Visualising interconnectedness through social network streams
"Tech City Map, created by developers at Trampoline Systems and designed by Playgen, pulls in streams of social network data for all of the businesses in the area to help analyse their influence. The Tech City Map follows in the footsteps of Matt Biddulph's original Silicon Roundabout map as well as Wired's very own version, produced in 2009."
(Olivia Solon and Nate Lanxon, 10 November 2011, Wired UK)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Facing ambiguity differently across design, business and technology
"team[s] of students of mixed disciplines worked together to understand and map a problem-space (identified by the client). They then defined a solution-space before focussing on a particular opportunity outcome. The range of projects included incremental innovation opportunities represented by the Lego and Hasbro projects through radical Philips work to truly disruptive work with Unilever. The studies confirmed stereotypical view points of how different disciplines may behave. They showed that design students were more (but not completely) comfortable with the ambiguous aspects associated with ‘phase zero’ problem-space exploration and early stage idea generation. They would only commit to a solution when time pressures dictated that this was essential in order to complete the project deliverables on time and they were happy to experiment with, and develop, new methods without a clear objective in mind. In contrast, the business students were uncomfortable with this ambiguity and were more readily able to come to terms with incremental innovation projects where a systematic approach could be directly linked to an end goal. The technologists, were more comfortable with the notion of the ambiguous approach leading to more radical innovation, but needed to wrap this in an analytical process that grounded experimentation. Meanwhile, the designers were unclear and unprepared to be precise when it came to committing to a business model. "
(Mark Bailey, 2010, p.42)
Bailey, M. (2010). "Working at the Edges". Networks, Art Design Media Subject Centre (ADM-HEA). Autumn 2010.
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Legal issues: intellectual property rights for the design industry
"Intellectual property law is made up of many elements of legal protection and a business might be concerned with any number of them. In some cases, IP ownership and its associated protection is inherent in the creation of the work and does not necessarily require further registration. Copyright is one example, which typically applies to 'artistic' works, such as books, music, software code and graphics. In other types, such as patents, registration is required. The tricky aspect is that any given design may qualify for one or more of the different intellectual property rights. Graphic design for a book, for example, would qualify for copyright, whilst the graphic elements of product packaging – such as the colours, lines or contours - might qualify for a 'registered design right', which is a different thing. The main types of intellectual property rights are: patents, copyright, unregistered design right, registered design right, trademarks."
(Design Council, UK)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Design Guides for Business: commissioning designers
"We have created this free guide to explain the process of finding and working with a designer - focusing on your needs and ensuring you get the most out of the project."
(UK Design Council)
Fig.1 "Briefing a Design Team" [http://www.bigstockphoto.com]
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Neoliberal whizz-kid: Aotearoa New Zealand PM John Key in 1987
"A 1987 video has been unearthed featuring a 25-year-old squash-playing, accountancy graduate John Key. The bright-eyed Mr Key features in an early Close-Up story called Big Dealers. The 'portrait of 80s job du jour: foreign exchange dealer', shows the now Prime Minister in 'the pit' (trading room) as a senior forex dealer. 'Forex dealing is a work hard, play hard world with an image of rich brats who wreck restaurants but always somewhere else,' says the reporter. 'I am not denying that, that has happened and I guess that will happen again in the future but I personally perform in that way,' Mr Key responded."
(Deanna Harris, 02 Sep 2010, MediaWorks TV)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
