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When nothing else works, try this
This reminded me of one of my favorite quotes. “Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably will not themselves be realized.” - Daniel Burnham
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Plastic Flashback
A visual history of the credit card.
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The Top Idea in Your Mind
“I realized recently that what one thinks about in the shower in the morning is more important than I’d thought. I knew it was a good time to have ideas. Now I’d go further: now I’d say it’s hard to do a really good job on anything you don’t think about in the shower.” Completely agree.
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Candyspotting
paper + laser cut = ♥
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The Official Panic Basketball Team
I need to find a team to coach again.
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Comcast now Xfinity
“This re-branding comes as Comcast has struggled to rebuild its reputation because of poor service and problems with its network that resulted in telephone and Internet outages. Its customer-satisfaction rating is among the lowest in the industry, but it has improved slightly in the last year.” And a terrible name like this is going to help how?
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Are You Better Than Yesterday?
“How can you make today better? Do it again the next day. Put it on your calendar. Spend two minutes thinking about this each morning.” I’ve heard things similar to this before, but this is a great reminder.
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Entrepreneurship Is Not Sexy
“Too many entrepreneurs stop after they build the product. They think that building products is what makes them an entrepreneur. But entrepreneurship is about building businesses, and the product is just one part of that.”
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Last Rites
Finally got around to reading Mike Davidson’s excellent article about the end of the P.I. I appreciate that he tries to keep it positive and offer ideas and solutions instead of focusing on the past and the demise. It’s sad to see the P.I. go, but it’s important to focus on what’s next.
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Innovation Insanity
Well argued, well written and a great point. I’ve often been frustrated with any group from the outside armchair quarterbacking another.
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Amazon Frustration-Free
I absolutely love this idea.
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Design Observer: Mad Men: Pitch Perfect
Michael Bierut describes why I love Mad Men perfectly.
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Egg Press Online Store
Looks like a fantastic letterpress studio. They even do custom printing.
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The No Votes
Yet another great infographic from the NY Times illustrating who voted against the $700 billion financial bailout plan.
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Untitled
Taken by Stefan Hartwig
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Running your own race
Eric Karjaluoto from smashLAB does a great job talking about, well a lot of things, but mainly about defining success for yourself. I know I could leave Blue Flavor and probably make more money, but I love my job, and to me, that’s a lot more important than a bigger paycheck. Sure, I’d like more money, I mean, who wouldn’t? But, I’m not willing to trade enjoying my job 90% of the time for a few more dollars. I’m always amazed at people who aren’t willing to push themselves to find out what makes them happy with work and their career. Sure, maybe you don’t have the education or experience to do just what you want to be doing now, but that’s no reason to stop trying. As Eric so nicely put it, “Maybe the problem with success is that we don’t take enough time to define it for ourselves.”
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Seth's Blog: Is architect a verb?
“More interesting, you can architect a business model or a pricing structure to make it far more effective at generating the behavior you’re looking for. Most broken websites aren’t broken because they violate common laws of good design. They’re broken because their architecture is all wrong. There’s no strategy in place.” The semantics of Information Architect, Designer, Visual Designer, Interaction Designer, etc. don’t really interest me anymore, but I do agree with Jeff’s commentary about educating the public more about what’s happening behind the scenes “design” and in particular web design. It’d be fantastic if clients knew even just a little more about what goes into creating a great website. It would sure make my job a lot easier.
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How We Decide What To Charge You
A nice follow up to the previous article about budgets and website pricing on the Blue Flavor blog. It’s never easy to explain to someone how much a site costs, but this gives you a good idea what Blue Flavor generally charges.
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Take Me To Your Budget!
A nice discussion about why it can be better for everyone if the budget is discussed up front. You’ve got to build that trust up first!
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Working with a designer
A great set of tips here and I particularly like this bit: “Yes, designers can make mistakes and take wrong directions. And yes, you need to give them direction. But you must tell them what you need, not how to achieve that goal.”
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American Psycho: Business Card Scene
“How’d a nit wit like you get so tasteful.”
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Early retirement is a false idol
“The chance of finding something you love doing? So much more achievable.” I love my job. I hope you do too.
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The Wide Divide
“In 2004 half of executives earned more than 104 times the average worker’s pay.”
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BMW's fascinating GINA Light Visionary Model design study
“It’s about being flexible… context over dogma.” Well said.
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Working With Blue Flavor, Part One: Engaging The Team
A comprehensive article from Keith outlining the first part of the Blue Flavor process. It’s all about our process, but I think it’s chalked full of good advice for any agency.
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Polaroid Abandons Instant Photography
I go and buy an old polaroid camera and then they go and do this! Figures. I’m going to stock up, but it’s really going to make pressing that shutter button a lot harder.
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25 most powerful people in business
Since Steve Jobs is numero uno the fanboy in me just couldn’t not let me not post this.
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Will it fly? How to Evaluate a New Product Idea
Some good advice from Evan Williams when you’re kicking around a new product or idea.
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10 Ways To Get Design Approval
A great list of tips from Paul Boag. I really like the first tip though. Setting that ground work with the clients and defining those expectations early on are the best way to end up with a successful project.
