Mobile phone plans - designed to confuse

If only Telstra, Optus and all the other telco's sold mobile phone plans that tried to 'usher in light' instead of just raising false 'high expectations' as does this pavilion in the Forbidden City in Beijing. 

When I use $18, why should I buy $600 worth?

I'm an average to low user of my smartphone, and I have just come off a two year contract for my first generation iPhone.  I'd love another - newer version, but can't really justify the $79 or $99 per month it would cost with my service provider (Oh what a misnomer that is!). $99 might buy me something like $600 worth of calls per month, but since my call charges are actually about $18 a month - what's all that left over capacity worth to me.  I'll tell you - about $80 a month, or $1,000 a year. So I said 'Put me on your minimum plan.' And then the fun started.

When good designers go bad

I love hotels.
To stay and sleep in, more than to drink or eat in. Best of all I like really well designed hotels. Sure I value really good service, but I especially like things that hotel designers think of that I wouldn't. Let me give you some examples.

Offensive Tags

'Because the world gives you enough tags' - a campaign for Hanes underwear, developed by the Indian branch of an international advertising agency, has american commentators up in arms.

Atomic v Otto Expresso Maker

Is this an Atomic? well no. It's a newly designed stove top - inspired by the Atomic. For those who are not coffee and design addicts, the Atomic machine was a a design icon of the 1950's designed by Giordano Robbiati and produced in Italy from the 1940's through until 1984, when a fire reportedly closed the factory. The photo above is not one of the original, but a newly designed stovetop Otto coffee maker inspired by the Atomic. But wait there's more.

Manifesto with Attitude

Jonathon Adler Manifesto

I got sent the link to this site from a friend, who's sister is in the decorating/furniture/softfurnishings trade. I'm not sure that I share the same manifesto - but I certainly like the attitude.

"We believe handcrafted tchotchkes are life-enhancing." is my favourite.

I want what he has

I want what Jeff Han at perceptive pixel has.



And I want it now! I like the idea of an upper body workout while you work.

Rumour is that some of these screens may be available as soon as this year.

Thanks to PSFK for alerting me to this.

Designers really are poor

On the PSFK website, I noticed an item about another website pdf-mags.com based in Germany.

It contains a great collection of sites that publish - as the title suggests - pdf magazines - or e-zines.

Bag the Bag

For several years I have been on a mission to find the perfect bag.

After years of posessing various backpacks, I have become a convert to the Messenger Bag. I've probably had about 5 in the last 10 years.

Brand utility V Branded Utility

Have you noticed that the terms 'brand' and 'branding' have become highly abused in the advertising, design and marketing industry? 'Brand' has gone from being an approach to recognising and developing a products attributes, to being a cover-all term that usually masks a messy swamp of half-baked marketing waffle.

I knew something was up when I heard someone say 'Kylie is a brand'. err... I thought she was singer, or an Australian, or a cancer survivor, or the singing budgie. Not a sales sticker.

Cherry Blossom Time

When told that I would be in Japan during Cherry Blossom season, I was underwhealmed. Cherry blossom is all very nice, but nothing to get that excited about. On arrival in Tokyo - there was not a lot of cherry blossom. I and my sinuses were relieved.

Turning Japanese

Prepare yourself. I spent some time in Japan earlier in the year. My first time. The next few posts will be that of me as a Japanophile.

Going to Japan has been something I wanted to do for many years. I love the minimalism, the respect for beauty, the torturing of nature. The ability to create beauty by the arrangement of things.

On my first few days in Tokyo, to my western eyes there were constant contradictions between beautiful vistas and mundane interruptions like electricity wires and TV antenna's. I would frame a shot, and there would be the bright pink sign in front of the perfect cherry blossom tree in flower.

For a while - I was frustrated, until I did some reading.

Donald Richie who since WW2 has lived most of his life in Japan provides some interesting insights into this. In his book Partial Views: Essays on Contemporary Japan he argues in one of the essays that the Japanese have a way of ignoring interruptions to beauty. The Japanese view instantly edits the frame to eliminate the telephone wires, or the neon sign.

Once I had read this comment - I abandoned my quest for the 'perfect shot'. It was quite liberating.

Fridges - Platter or no Platter

Not really graphic design related, but anyway.

This weekend, I went looking at fridges for our soon-to-be-renovated kitchen. Being a child of the sixties - one of those fridges with 2 side-by-side doors, an icemaker and chilled water dispenser has always been my aspiration.

These are very available and quite affordable, but they come with a downside. They won't take platters (because each side is narrow), or if they will, they are over a meter in depth - which means you have to have kitchen benches that are a meter deep if you want the fridge to be flush. Or have a sticky-outie fridge - and no one wants that in a modern minimalist interior.

They have two door fridges with freezer draws (sounds like a good idea until you try one). They have one door fridges with freezers at the top. But do they have a two door, freezer below wide model with an icemaker . . . not that I could find.

So, the perfect fridge would be wide (for the platters), with an icemaker, and chilled water in the door, and a freezer at the bottom (not in a drawer).

If you find one - I need to know

All web designers should be a part of this list

Design on the web moves at such a pace. I find it difficult to keep up.

I have some regular sources I check on. Some are in magazines, but most are online.

A List Apart has been around in one form or another for a few years. It is a community of contributors that want to share their knowledge.

It's probably more for the designer and developer rather than the client.

I hope you find it stimulating.