Technorati
If you don't use it you should. Really though, this isn't a blog post, it's me claiming that I own this blog to technorati. Please excuse this post, it will be down soon.
Change You Can Be Mistified By
If you're an Indy resident and have been living under a rock (or simply don't drive on the north side or read any local publications) you may have missed this little doozy:
In the art world there are many big cities that go mostly unnoticed for their talent. Ours here in Indy is one of them. Despite being the twelfth largest city in the nation and having a pool of very talented artists, Indy seems to go mostly unnoticed by the larger design world. To be honest, I'm not sure who Indiana Live's agency of record is, but whomever it may be is really making life hard for those of us in Indy who really do want to be legitimate. Despite a good amount of local criticism, we'll probably go on being known as "that major city whose designers thought it was cool to copy Obama."
On the bright side, it never gets old to hear people try to talk about the economic stimulus. It was awesome to hear "I'm concerned about the size of his stimulus package" on NPR the other day. It was even better to hear the reporter catch himself saying it.
Facebook is a scary place
... at least it can be. This clip from the BBC show Idiots of Ants does a really good job of showing the creepy-stalkery side of Facebook as well as demonstrating some of the largest frustrations and personal image issues. Best of all, it's pretty funny:
A little placed called…
The thing I like best about good cartoon is that they're usually only a step or two from the truth (or very often the truth in a new context) That's what makes them funny. It's not likely, but it could happen with a bit of fudge. This one is only four... five? steps from the truth. That's kinda close, right?
In other news, the Twitter handbook I've been working on lately is coming along nicely. Most of the very basic ground work section has been completed. The next sections will be a bit more like case studies than actual instructions, but it seems that it's just as valuable to see how other people are using as learning how to use it. It seems like so many people want to peg it into a single "thing". As a creative, I tend to resist that urge. It's not just for brand management. It's not just for microblogging. It can be used to promote sales. It doesn't need to be this or that or in-between. Sure, we can look at previous uses and determine "what works and what doesn't", but we can also find new creative solutions to the same problems. That's why creatives are so valuable: we take a new look at a problem and find a way to solve it that obeys the criteria while taking an approach that can keep it effective. The whole design process could really be compared to problem solving, but instead of numbers and variables we have client needs and constraints. And the best thing about math is that there isn't always a single way to solve a problem. How many remember those bloody greater than or equal to systems of equation where the "solution" was often "one, many, or none"? It's kind of like discovering that there are many solutions, and any of them could be equal, or finding one solution that works best, or concluding that the problem itself is flawed so there is no answer.
