that are up to some pretty cool things themselves that I'd love to tell you about:

American Cupcake
"Not your mother's cupcake"
http://www.yelp.com/biz/american-cupcake-san-francisco

BlinkM
Make crazy LED things.
http://thingm.com/

Love Spirals
Ryan and Anji Bee are uber chilltastic.
http://lovespirals.com/

Sister goes to Uganda
Yes, my sister. She is rad.
http://lorisaltveit.wordpress.com/

Solar Death Ray 3000
"Do not look into beam with remaining eye."
http://people.tribe.net/5969572e-afaf-4c36-97d4-b7be3d08f572

El Grande, Lumia Grande and Thomas Wilfred
Makers of visual music.
http://performinglights.com/index.html
http://www.lumiagrande.blogspot.com/
http://www.lumia-wilfred.org/