Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Best music of 2009

10 Best records of 2009 _in numerical order_
1. Merriweather Post Pavilion, by Animal Collective
2. Zii e Zie, by Caetano Veloso
3. XX, by XX
4. Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle, by Bill Callahan
5. Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, by Phoenix
6. Fever Ray, by Fever Ray
7. Let's Change the World With Music, by Prefab Sprout
8. How to Get to Heaven from Scotland, by Aidan Moffat & The Best-Ofs
9. Jewellery, by Micachu and the Shapes
10. Inspiration Information 3, by Mulatu Astatke & Heliocentrics

Hear the list in Spotify (except Bill Callahan)


Another 28 great records of 2009 _alphabetical order_
Album, by Girls
Beacons of Ancestorship, by Tortoise
Beat Conducta 5-6, by Madlib
BiRd-BrAiNs, by tUnE-yArDs
Bitte Orca, by Dirty Projectors
Bromst, by Dan Deacon
Dark Was the Night, VV.AA. (curated by The National)
Embryonic, by The Flaming Lips
Farm, by Dinosaur Jr.
Five Years of Hyperdub, VV.AA.
Hold Time, by M. Ward
Logos, by Atlas Sound
Manners, by Passion Pit
Noble Beast, by Andrew Bird
Popular songs, by Yo La Tengo
Primary Colours, by The Horrors
One, by Ben Klock
Rockwell, by Anni Rossi
The Ecstatic, by Mos Def
The Eternal, by Sonic Youth
The Good Feeling Music, by Dent May
The Love Language, by The Love Language
To Be Still, by Alela Diane
Together Through Life, by Bob Dylan
Veckatimest, by Grizzly Bear
Watersports, by Mi Ami
Wavves, by Wavves
Wilco (the Album), by Wilco

Hear the list in Spotify (except Tortoise, Hyperdub, Ben Klock, Alela Diane, Bob Dylan, Grizzly Bear and Mi Ami)


14 songs of 2009 _alphabetical order_
1901, by Phoenix
Hibari, by Ryuichi Sakamoto (video)
House of Diamonds, by Bowerbirds
Islands, by Xx
Lalita, by The Love Language
Lisztomania, by Phoenix
My Girls, by Animal Collective
Osaka Loop Line, by Discovery
Rum Hee (Deerhoof Remix), by Shugo Tokumaru (In Fairtilizer)
Sasong, by Avery Tare & Kría Brekkan (In YouTube)
Stillness Is The Move, by Dirty Projectors
The Reeling, by Passion Pit
Velvet, by The Big Pink
Woof Woof, by Dan Deacon

Hear the list in Spotify (except noted)


Fourteen beautiful Spanish records from 2009 _alphabetical order_
1971, by Elle Belga
A Nadie, by Javier Corcobado
And it Matters to me to see you Smiling, by bRUNA
Chill Out, by Joe Crepúsculo
Chorando Apréndese, by Emilio José
Desayuno Continental, by Extraperlo
En la Cama con Antonna, by Antonna
El Perro Es Mío, by Francisco Nixon
El Primero Era Mejor, by Manos de Topo
La Educación, by Abraham Boba
La Mejor Hora para Despertarse, by La Banda Municipal del Polo Norte
Larga Duración, by Lagartija Nick
Macumba o muerte, by Za!
Otra nube, by Javier Colís y las Malas Lenguas
Romancero, by La Bien Querida

Hear the list in Spotify (except Joe Crepúsculo, Antonna, Manos de Topo, Javier Colís and La Bien Querida)

Best Generic Music Blog: Bolachas

Best Genre Music Blog: 300 Discos importantes da Música Brasileira


Best Concert a Emporter Kazuki Tomokawa part 2

Kazuki Tomokawa - A Take Away Show #98 - Part II from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.



Xx

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Mom & Apple Pie

Mom & Apple Pie from seretuaccidente on Vimeo.

A documentary on sounds, textures, and sugar.

In front of the camera: Kate McDermott
Behind the camera: Xurxo Martínez

This is my final work for my Web Strategies for Storytelling class. Master of Communication in Digital Media, University of Washington. Fall 2009.

Visit Art of the Pie at http://www.artofthepie.com/

Camera: Canon HDVCAM HV30
Sound: Rode Microphone NTG-2
Edited with Sony Vegas

Xx

Thursday, December 3, 2009

Small revolution in Spain

The story goes like this:

a) Spain is one of the countries with higher levels of piracy of copyrighted content (link).
b) Spanish Culture minister, Ángeles González-Sinde, is an screenwriter that has a very tight relation with Spanish blogosphere and twittersphere.
c) This week her Ministry introduced a polemic paragraph in a big law project on Sustainable Economy (focused on recovering from the Economic Crisis). The paragraph said that the government could close websites or blogs that infringes intellectual property without any judicial control (link).
d) Bloggers, journalists and users created a Manifesto in Defense of Fundamental Rights in the Internet (link).
e) Legal analyse of the Law propose by lawyer David Bravo (link).
f) After a talking with some of the responsibles of the Manifesto, González-Sinde just says that it was a very interesting meeting. Hours after, Spanish President, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, had to step back and explain that no one in the government will close any webpage and that changes may be made in the law proposal (link).
g) Members of PSOE (party in power in Spain) complained because González-Sinde didn't make clear what consequences the paragraph could have.
h) Spanish newspaper Publico opens friday edition with the image of the keyboards ctrl+z (Zapatero's nickname/brand is ZP) (link).

Today in the news, tomorrow in a Clay Shirky book.

Xx

Monday, November 16, 2009

Give out the short story, sell the novel

iTunes made it possible to sell small music elements (songs) without needing to buy the whole work -the record-. And it made sense, not only because many people used to buy a CD just because of one or two songs, but because the psychology of the price (hey, is just $,99) and because one song is easily consumed on its own.

Can the same be applied to single articles, tales, a short video and any kind of single multimedia piece? Or the 'small stuff' is condemned to be free int he internet? Bill Wasik, Senior Editor of Harper's Magazine, bets for the latter.

Is easy to see a chapter sample, a small video related to a bigger one or a short comic strip as the -free- hook for a future sell. I also understand that give away excerpts or examples is the better way to promote you as an artist or a content producer.

But does it mean that selling small pieces in the internet will be a mission impossible? I think so. At least if we think about isolated objects that can be consumed in less than 10 minutes. Compilations will be the only way for short pieces to get to the market.

So, why someone will pay $,99 for a song and not the same for a videoclip or $,1 for a newspaper article? Because the users are used to pay $,99 for a good quality mp3, but always have seen videos or read articles for free. The only way this habit could be changed is with such a great user experience that would become a value in itself.

When Wasik talks about the non profit business model for newspapers I guess that he's also thinking about this: how difficult is to make the users pay for what always was for free.

Xx

Friday, November 13, 2009

US Airways Flight 1549 3D Reconstruction



Kas Osterbuhr, an engineer at K3 Resources who specializes in the visual presentation of complex data, goes one step further while showing how the the US Airways Flight 1549 crashed over the Hudson River. It reconstructs the flight using vast amounts of material, including radar information showing the position of the geese that led to the Airbus A320 losing power. The result is an incredible series of videos. This was the main one. Here are all of them.

The whole story, in Wired.

[Via Xocas]

Monday, November 9, 2009

Hulu's doubts may be others' chances

I love to see 30 Rock in Hulu. In fact is the only way I can do it, as I'm in my wonderful Web Strategies for Storytelling class when it's aired. The video and audio quality is good, the ads are few and not too horrible -great moment to check the mail- and if you want more you can access to any other episode in just two clicks. It works for me, and I don't really care if it works for Hulu's owners.

So I fully understand Quincy Smith's and Laura Martin's points: Why did they (Disney, GE and NewsCorp) decided to do it so well and so easy if they were not sure about how to make money of it?

Now it would be pretty hard to tell the users "hey, we've changed our minds and a) we're not going to put as much content online or b) we are going to charge you for what now is free". You need to be very careful with that kind of moves.

The strength of Hulu comes from the fact that some of the biggest players had agreed to act together. That way they get more than decent prices for the ads -$50 CPM is just amazing. The basic CPM for regular banners in a web site without special campaigns is just $1- and an offer big enough for the users to stay hours in the site. Others like Turner's Adult Swim or CBS' Social Room are too small or more experimental, and have less reach than Hulu.

All that said, if Hulu decides to charge for the films and episodes, not only would be the time for other smaller and free players to get new users, but also the time for more open and social-media like options. I'm thinking about Boxee, an open software media center that aggregates the most interesting free video content online and that even enables Torrent downloads from all kind of platforms. This application has been awarded at the CES as Best product in the 'Maximum tech' category and will turn from alpha to beta in a month. The more good quality video content that applications as Boxee are able to offer the less impressive and essential Hulu would look like.

Xx

Monday, November 2, 2009

Good storytelling makes the audience fill in the blanks

Both oral and writing storytelling have a quality that has really worked for them: part of the story always happen/is produced in the imagination of the audience. You can make a very detailed description of a dress or the view from a window, but each one pictures something different in their mind. The person who is reading or listening usually adds not only sensory aspects to the narration, but also personal memories to the narration. So she or he is never passive, always interacts in any way with the story itself.

For visual representational media things can be different, as some times the storytelling tries to give all the information to the audience. I'm thinking about video content, which usually drives the audience through all the details of the story, making the spectator passive. But a photo, drawing or painting can also tell a whole story by itself. Those cases usually ask for a talented storyteller and an audience ready to fill in the blanks.

What about web storytelling?
The Internet makes it possible to combine different formats in the same piece. This comes to be not only an advantage, but also a danger, as we can confuse the viewers with format changes or fall into aesthetic temptations.

A good web narrative should do two things: provide space for the reader to 'fill' some information and engage the user asking for his or her interaction at some points.

The web storyteller need to be sure that each part of the story is told using the format that makes more sense from the own story point of view.

For me a perfect marriage for web storytelling could come from the mix of video and flash infographics, where the infography in itself is the container and video provides framed stories inside the whole story.

Xx

Monday, October 26, 2009

An astronaut, e-postman or maybe online communicator

This post is about where do I see myself in the near future. A kind of What do you want to do when you grow up? where grow up means 'after leaving the Master of Communication in Digital Media'.

Want to start saying that for me the best plan is always Plan B. When I research one city before going on holiday is just to feel that I will have things to do in case I don't feel safe or confident enough to improvise, which is my first option. And I feel this post is something similar: I guess I still don't know what will be the perfect place for me, maybe it doesn't even exist, but will try to picture myself in the future with what I know now.

My background is online information, ranging from regular writing to product management. And my reasons to be in this Master are to learn a different information culture, see from the inside what's going on in the USA and, more specifically, learn new ways to tell stories and to provide information.

So I want to be...
In the next years I see myself trying to create new storytelling formats for the Internet and figuring out which way the users want the information to be delivered in an overcrowded and multi source world. I feel that we need to come out with some 100% internet journalistic genre, other than links and tweets.

If I have to think about just one position that already exists and I would love to have it would be at The New York Times Research and Development Lab. This is a place where they try to display the NYT content in ways that could be more convenient for mobile devices or could break the notion that an online newspaper is "just the same" in another platform. They also try to create formats that doesn't need to resemble a printed media and would be internet native.

And if I find a different way to tell stories and communicate I will be happy. Don't need to make money for this or to become famous. For me Internet is a place where people gets and gives things from and for others, and I'd love to make my contribution something else than posts, comments and photos.

Xx

Saturday, October 24, 2009

The history of internet

History of the Internet from PICOL on Vimeo.


This is a german animated documentary explaining the inventions from time-sharing to filesharing, from Arpanet to Internet.

Xx

Sunday, October 18, 2009

NYT video section: doing as always but in a different way


The New York Times was one of the very first print newspapers in producing specific video content for the web version. In 2005 they started to create their own videos, ranging from breaking news to in depth reports. Most of the content were created by NYT staff, including interviews conducted by some of their better known journalists.

My feeling as an user is that they've always tried to meet the quality and excellence of their written stuff. Although it took some time to adapt their style to an audience used to shorter pieces than the ones they use to deliver at first, now their archive (http://video.nytimes.com/) is really a video world in itself. A place for both the casual user and the one that thinks that looking for something interesting at Youtube is a loss of time.

Text and video are complementary
The company has made a great work trying to make video and text sites compatible and complementary. Just to put an example, anyone interested in business information sure will have time to spend at their video section, that offers both interviews, analysis and help discovering innovator ideas.

Two of the most popular columnists of the printed version, David Pogue and Mark Bittman, have their own spaces in the video site, where they show (each on in his own style) that an information video doesn't need to be a simple visual translation of a text and create formats that are not just well fitted for the internet, but make their videos perfect for watching with a mobile device as a video podcasts.

Since 2007 The New York Times is one of Brightcove's investors and uses their software to manage most part of their site.

For the last two years, the video section of The New York Times has also tried to create or use formats that would set apart, both from the content and the formal points of view. That way they came out with Blogginheads (a deal with http://bloggingheads.tv/ in order to showcase all kind of debates), or the Screen Tests, where popular actors talk in a minimal and intimate way.

Finally I guess that creating content in a similar way that a magazine does (entertaining, somewhat timeless, not mandatory tight to the breaking news) they have create a pure internet experience, where any of the videos can be considered a piece in its own or just a part of something else.


Saturday, October 17, 2009

Tasting Pears

Tasting pears from seretuaccidente on Vimeo.



Horrible back light, I know. Used a Flip HD + mini-spider tripod and iMovie for edit.

Can a pear be too sweet? This Comice from Safeway ($1.5) was. Not bad at all and really tasteful, but the excessive sugar killed the natural flavor. I guess it should be great with plain yogurt.

Maybe the cheapest thing I found at KFC was this Bartell pear. Just $2 per pound. A single yellow bell pepper was more expensive. Is not only that it was too green. The outside was great but you had the feeling that it had been frozen. The flavor was just decent. For decoration.

From the Farmers Market I chose one Bosc at $2.5 each pound. Just ripped. The smell is great. So is the texture. The flavor was not as expressive as the Comice but I found it better, because was far more natural. Need to get more of this.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Free books at $26.99


Chris Anderson: "Zero is one market and any other price is another".

'Free' is not a completely new marketplace. As Anderson writes in the book of the same title and before in the Wire article Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business, there are examples of businessmen that decided to give away one of their products in order to gain something: either audience or create in the consumer the need of a complementary product.

In fact this is what he has done with the book. For a limited time, anyone could read a pdf version for free in Scribd, and even now anyone can obtain the unabridged audio version, read by Anderson himself, without paying for it. But if anyone prefer to have the hardcover book version at home, then he or she will need to pay $26.99.

The book talks about a reality in the digital world: storage and delivery costs are getting cheaper and cheaper each year and tend to zero cost. And talks also about 'free' as a marketing trend that is becoming one of the few successful nowadays: give something for free and you'll have the attention that would cost enormous amounts of money otherwise. And Anderson does so with an entertaining style, mixing storytelling and statistics.

But in all its brightness, it would be dangerous to see his points as perfect, absolut or definitive. It wouldn't be fair to look at this work as a philosopher's stone that can solve all the business model problems. Mainly because Anderson tries to show how it works something that is still growing and mutating.

Healthy controversy

For that reason is good to find voices as Malcom Gladwell's that make objections and ask questions that, if answered, can help the 'free' hypothesis to become stronger. A good example is Anderson's response to Gladwell in the post Dear Malcom: Why so threatened?

I don't really see a tremendous difference between what Anderson says and Gladwell's points. Basically what the latter says is that most web free services that are successful engaging people still doesn't make enough money to pay their costs. And that considering 'free' an iron law is wrong, because what really happens is that the digital age has changed everything and now we have to figure out how to make a living from our intelectual work. And 'free' is just one more option among the many that can show up in a near future.

And I find too adventurous to state, as Seth Godin does, that a publishing company as Conde Nast will sure disappear quite soon. I agree that they'll have to change, but may stay in business even longer than Youtube, Hulu or MySpace. Godin himself says that "only really valuable information will get paid", and Conde Nast produces great information. Their challenge is to guess how to monetize it, and Mark Cuban believes that the Music industry has already found a path: you can give content for free but always keeping control on the distribution.

Internet and 'free'

For me, the concept of 'free' in the internet is somewhat wicked. First because is not real free: you are paying for the connection. Then, because giving content without expecting money in return was a great marketing idea when the commercial internet started up, but it haven't fully proved to work from an economic point of view.

If advertising revenue keeps low and no-one comes with new business models, a lot of webpages will have to close at some moment. Even some with millions of users. Because millions of users represent millions of profit options but what they are, for sure, is millions of spendings. Will MySpace or Hulu resist if they don't have benefits in three more years? If they do is for strategy reasons related with companies that have their assets in the offline world.

And also internet 'free' is wicked because you tend to think that you have some kind of right to get everything without paying. And maybe won't use a web service that is $1 more than free, even if is terribly useful. But at the same time you but will pay $5 for a latte and a muffin in any coffee shop just because you need to make time waiting for someone. Culture and environment makes a big difference when stating what are you willing to pay for.

And that's the reason why the paper version of Anderson's book needed to have a price. Because all books have. At least until now.

Xx

PD: 2 cents on storytelling in a 'free market': if both the creation and distribution costs are almost free and I can compete with the best possible price (zero), I'll find myself in the same start conditions than anyone else. This can be stressful, but also hopeful: all I have to think about is to deliver the best possible product, focusing in the user's attention because of my topic and trying to engage them at the very beginning of my pieces.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Yo La Tengo: 'A girl like you' and 'Our way to fall'

Yo La tengo - A Take Away Show - Part 1 from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.


A beautiful evening in Paris, one of the greatest (indie) rock bands of the last 20 years, and an adventurous group of filmmakers lead by Vincent Moon. A cover of a Troggs' classic, and one of Yo La Tengo' best songs. Here we are, another Les concerts a emporter jewel on La Blogotheque. Maybe the best of the year, so far.

Second part (with 'Sugarcube', and 'Periodically double or triple') is also great.

Xx

Monday, October 5, 2009

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Whistle my name


This video is part of a marketing campaign made by spanish agency La Despensa (check other works in their Youtube page) for the online learning service Buusu.

The clip performs a group of people from La Gomera, one of the Canary Islands, who still uses the ancient... launguage? of Silbo Gomero, a way of communication that consists on whistles. In a way similar to Morse. The campaign was awarded with a Silver Lion at the last Cannes Advertising Festival.

In the last years Silbo has been re-introduced in the public education system of Gomera, and hopefully a bunch of young guys will learn it and keep on using it for a long time.

Last week the Silbo Gomero has been included by Unesco in the List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, among others as Argentina's and Uruguay's Tango, China's Qiang New Year festival or Azerbaijan's performance art Ashiqs.

+ INFO:
- Official site for the promotion of Silbo Gomero (spanish).
- Here's an article by one researcher from the UW dated back in 2005.
- Coursebook (in english)

Xx

Ideas for final video work

Ideas for the final video work at com597b from seretuaccidente on Vimeo.


For those that have problems with the video (the audio is quite low) or my english, or just because is more than 45 seconds long, here's the four options I put on the table:

- Neighborhoods, because most of the Seattle ones work as small independent units, have their own personality and resources. Quenn Anne and International district are world apart. This subject is open enough for people also to focus on any daily issue that involves the people you live with and the relations with/among them

- Transport (bus, bike, car, light rail, monorail, train...) because is one of the defining characteristics of the city and allow to talk about the people and the relations with the place where they live.

- Music, that have been a city's leitmotiv for the last 20 years (from Mudhoney to Fleet foxes), is one of it's creative forces and also can give us the opportunity of talking about the cultural diversity of Seattle.

- Coffee + coffee shops. This is an obvious one, don't know if too closed. What's the role of the coffee houses in the daily life, if the (again) cultural and ethnical diversity has something to do with the fact that Seattle is one of the prime consumers of coffee in the States...

Xx

Monday, August 31, 2009

Hanson Hosein and the Future of Digital Media

Great radio interview with Hanson Hosein as guest. He talks with clear vision and no fears about the mass media (and their business model) crisis, and explains how the internet has made more evident (and sooner) the problems 'old media' have been developing for the last 10-15 years.





Xx

Disclaimer: This fall I'll become an MCDM student, so Mr. Hosein will be, in a way, my 'boss'.

2nd disclaimer: It happens that the journalist who interviews Hanson Hosein, Ross Reynolds, is also my classmate in the Master.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Valuable brands that play the social game

Among the most valuable brands, this report shows which of them work harder and better in the social media world. Starbucks and Dell are by far the most active. If you focus in the industry, obviously Media and Technology companies get the best scores, while finance ones get the worst.


Engagementdb Social Media Engagement Report 2009

More info in Social Media DB

Xx

Saturday, July 18, 2009

Gauging Your Distraction - Interactive Feature

Another brilliant work from the NYT. The related story is this: Drivers Dismiss Risks of Multitasking on the Road, focusing not only on alcohol intake, but also on mobile texting.


Posted via web from seretuaccidente's posterous



Xx

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Time Lapse: Mardi Gras

Time lapse is a technique where each video frame i captured at a slow speed an later reproduced at a normal rate of speed. The result is similar to the slow motion animation.
- Timelapse videos channel
- Here an interview with Luis Caldevilla, from TimeLapses.tv (in spanish). Google translation to english


- A nice example of time lapse video

Mardi Gras from Keith Loutit on Vimeo.



Xx

Friday, July 10, 2009

An aggregator with a newspaper's heart

Just wanted to show you the web I've been working on as PM for the last 9 months

http://fresqui.com/

Is a social aggregator (as digg.com or reddit.com) but with the the looks of a very 2.0 online newspaper. We wanted two (maybe three) main things:
- Give video and images the same relevance as text articles
- Be a confortable place to stay for everyone: social aggregators (even twitter) use to have very interesting content, but the interface is too hard and geek for a lot of people who looks for information in the internet.
- Avoid the feeling that this is a voting contest and that if Mr. Popularity sends an article it will be in the frontpage in few minutes. Of course we use the votes in order to create the top, but also give more relevance to a visit that comes from a mail or a tweet than to a visit from google and we think that if a reader goes to the original source that means he or she really liked it and is more valuable.

Hope you enjoy it


Nuevo Fresqui

Xx

Friday, July 3, 2009

Man Man: freedom music

Man Man at their best. Is great to see both the energy they display when playing in the street with a bunch of kids as improvised companion and how do they finish their concert and lead the people as modern Hamelin flautists.




By La blogotheque

Xx

Thursday, July 2, 2009

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Steam, smoke and the magic ring

This spectacular pic was taking by the NASA's ISS. It belongs to the eruption of Saychev Peak on Matua Island on June 12th. You can see the steam (white oval on top), the cloud of dust and how the violence of the eruption forces the clouds to give space: a kind of ring due to the atmospheric shockwave.


It takes some time to open the image, but is worth the wait.



[Via io9]



Xx

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Space Jigsaw

I'm ashamed of my performance with this beautiful BBC graphic. Now it's your turn


Here you are the instructions:
Build the Solar System, from planets to space probes.

Choose which level to complete
Drag and drop each object into the right place




WIDTH="940" HEIGHT="705"

CODEBASE="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab">












PLAY="true"

LOOP="false"

QUALITY="high"

MENU="false"

TYPE="application/x-shockwave-flash"

PLUGINSPAGE="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash">





Xx

Monday, June 22, 2009

Twitter search in plain english

Not the most original video in history, but clear and thought enough to be clear. Created by Commoncraft for education and training purposes.




Xx

Sunday, June 21, 2009

St Vincent: Actor out of work

From a Pitchfork's new performance series set in a chapel in the middle of a Brooklyn graveyard and named Cementery Gates. St. Vincent sings one of the songs from the album Actor. What I like from hearing St.Vincent performing alive is to realise that her songs are not only beautiful and well built, but also urgent and touching. I don't think that perfection she looks for in the record production makes the songs any better than this.




Xx

Friday, June 19, 2009

The little, tiny, chopped mermaid

I don't want to look for resemblances, but despite is great to be able to embed google books is also frustrating to realize that they will cut some pages here and there. I would prefer to have just the first 15 than realizing that you lack of pages, let's say, 8-9 or page 14.



Xx

Monday, June 1, 2009

Mapumental

Watch this video, where Tom Steinberg, from mysociety.org, explains what Mapumental (now in public beta) is about: basically it shows how much time does it takes to get from one point of UK to another when you use bus, train, tram, tube or boat (where timetables are available). Finally, the goal is to really be aware of how far (in time, not in space) is your house from the center of a city (where you are supposed to work, specially if the city is London). It also adds the pricing of each area, so you can check interesting areas to move in, in order to arrive early to work and live in an affordable place. A great way to use official data and get something really worth for the user. Check out the video.





[Vía @adrianholovaty]

Xx

Saturday, May 16, 2009

Undressed + music + street



Previous video, Baby Baby Baby by The girl dance, happens to be influenced by Matt and Kim's Lessons Learned. Looks like police are less intrusive in París than in NY





[Vía Fubiz]

Xx

Thursday, May 14, 2009

Mark Bittman at TED conference


One of my favorite TED conferences, named 'what's wrong with what we eat' and delivered by the always funny and meaningful Mark Bittman. I really enjoy his thoughts on local food production and seasonal food.



Xx

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Physics + touch screens = games

DaVinci (Microsoft Surface Physics Illustrator) from Razorfish - Emerging Experiences on Vimeo.


DaVinci is a software experiment created by Razorfish for Microsoft Surface that combines drawing and phsics. The user can create forms that interact as if they were 3D 'real' objects


Similar to DaVinci there is other experiment with touch screens (even an iPhone/iPod Touch game) named Crayon Physics in the form of a game that allows the user to create forms that will behave as real balls, edges or axis.


Crayon Physics from tdgunes on Vimeo.


Xx

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Juan Muñoz: Many Times


Photo by Insaneyouth

You go into the room and discover 100 almost identical ceramic figures resembling asian men in small groups, as if they were chatting in a public park. Sometimes the faces reflect happiness, others avoid their counterparts, and the relation between them and the spectator becomes a game between individuals who look at each other with curiosity but without empathy.


This instalation, called "Many Times", is the center of the retrospective dedicated to spanish artist Juan Muñoz, curated by the Tate Modern and now showing at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, in Madrid. The whole exhibition is brilliant, but "Many Times" is an experience in its own.



Xx

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Where is the sun?


What you are looking at is the rectangular projection of the world map and the current sunlight and shadow areas. The computer generated pic is updated each hour, and the clouds each three. The original, plus a semi-realistic view of dawn and dusk from far above the Earth or other projections --such as Peters, Mollweide or equirectangular-- can be found at the Die.net webpage.



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Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Kew Gardens turns 250 years old



Just a simple shot of the simplest flowers you can find at the wonderful Kew Gardens (London), one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. And I've seen quite a lot by now.


+ INFO
- Link to my Kew photos in Flickr
- Link to the most relevant Kew photos in Flickr
- Kew Gardens website
- Slideshow about the 250th anniversary

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Saturday, May 2, 2009

The red balloon / Le ballon rouge


Not suitable for impatient people, this almost silent short film by Albert Lamorisse (1965), is not only one of the most awarded in history, but also the inspiration for another wonderful film by the director from Taiwan Hou Hsiao-Hsien: Flight of the Red Balloon.



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Intimacy or marketing?



One of the many Barak Obama's photos that anyone can find at the White House page in Flickr.



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Friday, May 1, 2009

Why you shouldn't trust InTouch



Text says: If all that Magazine 'InTouch' have publised on Pitt and Jolie for the last few months were true they now would have one more daughter, scars all over their bodies, dead liver, be about to move and tons of marriage lawyers pretty happy. I'll believe that relationship (or marketing brand) is ended when 'The Economist' will announce it, not before.



Bob Bop, gossip columnist from spanish newspaper'Publico'

Thursday, April 30, 2009

On the beach


Once again, the Big picture deserves its name. Now is 'Human landscapes from above', by photographer Jason Hawkes. This pic was taken in Menorca Island (Spain).



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Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Scrollbars experiment


Scrollbars Experiment from Yazev on Vimeo.

To reproduce the experiment (click here) you need to browse with Safari or Google Chrome.

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Monday, April 27, 2009

For one moment...

for one moment...

Seen in the streets of Shoreditch (London)

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Swine flu already has a song



Is a cumbia from the mexican group Agrupación Cariño, and, yes, it shows how mexican are able to laugh at anything.

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Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Bill Callahan: Cool blooded old times



From the 'Don't Look Back' series by Pitchfork TV

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Politics is all about pose



Word game (letter game, in fact) with the acronym for the Spain's ruling party in (PSOE) and the word 'pose'. This tries to criticise PSOE's and Gov's latest decissions and cabinet changes.



Image by the great graphic designer and infographist Álvaro Valiño.

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Thursday, April 16, 2009

Song of the week: Harvest moon

I guess no-one was expecting nothing like that from Neil Young. It was 1992 and for the last 15 years he had become a kind of wild rebel, angry with the world, revered for the youngs and selling less and less records. But suddenly, as his classic record 'Harvest' turned 20 years old, Young went back and wrote another beautiful record of acoustic ballads, 'Harvest Moon'. And, by far, the best of all was the title one: a track that has one of his finest melodies crafted with warm and wise lyrics about love and the pass of the time. The first time I heard it I just thought it was a good song. Now, for me, it's a classic.




Harvest Moon Unplugged - Neil Young

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Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Where would you wish to wake up tomorrow? (NY answers)

One single question made to 50 different people. Here's the answers



Fifty People, One Question: New York from Fifty People, One Question on Vimeo.

By Fifty people, one question

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Where would you wish to wake up tomorrow? (New Orleans)

One single question made to 50 different people in New Orleans. Here's the answers



Fifty People, One Question: New Orleans from Fifty People, One Question on Vimeo.

By Fifty people, one question

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Where would you wish to wake up tomorrow? (Brooklyn)

One question, fifty answers. In Brooklyn, NY



Fifty People, One Question: Brooklyn from Fifty People, One Question on Vimeo.


By Fifty people, one question

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Where would you wish to wake up tomorrow? (London answers)

One single question made to 50 different people in London. Here's the answers



Fifty People, One Question: London from Fifty People, One Question on Vimeo.

By Fifty people, one question

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Essential tips for time travelers



You can buy it here

[Vía Microsiervos]



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Sunday, April 12, 2009

Tweenbot


Image by Noneck

Cute robot, isn't it? I's name is Tweenbot and has been created by an NYU student named Kacie Kinzer. The mission of his robots (the tweenbots) is to get from one place to another, always with the help of complete unknowns, because they only can move forward in straight line.
[+ Info at Tweenbots]


Here you are a video where Tweenbot travels from the northeast to the southwest square of Washington Sq (NY)




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Are you looking at me?



[Via !=]

Redefining Women - Nickalene Thomas

One of the most interesting artist in the USA today.

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Thursday, April 9, 2009

G20 protests video shows aftermath of police assault on Tomlinson

The video provides further evidence that the initial explanation of Tomlinson's final moments released by police was misleading. It also corroborates the version of events given to the Guardian by witnesses to his death, some of whom are pictured in the film.

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Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Twitter strips




Funny comic strips on twitter and microblogging.

[More strips at Webdesigner Depot]

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Thursday, March 26, 2009

The brand new Little Red Riding Hood


Slagsmålsklubben - Sponsored by destiny from Tomas Nilsson on Vimeo.

School assignment to reinterpret the fairytale Little red ridning hood.
Inspired by Röyksopp's Remind me.

Music: Slagsmålsklubben, Sponsored by destiny |
www.smk.just.nu | Animation: Tomas Nilsson (www.tomas-nilsson.se)

[Via Microsiervos]

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Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Optical illusions

This is the cover for the first record from the band Faggot Rock


By the way, "best indie record name of the month": Collective Grizzly Bears in Rainbows

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Sunday, March 22, 2009

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

The National: "So Far Around the bend"

From the wonderful collective album 'Dark was the ground' (Red Hot)

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Interactive Map Showing Immigration Data Since 1890





Another great interactive info from NYT. They not only put the data in maps. Both the choose of nationalities and making the bubble size proportional to population are real examples of journalism.

Take a look at how italian or irish inmigrantion has declined since 1920's to today. Also amazing the growth of mexican inmigration in the last years.

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Yahoo!, still Nº1 in Japan



Yahoo! not only keeps the advantage over Google in Japan, but increases in the last year. The source is a Comscore release, that only sizes search market. Should be noted that in Japan Yahoo! is a joint venture with Softbank, a japanese telecomunications and media corporation. Maybe Carol Bartz (new Y! SEO) should take a look at the international market, too.

Xx

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Size Matters

This is the number of tumbs (1,4 million) that represents the dead people during the cambodian Khmer Rouge policies between 1975 and 1979.



Originally by The big picture blog

[Vía Infografistas.com]

Most dangerous streets in the world, Irak; Second, El Salvador

El Salvador is, after Irak, the most dangerous place on Earth 

(Honduras ranks fourth). As it is the case of DC, in El Salvador weapons are widespread: almost 10% of the population -basically men- carry guns in the streets. No wonder why many restaurants and shops display a door sticker of "Guns forbidden here" next to the one about dogs.

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