Design on the Cross

I complain about religion alot. I would argue it is one of the most destructive forces in our modern society, but thats not what this blog is about. This blog is about the cross. Seriously, what the hell?

Why do christians insist on using one of the most horrible, gruesome and violent actions AGAINST their religion as the very icon they stand under? Okay, I'm Christ, sitting at the right hand of God in heaven. People are praying to me, but wait, their surrounded by the very thing that brought me pain, missery and death. Just a few bad memories tied to that, and I would hope my dad feels the same way (and considering the holy trinity, thats pretty likely).

And its not like theirs a lack of imagery in that religion either. Here's a painting of baby Jesus.

Why not a wheel? Lots of people got tortured and killed on those. Or, heres an idea, how about something with positive conotations? If anyone else tried to make a symbol of pain and dismemberment a publicly used icon they'd be burned at the stake

Hmm, stake ...

Unlock Someone Elses Future

If your not quite sure what your looking at, its a set of lock picks. A set of real, functional lock picks. Its also a business card. Clever? yes, unique? you bet, legal? well honestly, I don't know. Its really hard to buy lock picks if your not a locksmith, which is what makes this little piece interesting. It has 4 metal picks and a tension bar that snap out of its little frame. This little card contains everything, except a working knowledge, needed to get through any standard door lock. Craig said design is a risk, well, here it is.

iWatch 2.0

Taking the minimalist iPod approach to an extreme, we have with us today the i/o Watch.


This is a white plastic watch with the time displayed in red dots on its surface. No interface, no buttons, no exposed anything. There isn't even a place to put the battery. The only problem is actually wearing it would ruin its mystic and presence. Very cool.

Natural Conclusion

I like spiders, they're helpful little arachnids that keep our homes free from pests, stay out of the way, and can be quite cute.

I also like scissors, the wonderful surgical look of a big pair of steel scissors is as classic and iconographic as a fire hydrant, or a toilet.

So logically, I like this


Its a spider, made out of bits of scissors. I don't often put art on here, but this fella, with no prectical application, has such a distinctly menacing verve to him I had to post it. He's sharp, and dangerous, but can be quite helpful if respected. Just like scissors. Just like a spider.

This, however, is Similar to a Musket

Another amusing video for your infotainment. This one was made by no one.

This Isn't a Musket Either

On a design unrelated note, check out these guys.



They're a comedy troupe called "Those Arn't Muskets". There stuff is clever and fresh, and delivers some of the best one-liners I've heard in a long time.

Design is Risk and Swearing

Because Craig can't get enough good publicity for his design is piece, I'm gonna mention it. A month long guerrilla campaign raising awareness for dangerous ideas? BRILLIANT! Worthy of expletive, so here it is, the only occurrence of the word in my entire blog, because Craig is just that good. Fucking brilliant!

The amount of time and effort that went into organizing, and delivering that piece is staggering.

An entire fake report for hand in day? Yes. Numerous co-conspirators to deliver your pieces? Naturally. An alternate project to deflect suspicion? Why not. A POEM?! Well god-damn if he didn't!

Many projects convinced me of the creators "Design is ..." statment, but only Craigs proved it to me. Truley, design IS risk!

Cooking Never Looked so Sexy

Now THIS is a sexy stove


The iZona Cook Surface is the iPod equivalent of a stove. It doesn't have any numbers. Turn the dial and the little red indicator lights up, more red means more hot. The truley universal interface has no characters on it at all. It relies on concept of "a big dial on a stove" being pretty universal in its meaning.

Footcycle

I want one.
It serves no purpose, its awkward and ugly, and thank god theres only 1 in the world. But I still want one.

Macin v. Micro

Hey check this out. It acurately sums up the difference between M$ campaigns and Mac campaigns.

The Living Tetris didn't Work as Well as Expected

BWAHAHAHA ha ha, a-heh heh, aah

AAAAHAHAHAHa ha

But seriously. No, on second thought, there is nothing serious about this.

Life Through 342 UC lenses

Pantone has released a series of sun glasses. The lenses are tinted with Pantone colours. This serves no real purpose, but it lets us designers act like slightly bigger design nerds. WOOO, Pantone 122 un-COATED, YEAH!

Just a Bite

My mother doesn't have a sweet tooth, neither do I particularly. Whenever we have cake, pie, tart, flan, squares or anything else of the type she'll ask for "just a bite". A small slice for the taste, but not a real dessert. Which is why this piece caught my eye.

Its a cake pan with pre-sized slices in a variety of sizes. This is quite a clever design, as different people eat different amounts. Its about time someone got around to figuring that out!

Pity these Fools

To celebrate April Fools day, we're going to look at some of the worst advertising and PR attrocities that cost millions.
1. Killing Napster
In 2001 the RIAA (The Music Industry) killed Napster, and signed their own death warrant. No company, in the history of business, has managed to so blindly over look TRILLIONS in revenue. Napster represented throngs of savvy young music consumers with dispossable income and a desire for music in an exciting new format. No, "represented" is the wrong word. Napster WAS throngs of young consumers. Ignorance made them sue Napster, but thats nothing compared to the level of stupidity required to sue your own gawdamn consumers. "If I sue them for millions over the music they download, surly they'll see the light and start buying our records again".

2. Vista
In an attempt to compete with the user friendly Leopard and Linux OS, two very easy, intuitive OS's, Microsoft released Vista, an OS that requires a computer sciences degree to operate ... late. Vista is a good OS, its just not good for the end user. Out of the box Vista expects people to have an indepth understanding of execution variables, multi-layered interfaces, runtime commands and windows quick keys. Packaged with an interface that rivals Quark. Whats worse, it was released late and imcomplete. How late? Just after Christmas late. Just after biggest buying season of the year late. Man, thats just tiny and flimsy ... wait a minute, micro, soft, hey I just got it!

3. Candidate Wal-Mart
Because I had to get at least 1 actual campaign in here. Candidate Wal-Mart was the single biggest ad campaign Wal-Mart ever embarked on, and the single biggest hit to their sales since ... you know what, any stupid comment I could come up with would just undermine the vast failure of this campaign. For those of us in Canada, who may not know what the CWM campaign was, let me explain. Edelman made for Wal-Mart a series of ads that portrayed their lovable smiley face as a presidential candidate. He espoused the benefits of having a Wal-Mart in your neighborhood. He wore a suit. He was hated by all. Wal-Mart spent millions on this campaign, and lost millions because of it, making it one of the biggest PR screw ups of all time.

Well, that was depressing, maybe the rest of April will go better