Mimi YuFan You

“Microsoft Future Vision Vid” Unrealistic, way too...

Fri, 04 Nov 2011 15:11:00 -0700

“Microsoft Future Vision Vid” Unrealistic, way too utopian but oh how I live for this stuff.

Definitely putting it in the enormous collection of bookmarks & articles for my Student Directed Seminar - “Emerging Technologies and Business”

http://studentdirectedseminars.ubc.ca/2011-2012-seminars/

I could watch this forever… Favourite video from this year...

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 17:03:02 -0700

I could watch this forever… Favourite video from this year hands down.

Iris Van Herpen - Fall 11/12 - Place des Vosges Using a...

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 17:29:32 -0700

Iris Van Herpen - Fall 11/12 - Place des Vosges

Using a combination of traditional sewing techniques and rapid prototyping, she’s created an incredibly organic, sculptural collection using technology-laden materials.

In short, this is the future of fashion.

To expand on that, this is what I believe to be not only the future of fashion but the key to any good design - integrating an aesthetic and functionality that is guided by the requirements and elegance of the natural world. This is what appeals instinctively to us as humans, the undulating patterns and fractal nature that shows up in much of her work.

As we come to a crossroads in technology where the capabilities of our creations are able to mimic or seemly exceed nature in ways, this is something to remember.

Anything can be made beautiful. Salt.

Fri, 22 Jul 2011 02:14:00 -0700

Anything can be made beautiful. Salt.

jersey shore oscar wilde style

Tue, 26 Apr 2011 21:34:35 -0700

jersey shore oscar wilde style

Killing Microbes

Sat, 26 Mar 2011 13:29:55 -0700

Killing Microbes

Lernert Engelberts and Sander Plug - “Elektrotechnique”

Thu, 24 Mar 2011 22:58:10 -0700

Lernert Engelberts and Sander Plug - “Elektrotechnique”

Print Stuff In My Room

Wed, 16 Mar 2011 11:09:45 -0700

Print Stuff In My Room :

via AdaptCreative

What Standup Comedy Teaches Us About Innovation

Wed, 16 Mar 2011 10:32:27 -0700

What Standup Comedy Teaches Us About Innovation

UX and Willpower

Tue, 15 Mar 2011 12:29:00 -0700

The revitalization of retail in two ways.

1. Men - and their shopping habits

2. iPad - Apple’s e-commerce system

Allow me to explain why the iPad heralds a new era of retail shopping.

The first realization of this was hearing about the launch of Mr Porter - the new spin-off website from the vastly successful Net-A-Porter luxury fashion e-retailer. Natalie Massenet discussed her company’s new site at the recent DLD conference in Munich during a panel on crowdsourcing. Most of the discussion is mundane but one point has stuck with me since watching it weeks ago, Natalie theorizing that the retail experience for men right now definitely isn’t perfect - and that with the right e-commerce site that caters to men who don’t generally enjoy the social aspect of shopping may hit that perfect note that shows success beyond current expectations in the category.

This goes hand-in-hand with the smooth UI that the iPad and Apple offers in their line of products in addition to their “almost too easy” direct charge between the Apple ID and your credit card information.

Lo and behold, just the other day, Giovanni Calabro of FastCompany writes an article on how he has been hiding his credit card bill from his wife ever since getting his iPad and the lowlowlow threshold of impulse shopping on it he’s been experiencing since.

While the entire mobile e-commerce segment is pegged for sharp growth, outpacing older browser shopping and brick & mortar and I believe that retailers catering to men and in particular men’s fashion need to react fast to this new opportunity in the market. Remember when credit cards started taking off, how every basket of goods was just that much higher?

From Privacy vs. Web 2.0, The Importance of Public Relations

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 00:49:00 -0700

Internet privacy, the legal implications and how it affects your personal life has been a common concern in recent years - popping up in discussions regarding Facebook settings, unauthorized photography and internet anonymity.

With this in mind, how has the fluidity of information affected the privacy of businesses? An article in the Economist delves into how the ever-growing pile of digital information is increasingly difficult to manage and how the technology that has presented so many opportunities to engage with customers, is also contributing to corporate security becoming increasingly porous.

Internet Privacy

The solution - transparency. Mitchell Baker of the Mozilla Foundation argues that given the technological environment we’re in now “transparency is not just a natural inclination but a necessity.”

From a marketing standpoint, we’ve known this for quite a while - that building from the core of a business’ philosophy and maintaining authenticity is key. However, thinking about this shift in the business environment, I believe it’s a signal for the increasing importance of public relations in the promotional mix. As marketing transforms from an advertising ‘monologue’ to a consumer to company ‘dialogue’ with consumers become increasingly well-informed and sophisticated, managing reputation and leveraging earned/social media through public relations while maintaining the necessary level of transparency will give businesses the best value for their marketing dollars.

Twitter Tools

Sun, 13 Mar 2011 16:02:00 -0700

In Three Easy Steps

1. Lay Of The Land

Trends Map - watch realtime updates on topics as their happening in any region around the world

Mention Map - start from one username and watch as their closest networks and most common topics start to pop up like fungi.

Using these mapping apps, one can get a great idea of the social networks that exist, zero in on relationship hubs and relevant conversations, thus being able to enter the fray in an informed and intelligent way.

2. What You Want + Measure It

TweetDeck or Hootsuite - aggregators that can organize your conversation spheres

Klout - redefines social technographics and tracks what type of twitter user you are, giving you a Klout score based on your reach and influence. Cat does a great post on it in her blog Creativity from the Right.

More and more startups are focusing on organizing and defining this ‘fuzzy’ social media area. Ironically, creating more mess in the process but I look forward to when standards and more benchmark companies begin to emerge from the primordial startup goo.

3. Keep It There + Stay ‘Not Annoying’

Twuffer - a tweet scheduler to queue and post your tweets at pre-determined times so your contact with followers is consistent. Currently HootSuite and TweetDeck support their own features doing this but if you’re using neither of them Twuffer is useful.

It’s basically common sense but at times its hard to resist dumping a whole slew of tweets after some particularly interesting browsing. However, as Twitter is basically this constant flow of information, thus not inundating followers with alternating tweet-binges and periods of radio-silence = more likely your followers are catching them and aren’t overexposed to it.

South by SouthWest - SXSW

Sun, 13 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0800

18,000 early adopters descend on Austin, Texas.

The SXSW Conference/Festival just kicked off this weekend on Friday.

It consists of three components - an interactive technology conference, a music festival and a film festival.

This is where everything from FourSquare, Twitter to Broke Social Scene gained momentum.

Some interesting SXSW developments…

(What everyone else is going to be talking about 6 months from now)

Group Texting - localized or not - an app called GroupMe lets you send private text messages to all your friends within a certain proximity.

Backstage Pass Apps - letting you choose where to “hangout” in terms of media consumption e.g. content not on the red carpet but maybe behind the scenes

Curation - discussing solutions to help make the internet more useful, readable and relevant each time we use it, instead of falling into a black hole of clicking

Google Circles - direct competition for Facebook, you can share photos, videos and status updates but unlike Facebook, you can direct target these updates to certain people in your circle

Focused exactly on the issue that we had discussed last week in 464 of the disconnect between online and offline social circles and the definition of “friends”. It will facilitate that ‘nuanced’ sharing that we all lack right now with what Twitter and Facebook offer.

Unfortunately, Google announced that they have no imminent plans to launch Circles but I’m definitely adding it to my list of “please make it” products like the Microsoft Courier that so perfectly fit into what I believe is a better, more ‘natural’ experience with technology.

SXSW events roll until March the 20th so definitely follow it in the news for more peeks into the next year in tech/culture.

Macro Kingdom III - Video by Clemens Wirth - Sound Design by...

Tue, 15 Feb 2011 15:47:00 -0800

Macro Kingdom III - Video by Clemens Wirth - Sound Design by Radium Audio

How Vimeo has changed creative collaboration and creator reach. With high quality video and incredible usability, Vimeo has created a platform for sharing quality media (owned, UGC or otherwise) that gives individuals behind the camera the exposure deserved and needed to truly create a dynamic community of artists that ad firms can draw from and anyone online can appreciate.

More Great Videos

Up There (Stella Artois)

James Blake - The Wilhelm Scream

Tue, 15 Feb 2011 06:27:14 -0800

James Blake - The Wilhelm Scream

The Black Cab Sessions - Charlie Siem

Tue, 15 Feb 2011 00:03:47 -0800

The Black Cab Sessions - Charlie Siem:

One Song. One Take. One Cab.

The Second Largest Facebook Market?

Fri, 11 Feb 2011 17:35:39 -0800

It’s not where you expect.

And it definitely will get to you reevaluate what the internet landscape will look like in the coming years.

It’s easy for us to have quite a western centric view of what is out there as our browsers are English, much of our media is divided into several different zones across the globe and isn’t cross-compatible, and there’s so much content immediately available to us, why look beyond that?

From a marketing standpoint, and using the trite globalization argument, it would be nice to know what’s happening outside our bubble.

It’s this:

Indonesia is the second largest market for Facebook and fourth largest for Twitter in the world.

The country is incredibly tech-savvy. It has grown to 30 million users with only 20% of the population converted so far. It’s also one of the largest markets for RIM (Blackberries) with the vast majority using mobile social media platforms and not their laptops (The Economist)

What’s really interesting is their microtransactions market - like mini e-commerce. It occurs to bridge the gap between physical currency and internet currency, allowing users to purchase credits to use online.

Not only is it an enormous portion of Facebook, it’s also one of the oft overlooked centers for technology start-ups. Because of low costs, large market and strong tight-knit technology community, in many ways it seems that Jakarta, Jogjakarta or Bandung may be the next Silicon Valley.

Social Networks vs. Social Tribes

Fri, 11 Feb 2011 17:01:39 -0800

Social Networks vs. Social Tribes

Watching You, Watching Me

Fri, 11 Feb 2011 16:45:46 -0800

The National Science Foundation recently just awarded $150,000 to a new start-up.

It’s a company called Affectiva.

Birthed out of a project from MIT called FaceSense, it’s attempting to commercialize the emotion measurement technology that was developed during that project. Currently, the program can “see” when you smile at your computer while watching videos and associate it with happiness.

Affectiva’s software will be capable of analyzing multiple expressions and associating them with various states of mind. With this recent funding, they hope to move their facial expression recognition technology to a cloud environment.

The program could unlock a lot of potential for market research in the viral video category as we would be able to better pinpoint the key success factors and uncover information about how consumers react to content online that they themselves may not even be aware of as well as release marketers from the errors of self-reporting in studies.

via Mashable

Democracy and Knowledge

Fri, 11 Feb 2011 15:58:00 -0800

The Art Project

Just launched by Google, it gives everyone and anyone access to 17 of the world’s most acclaimed art musuems. This includes the Met and the MoMA in New York, the Tate and National Gallery in London, the State Hermitage in St. Petersburg and the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.

What’s incredible about is that it uses gigapixel technology that allows you to zoom into minute details in the painting that you probably wouldn’t even be able to see in person.

Making knowledge that much more accessible.

And art that much more comprehensible.

Mondrian, eat your heart out.