The User Advocate

Arie van Baarle; 20+ years experience in design, branding & interaction. Founder of Limage Dangereuse, creative director of Razorfish, co-founder of Syndicat now selfemployed.

Developing adaptive brands and helping brands to interact with their stakeholders.

Focussing on all aspects of interaction: Human-Brand interaction (brand development, service design and digital strategy), Human-Machine interaction (website and brand-app concepts/design) and Human-Human interaction (social media strategy and concepts).

Specialties:
Digital strategy, concept development, human centered design, interaction concepts, service design, experience branding, social media- and experience design.

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Text Science Journal Produces a Different Kind of Viral Video

The world’s first peer-reviewed video journal gives scientists a better way to show others how to replicate experiments.

If a photo is worth a thousand words, imagine the understanding that can be captured from 10 minutes at 30 frames per second. A scientific journal dedicated to video—a medium seldom seen in peer-reviewed publications—is finding out.

Increasingly, scientists include short video clips when they submit their manuscripts to a journal. But the Journal of Visualized Experiments—JoVE for short—is an online journal where video is the main medium rather than a supplement.

www.jove.com

source: technology review

http:///

#internet #knowledge
Text 1
Notes The state of creativity

source: adobe

#creative #infographics
Text Coke’s vending machine experiments

The friendship Machine

What if you can climb up a huge Coke machine and get 2 coke bottles for the price of one?

The Hug Machine

The Coca-Cola Hug Machine. You hug it, it returns the favour with a Coke. Because vending machines have feelings too. #hugmecoke

#fun #innovation #user experience
Text Color Forecast

Color Forecast shows you in real time what colors people are wearing in the fashion capitals Paris & Milan & Antwerp…

check color forecast

#fun
Text The Internet in society: Empowering or censoring citizens?

Does the internet actually inhibit, not encourage democracy? In this new RSA Animate adapted from a talk given in 2009, Evgeny Morozov presents an alternative take on ‘cyber-utopianism’ - the seductive idea that the internet plays a largely emancipatory role in global politics.

Exposing some idealistic myths about freedom and technology (during Iran’s ‘twitter revolution’ fewer than 20,000 Twitter users actually took part), Evgeny argues for some realism about the actual uses and abuses of the internet.

A provocative thought….

#activism #provocative thoughts
Text Make the most of any space

The smallest IKEA in the world

#fun
Text IKEA on the move

Ikea is entering a brave new world: home entertainment systems. The company unveiled its UPPLEVA line today with a smart YouTube ad (embedded after the jump). The video spot quickly explains that the UPPLEVA line is the savior to living rooms everywhere with hidden cable tracks, integrated wireless components and a customizable cabinet design.

Argue all you want, but a HDTV is a glorified monitor. It should not be the primary point of focus when designing a home theater system. The new UPPLEVA line completely disrupts the big box store’s HDTV buying process with a high-dose injection of Ikea genius.

Like with everything else Ikea sells, the UPPLEVA system is completely customizable with a range of TV sizes and cabinet designs.

Ikea now even can provide you with the house that goes along with the entertainment system. IKEA is now also in real estate development.

Buyers probably still have to piece them together using those dumb keys, though.

(source: Techcrunch, Youtube and ikea.com)

#brandconcepts #business models
Text Details….

(thanx Edward)

#fun
Text Disconnected

#fun
Text Censorship is inseparable from surveillance (Cory Doctorow)

There was a time when you could censor without spying. When Britain banned the publication of James Joyce’s Ulysses in the 1920s and 1930s, the ban took the form on a prohibition on the sale of copies of the books. Theoretically, this entailed opening some imported parcels, and it certainly imposed a constraint on publishers and booksellers. It was undoubtedly awful. But we’ve got it worse today.

Jump forward 80 years. Imagine that you want to ban www.jamesjoycesulysses.com due to a copyright claim from the Joyce estate. Thanks to the Digital Economy Act and the provision it makes for a national British copyright firewall, we’re headed for a system where entertainment companies can specify URLs that have “infringing” websites, and a national censorwall will block everyone in the country from visiting those sites.

In order to stop you from visiting www.jamesjoycesulysses.com, the national censorwall must intercept all your outgoing internet requests and examine them to determine whether they are for the banned website. That’s the difference between the old days of censorship and our new digital censorship world. Today, censorship is inseparable from surveillance.
MP3 link

source: cory doctorows craphound
Text Facebook uh oh oh (huh?)

The contribution of San Marino for the eurovision song contest… no really! :-)
Text KONY 2012, a movie directors thoughtful response

INVISIBLE CHILDREN USES FILM, CREATIVITY AND SOCIAL ACTION TO END THE USE OF CHILD SOLDIERS IN JOSEPH KONY’S REBEL WAR AND RESTORE LRA-AFFECTED COMMUNITIES IN CENTRAL AFRICA TO PEACE AND PROSPERITY.

In response to a not-so-shiny article in Washington Post regarding Invisible Children and KONY 2012, director Jon Turteltaub wrote the following response to the author/interviewer & interviewee:

My name is Jon Turteltaub. I have directed several movies including both National Treasure films, Phenomenon and Cool Runnings. In spite of how much my mother loves my films, I have had more than my share of criticism in person and in the press for my films over the years. Whenever the negative comments got me down I could usually prop myself up a bit by saying “Who cares? It’s just a movie. Let them hate it. It just makes them petty to put into print such negative thoughts about something so unimportant.” But it wasn’t until reading your blog and interview with Glenna Gordon that I realized how much worse it is to criticize and belittle something so important as bringing peace to a region of Africa, saving the lives of children, and ending rape, murder and torture.

Really? Three young men who fly half way around the world to stop violence against children is something you feel the need to criticize? Three middle-class white guys risking their lives to stop a genocidal madman instead of hanging out at home and playing Angry Birds is something you feel needs to be brought down a notch? If even one person reads your article and decides not to help Invisible Children stop Joseph Kony what good have you done?

The picture shows some white guys holding guns with some black African soldiers… the STORY is that those three guys are inspiring an entire generation of young people to get active and to make positive changes in their world. The STORY is that Joseph Kony’s name is getting out there and that tens of millions of people are watching the video those guys made. The STORY is that even some goofballs from San Diego can change the world using media, the internet, and their hearts.

Not only have I been aware of and supportive of the work Invisible Children does… both as a filmmaker and as someone who has been to Northern Uganda and seen the damage inflicted on these families… but I am also the brother-in-law of another war photographer, Dan Eldon, who was killed while on assignment in Somalia. Very few people have had a greater impact on young people and their desire to make a positive change in the world. No young journalist ever sacrificed so much to shed light on the horrors of famine and war. And in my living room, I have a picture of my late brother-in-law… acting goofy, holding a gun and standing with local soldiers.

Apologizing to Invisible Children for an article created by you and Glenna Gordon is irrelevant. Apologizing to the kids being killed and raped because you thought it might be smart to bring down the people risking their own lives to save them makes more sense. Imagine yourself in Northern Uganda talking to a child who has been mutilated and saying, “Oh, I know about what happened to you. I even wrote a blog criticizing the people who were helping you! Maybe my blog slowed their support and kept aid from getting to you.”

If Invisible Children raises one less dollar, gets one less supporter, gets one more opponent because of your blog then you have to ask yourself what good you are doing in this world. You will tell yourself you’re a journalist who is “just putting it out there”… and at some point you will realize that in journalism and film making there is no such thing as “just putting it out there”. What you do with your blog has meaning to people. Don’t underestimate yourself. And if you want the point of your blog to be the criticism of people fighting tirelessly to make the world an undeniably better place, then in my opinion, you are supporting the exact kind of thing that all of us fighting for peace are struggling with: apathy, cynicism and ignorance.

If you want, criticize National Treasure… parts are too long, some of it is slow, a couple of things are confusing. Got it. That’s fine. But to unfairly and wrongly criticize these young men and their world of supporters for risking everything they have to save the lives of strangers, children and their families, and to give voice to another critic while doing so, is the worst kind of journalistic nonsense and personal irresponsibility. I’m sure you and Glenna remember when you were filled with optimism and enthusiasm at the thought of using your journalistic voice to make the world a better place. That’s where Invisible Children and its supporters live… and we should be proud and support their efforts, their successes and their courage.

source: invisible.tumblr

other koni sources:

kony2012 website, with petition

Kony, meest virale video ooit (nu.nl)

#activism #social media
Text 1
Notes The future of the book?

Meet Nelson, Coupland, and Alice — the faces of tomorrow’s book. Watch global design and innovation consultancy IDEO’s vision for the future of the book. What new experiences might be created by linking diverse discussions, what additional value could be created by connected readers to one another, and what innovative ways we might use to tell our favorite stories and build community around books?

#future #innovation #inspiration
Text Great brands lead users, not the other way around…

A few months back Fast Company’s Co.Design blog published a controversial post that triggered a lot of discussion. In their article provocatively titled User-Led Innovation Can’t Create Breakthroughs; Just Ask Apple and Ikea, Jens Martin Skibsted and Rasmus Bech Hansen wrote:

“[User-centered design] doesn’t work. Here’s the truth: Great brands lead users, not the other way around.”

Skibsted and Hansen cited Apple and IKEA as some of the most innovative brands that don’t follow the user-centric design model. They say that their friends in the Apple design team spoke out against user-centric design because it’s “a waste of time”, and similarly at IKEA because “it doesn’t work.” They argued that brands have to take the lead in innovation with a strong and consistent vision, and outlined several reasons why it’s actually detrimental to listen to your users.

I have to admit, their examples are compelling, but are they correct? How do we reconcile their claims with what we know about the value of design research and user-centered design?

read this great post by Peter Hui

#User Centered
Text Pinterest, here to stay?
Pinterest, here to stay?
Think of Pinterest in the same way you would look at viral video (i.e. YouTube channels). Pinterest is like YouTube in the sense that you favourite and share information. The similarities finish there. On Pinterest, you build boards of pictures that you like and mean something to you or your brand on whatever topic you decide. Other ‘Pinners,’ can like, share or comment on your different pin boards.

The objective is to get people talking with much more visually and networking based on similar interests or beliefs.

Similar to when Google launched Google Plus last year, the buzz right now is all about Pinterest.
- Currently, Pinterest is driving more traffic than Google+.
- Brands have seen staggering levels of referral traffic. In the US, five large retailers surveyed had seen a rise of over 289% over a 6-month period.
- In the US, Women currently compromise 83% of the user base.
- In the UK, the majority are men (56%) and tend to be a higher income demographic then US counterparts.
- In the UK, it is very much business focused, highlighting information about PR, blogging and online marketing best practices.
source: social media today
#social media

Quote via oranginaaaa

“You cannot rely on the end goal being incentive enough to encourage individuals to cooperate on achieving the end goal”

—
Internet of things innovator...

Quote via oranginaaaa

The User Advocate

INVISIBLE CHILDREN USES FILM, CREATIVITY AND SOCIAL ACTION TO END THE USE OF CHILD SOLDIERS IN JOSEPH KONY’S REBEL WAR AND RESTORE LRA-AFFECTED COMMUNITIES IN CENTRAL AFRICA TO PEACE AND PROSPERITY.

“[User-centered design] doesn’t work. Here’s the truth: Great brands lead users, not the other way around.”