Simon Dingle » Why didn’t I think of that?

Stefan Sagmeister: The power of time off

Simon — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 11:04:59 +0000

Designer Stefan Sagmeister recently presented this talk at TED. In it he stresses the importance of productive time off. I like to think that I apply this thinking on a weekly basis, taking short productive and indulgent breaks at regular intervals as opposed to longer sabbaticals as such. Thanks to @craigrodney for sharing this with me =)

Changing the world with technology

Simon — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 15:09:49 +0000

I’m honoured to have been asked to be a judge in The Digital Open by David Evan Harris. The Digital Open is an awesome project that poses the question: what can you make with technology that will change the world – or even just make life a little easier or more fun?

Institute for the Future, in partnership with Sun Microsystems and Boing Boing, invites youth worldwide, age 17 and under, to join us as we explore the frontiers of free and open innovation. The Digital Open: An Innovation Expo for Global Youth will celebrate projects in a variety of areas ranging from the environment, art and music to the more traditional open source domains of software and hardware.

From April 15 until August 15, 2009, we’ll accept text, photos, and videos documenting projects from young people around the world who want to contribute to the growing free and open technology community.

But the Digital Open is more than an online competition. By submitting a project, you’ll become a valuable member of a community of creative young innovators working in the exciting world of free and open technology.

Collaboration is encouraged. In addition to a variety of prizes and achievements you can earn through community participation, the top project in each category will earn a fantastic prize pack and be featured on Boing Boing Video.

The future is yours to make! Get started at http://digitalopen.org. I personally can’t wait to see the submissions.

Awesome Twitter applications

Simon — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 14:59:03 +0000

Darren Smith recently posted on Facebook with a link to twtapps – developers of Twitter applications for everything from polls to travel and event scheduling tools.

The applications are lightweight and make the most of Twitter-integration. They also don’t require your Twitter password, respecting privacy and security of users.

I created the following poll to test out their twtpoll application. Come to think of it, these results will be interesting…

I like the clean layout and simple, intuitive usability of these applications. Well done to twtapps. File this one under ‘why the hell didn’t I think of that?’