Dream proposition

Welcome to Idealog Weekly, the free email newsletter for New Zealand commercial creatives, entrepreneurs and anyone rich with ideas.

Dream proposition

How do you make money out of irreverence and booze? That’s kind of a dream proposition. On this week’s Idealog TV, Vincent Heeringa talks to 42 Below founder Geoff Ross about how he did what few dared to think, and turned New Zealand into the Sweden of the South Pacific. Well, for making vodka at least. And if you’d like to know what he wants to hear in a pitch from the next entrepreneur who asks him for dosh, check out the video on our website.

Crafty does it

Earlier this year we wrote about Ponoko … a great idea involving grassroots design, laser cutters and the Internet. Now, they’ve taken the concept further with Ponoko ID, where punters like you and me can describe the amazing design we want and Ponoko designers can bid to custom-create it for us, and Ponoko will then laser-cut it into reality. It’s in open beta at the moment but if you ever wanted your own personal product made just for you, now’s your chance.

OOBE Doobie

The Internet has taken the OOBE (yes, it stands for out of box experience) to new heights. Here’s the Samsung Omnia i900 unboxing your ears and eyes in a spectacular fashion. Could it possibly be a clever viral?

Winding up for Webstock

If Flickr, Dopplr, and other similarly vowel-challenged billion-dollar web ideas is your game, you’ll know to register for Webstock 2009. Idealog is proud to be a sponsor of Webstock 2009, lighting up Wellington for five days between February 16 and 20.

Webstock usually has speakers of the highest calibre, and the 2009 edition is no exception. You wouldn’t want to miss the Mad Scientist of Perl whose personal interest includes Total World Domination, would you? Check out the full list of speakers at their website where you can also sign up for the event. Be quick, as Webstock 2009 will fill up fast. This year’s event sold out promptly.

Hadrons and Higgs bosons

Even if you’re not particularly into fundamental physics, you would have to admit that the 27-kilometre-long Large Hadron Collider in Geneva is a gobsmackingly impressive scientific feat.

It’s too early to say what the LHC will discover or if the scientists will understand it but the particle accelerator is possibly the most complex and fantastic machine ever built … certainly the most photogenic. We can’t think of anything rivalling it.

Such a feat of engineering and science is too much for some people to bear, however. They fear that poking at the fabric of the universe with mega-Joules of energy and smashing protons willy-nilly will open up a gateway to … something rather evil indeed.

Mmm. Right.

Poetry on the knife edge

Popular poetess Carol Ann Duffy’s response to an overzealous exam board removing an anthology containing a poem of hears as it supposedly glorified knife crime (a real problem in the UK these days) speaks for itself:

You must prepare your bosom for his knife,
said Portia to Antonio in which
of Shakespeare’s Comedies? Who killed his wife,
insane with jealousy? And which Scots witch
knew Something wicked this way comes? Who said
Is this a dagger which I see? Which Tragedy?
Whose blade was drawn which led to Tybalt’s death?
To whom did dying Caesar say Et tu? And why?
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark—do you
know what this means? Explain how poetry
pursues the human like the smitten moon
above the weeping, laughing earth; how we
make prayers of it. Nothing will come of nothing:
speak again. Said by which King? You may begin.

Peerless Peri

A Persian Peri is descended from fallen angels, denied paradise until penance has been done. Thomas Moore wrote about a Peri gaining entrance to paradise after three attempts at giving an angel the gift most dear to God. The first was a drop of blood from a young soldier killed trying to assassinate a sultan; the second, a sigh stolen from the lips of a girl dying of plague with her lover rather than deserting him and saving herself; the third was the tear of a horrid old man who repented his evil ways upon seeing a child praying.

This is unlike our Peri Drysdale, speaking at the AUT-Idealog Innovation Series Plus on Wednesday next week. Our Peri is the founder of Snowy Peak and Untouched World. She’s speaking about her journey to become a global leader in sustainable fashion, and her direct line to Bill Clinton.

Tickets are a snip at $49, and Peri’s words will ring out at the Bellini Bar, at the Hilton on Princess Wharf, Auckland. Go to idealog.co.nz/events for booking details.

Inflatoplane?

It seemed like a good concept: Goodyear Aerospace developed a single-seater and double-seater inflatable aeroplane for soldiers needing a quick exit out of sticky situations in war time. Drop it off in a container, inflate it and fly out of trouble in five minutes.

Unfortunately for the US Army and the test pilot who died during trials, the inflatoplane was one of those ideas that shouldn’t have taken off …

Check out the invention that did work on the same page, a method for airplanes to pick up people without actually landing. It’s truly a wild ride … and not recommended around power lines.

If you really must have an inflatable aeroplane, get one here.

Stick more bills

As fans of weird and wonderful gig posters, we love Under The Radar’s simple idea … the poster wall.

Of Knowing and Dancing With Dragons

Bath Street Gallery in Parnell, Auckland, is showing works of Kazu Nakagawa and Riduan Tomkins until October 4; both are wonderful artists. Favourites: Nakagawa’s Fuisse (1992) and Tomkins’ Single figure with painting (2003).

Some Microsoft cool. No, really

Whereas Apple cruises along with consummate ease in the Cool Lane on the Information SuperHypeWay, Microsoft has yet to find the onramp. Actually, that’s not quite true. OK, so Vista bombed in that department, and no amount of Seinfelding could help it. Check out Microsoft’s hardware though … the new, foldable Arc mouse for instance. That’s a better, err, mouse, and dare we say it? Really quite cool.

Quote of the week

“The emphasis is on eco-effectiveness rather than eco-efficiency—and rightly so. I mean (as Braungart suggested in his presentation), who really wants to be having efficient sex when effective sex is up for grabs?”

—Rosie Bosworth watches Michael Braungart tell a story in terms that his audience can understand at this year’s Better by Design CEO Summit. Read Rosie’s EcoInnovator blog on our website.

More at Idealog online

Read more on our website: web exclusives, opinion, creative directory, Idealog TV, the Idealog blogs and the Idealog podcast. See you at idealog.co.nz.

  Juha Saarinen
  Ideologue, Weekly