Posts Tagged ‘Creativity’

Springwise:

Digital greetings are all very well, but it seems there’s something about the tangible paper card that just can’t be replaced. We’ve written about talking gift tags and greeting cards with online attachments, and now there’s Burney Cards, combining an artist-designed, fold-out paper card with a burnable CD tucked inside.

Created by Dutch firm Schmeitz+Freitag, the Burney CD Card provides content-sharing consumers with a giftable alternative to download links and plastic jewel cases.

The current line includes 24 styles of cards designed by up-and-coming artists. With designs for a variety of occasions, the cards let users record music, pictures or video onto the matching CD and send it along in the included slot, with a personalized message written on the card itself.

The 15-by-15-cm cards are priced at EUR 5.95 each, with an introductory offer that provides one free card for every 10 purchased. Burney Cards were named finalists in this year’s Creative Amsterdam Award.

Photo by Schmeitz+Freitag.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

The Gazette:

Reclining in his Peel St. office in an ergonomic chair of his own design, wearing a sleek black golf shirt with matching rims and watchband – Michel Dallaire is Bixi personified.

Smart, bold, elegant.

And yet, says the Montreal industrial designer who dreamed up the Bixi system, he’s been wearing the same type of shoe for 23 years.

Dallaire is full of surprises. In fact, he’s staked his whole career on the element of surprise, he said.

“All my life, I’ve been looking for that ‘wow,’ ” he said.

Dallaire’s office is littered with tokens of success, including the torch he designed for the 1976 Olympics – he refused a gold-plated version – and a row of futuristic seating commissioned for the University of Montreal.

His wall space is crowded with five diplomas, the Order of Canada and the Order of Quebec.

In his 43-year career, Dallaire has designed coffee urns, briefcases, swimming pools and subway cars, always looking for that “wow” or frisson.

But the bike share system he conceived last year is eliciting more than just shivers.

Bixi received rave reviews from all sides after its launch this spring and is being eyeballed by a growing number of cities, including Vancouver, Seattle, Minneapolis, Toronto, Ottawa, Gatineau and New York. The concept looks poised to sweep the continent.

Photo by The Gazette.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.

Men With Pens:

Not thinking and not caring.

That doesn’t mean you don’t care about the work you’re doing. There’s a huge difference between not thinking and not caring. When you don’t care, you’re just slapping words into a sentence or throwing images up onto the page. Whatever works – you just don’t give a damn.

But when you’re not thinking, you’re allowing yourself to be open to new ideas. You’ve loosened your creativity and set it free to go where it will. You start to think in new directions and try new ways of doing things.

This freedom of creativity is one of the main reasons you’ll find so many people encouraging you to take breaks, go for a walk, play with the kids or have a nap. These common-sense ideas have a deeper goal:

They let your brain loose to play so that you can do your best work.

Photo by RobertOak.

From Business Opportunities Weblog.