http://channel.walkerart.org/detail.wac?id=4266

A few years back I wrote a now widely distributed article entitled Designer as Author. In it I argued that designers aspire to be authors because we are insecure about the value of our work. We often feel if our work were more significant, we would garner more respect. We envy the power granted artists and authors. It is this deeply-seated anxiety that was behind a movement pushing designers toward the origination over the manipulation of content.

Remarkably, this critique of the “designer as author” has been turned almost completely on its head. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard that article referred to as my call to arms, my call for designers to become authors. The misreading of the argument is evidence that the anxiety identified therein rages unabated. I attempted to argue that design itself was content enough, it didn’t need to be supplemented. Apparently that argument didn’t take.

via 2×4.

Advertising Agency: Publicis, Frankfurt, Germany

What if you slept?

And what if in your sleep, you dreamt?

And what if, in your dream, you went to heaven and there plucked a strange and beautiful flower?

And what if, when you awake, you had the flower in your hand?

Ah, what then?

—-Coleridge

Why do you build programs (Dreamweaver) based on JavaScript, which run slower than my grandmother?

http://dearadobe.com/index.php

At the mere hint of a threat, the insects adjust their preflight stance to flee in the opposite direction, ensuring a clean getaway, they said in a finding that helps explain why flies so easily evade swipes from their human foes.

http://www.sound101.org/mixer.php

http://www.plusheads.com/mixi/index.html

Opentape is a free, open-source package that lets you make and host your own mixtapes on the web.

Upload songs (via web or FTP), reorder, rename, customize the style, and share what you like on other sites with an embeddable player.

http://opentape.fm/

http://www.yearbookyourself.com/

After months of collecting assets, writing case studies, translating, programming, bug checking and re-programming, www.wktokyo.jp launched today. Beyond covering the usual stuff – who we are, where we are, what we do – the site also features our people and their input on what’s cool and interesting in our city.

http://www.wktokyo.jp/blog/?p=786

Naomi Yotsumoto is the most-talked about ping pong player in Japan right now, and it’s not just because of her paddle-swatting skillz. The petite 29-year old Tokyo native is revolutionizing the sport by dressing provocatively and presenting herself as more than just an athlete. After creating plenty of buzz in local and international press because of her hot pink and rainbow-striped outfits (there is no dress code in professional ping pong), she now has her own TV show and a published autobiography. And as you can see in this video (from the national mixed doubles competition this year, where she placed second), she’s really pretty good at what she does. And even when she doesn’t win, the commentators never fail to spend a bunch of time fawning over her outfits and noticing how the crowd perks up when she walks in. Naomi Yotsumoto = the Asian Anna Kournikova = awesome at doubles, not so hot at singles, better known for her looks than for her athleticism.

Collaborative workshop with Aubrey Stalnaker, Adam Loczynksi and Kristi Pesick. An intense weeklong workshop with Thomas Castro and Jeroen Barendse of Studio LUST. Given 44-minutes of an interview with the composer John Cage by Morton Feldman we developed a concept based on a converstation we had in reaction to the interview. As a group we decided that our conversation was fragmented and disjointed, often bouncing from topic to topic. We then deconstructed and analyzed our conversation into as many fragments as we could: from the smallest representation, a single letter of the discussion, to the largest - the entire conversation.

via http://iamdriv.blogspot.com

In this work by Pascual Sisto, a plastic bag obstructs the Google Maps Street View of Minnie Street in Fairbanks, Alaska. Discovered while researching Google Maps Street View, Sisto preserves this “found object” by redirecting it to its own url, lastbreathinalaska.com, as well as capturing it as a back-up video, in case Google decides to reshoot the location. Swirling on a constant panoramic loop, the movement of the camera gives the abstract image an almost 3D-like quality. The piece documents Google’s fraught attempt to supply an accurate representation of Minnie Street, and, as such, Sisto sees Last Breath in Alaska (Found Object) as a response to the purportedly omniscient eye of the Street View feature, and the issues of transparency and privacy it raises. - Ceci Moss