Vodafone Symphonia

Know more and download soundtrack from the Vodafone New Zealand project page.

The Dyson Air Multiplier

I didn’t see it, but when I see I’ll probably react the same way they did:

Know more at the Dyson website.

Meet WikiReader

In a world filled with noise and constant interruptions comes a device specifically designed to facilitate your focus. It’s a small, simple three buttons device, equiped with a e-ink thouch screen, low power comsuption and packs inside all the things we ever wanted to know more about (well almost everthying I bet!) just check out the introduction video:

Is it just me, or this reminds me the Hitchhiker’s?

10/GUI

Clayton Miller’s 10/GIU proposal envisions a possible future interaction model for Desktops:

The proposition relies on separation between visual and input areas, introducing ‘con10nuum’, a window manager that works as a pipeline manager for windows, where the input area besides an enlarged multitouch pad actually allows both hands & fingers to work simultaneous as different input devices.

One of the positive aspects that I liked on this was the introduction of a pre-defined language for interaction, pretty much like the ones we have on mac’s today, where same actions can be invoked in different apps by using the same keyboard combinations.

I’m wondering, when are we finally going to ditch the 46yo Mouse!

Vodafone 360 – Power to you

Today marks a big day in Vodafone’s history, the company just announced it’s new suite of internet services, goes by the name of Vodafone 360 and combines a unique seamless experience between mobile and the web.

Vodafone 360 aims at the core of our social life online: our friends, our communities, and all the artifacts that came from interacting with those, wether chat or mere content like photos, comments and music, all shared in one single place, providing a unified experience across different mediums.

Mobile phones have long been a central piece in our lives, it helps us define who we are, putting us in contact with the rest of the world. It’s also in many cases the first gateway to interact and perceive the world, in many senses they’ve enhanced our lives beyond expected, but at the same time they have been somehow out of the loop of our online lives, well it seems that until now! By combining contacts with the bits and bytes that they drop into the world, and combining all those tiny pieces of information in one single place I dare to say that Vodafone just took a deep jump into the future!

The 360 platform is open to anyone, meaning that you can join independently of your mobile operator, it’s also doesn’t compromise devices as it works across a multitude of different devices including the new and exclusive Vodafone 350 phones by Samsung.

In the words of Pieter Knook, Director of Internet Services at Vodafone Group:

“Vodafone 360 is the first service of its kind to offer customers the benefits of a truly integrated mobile internet experience that gathers all their contacts and content, all around them, in one place,”

“The beauty of Vodafone 360 is that all the services work together and they are easy to use. Vodafone 360 enables customers’ digital lives. Customers can stay in touch and share experiences through social networks, instant messaging, email, apps, maps, music and buying digital content on their mobile bill, with the personalized address book at its heart.”

Vodafone 360 is a substantiator of Vodafone’s new brand expression – ‘power to you’ – which is focused on putting the customer in control and enabling simple and easy to manage communications, both mobile and fixed.

Disclaimer: Although I’m extremely happy to see this announcement from Vodafone, my current employee, this post still represents a personal view on this subject and shouldn’t therefor be considered an official statement from the company in any ways. I’m truly happy to be able to write about it as this has been part of my life for the past months and the reason why I’ve moved to Germany.

Rubik’s 360

The Cube was invented in 1974, two years before I was even born, but I still remember watching TV programs where people would challenge themselves to be the fastest person to solve the Cube.

I’m a fan, no big news there! It’s a fact, Ernö Rubik cube is one of the most popular and infuriating toys of all time.

So today I’m actually shocked to see that more than 30 years later, Ernö comes up with Rubik 360, a sphere designed to break us all (or at least get us more sleepless nights)!

It’s simple:

Six Coloured Balls – Three Transparent Spheres – Only One Solution

I’m particularly fascinated with it because of the fact that Ernö actually introduced physics into the puzzling equation. It’s now needed not only to master the complex puzzle rules but also to take Gravity into account when solving it!

While reading about it (yes, I’m still trying to get my hands on one!) I couldn’t help hearing echoes of Steven Johnson book’Everything Bad Is Good for You‘ where he presented the idea of how we as society have evolved so much in terms of complexity in the last generations, that the things that attract us today are getting more and more complex by the day.

Argg.. there goes my productivity!

Sixth Sense

by Pattie Maes & Pranav Mistry from the MIT Media Lab’s new Fluid Interfaces Group.

Click on Pranav photo to read more about the Sixth Sense project:

Use the force…

Mattel just released a new game entitled Mindflex, that you can see above… the craziness about it, is that it’s based on you controlling a floating ball with your mind as it navigate through hoops, cages, and hurdles on a circular track!

I say… it’s the force!

more on CNET.