Own your mistakes
Welcome to Idealog Weekly, the free email newsletter for New Zealand commercial creatives, entrepreneurs and anyone rich with ideas.
Own your mistakes
Most people, when starting a new business, pick an industry they
know something about. Others have faith in their idea … and are content
to learn as they go along.
Case in point: Antipodes Water.
“When we first thought about it, we said ‘What could go wrong?’”
recalls Peter Cullinane, one of Antipodes’ four co-founders.
As
it turns out: plenty. From the water, to the bottle that held the
water, to the outlets that would sell the bottle that held the water,
Antipodes made many innocent mistakes. Somehow, they turned the errors
to their advantage. How? Find out in the current issue of Idealog and on our website.
Like school camp, but with more whisky
It’s the third Foo Camp, or ‘Baa Camp’
as it’s also known, this weekend. Some 150 very fine minds indeed from
Godzone and overseas will be attending to talk about a wide range of
things and have fun hacking stuff in an unexpected fashion. Baa Camp is
organised by Nat and Jenine Torkington with Russell Brown of Public Address. Yours truly will head up as well, and I’ll be blogging about it on the Idealog
website. The past two Foo Camps were amazingly full-on, with brilliant
people exchanging views and thoughts frankly and freely. Find out how 2009 shapes up over the weekend.
On the origin of the specious
Two centuries ago, Charles Darwin was born and, well, went on to change the
world with his science. That’s probably a huge understatement,
especially if you’ve seen the excellent touring Darwin exhibition that
was at Auckland Museum not so long ago, where much of the great
scientist’s work was displayed.
Bette Flagler has drawn a
line from Darwin to the work at New Zealand’s Allan Wilson Centre for
Molecular Ecology and Evolution in the next issue, which will hit the
streets and subscribers on February 23. It’s a fascinating read, so
don’t miss it. In fact, it’s so fascinating that we’ve already put it
on our website—check it out.
What’s
surprising about Darwin is 200 years after his birth, and
incontrovertible evidence that he was correct, some people insist that
he was wrong. Yes, it’s the creationists, less evolved people like
Harun Yahya, who make a career out of dissin’ Darwin and shameless spin, using bad Photoshopping and scammy tricks to blame Hitler and more on poor Charles.
It’s about the experience
It’s about how you connect with people. At Method, we believe in creating exceptional online and digital experiences that engage and inspire. We help your brand come to life and ensure it stands out from the rest, not only appealing to your customer but really connecting with them as well. If you want an online presence that gets results visit us at methodstudios.co.nz
Desperately needed ideas
The annual Technology, Entertainment, Design (or TED) conference has just finished, with its usual crowd of brilliant people talking about
really important matters. This year, however, TED2009 had perhaps the
strongest message yet: that we really need to act now before it’s too late.
Global warming, overpopulation, the economy—these things are all intertwined and shouldn’t be dealt with in isolation.
Bill Gates: How I’m trying to change the world now
http://www.ted.com/talks/bill_gates_unplugged.html
Bjorn Lomborg: Our priorities for saving the world
http://www.ted.com/talks/bjorn_lomborg_sets_global_priorities.html
David Carson on design, discovery and humour
http://www.ted.com/talks/david_carson_on_design.html
And more at the TED website
And was New Zealand represented? Too right. Jason Kemp has this to say on the Idealog blog:
This
week TED announced the inaugural TED Fellows programme and Sean
Gourley, described as ‘physicist/military theorist, Rhodes Scholar, New
Zealand’ is one of 40 world-changers picked. Sean’s background is BSc
with Honours and Master of Science in Physics from Canterbury
University. He researched nano-scale blue light lasers for his
first-class BSc (Hons) degree in physics and self-assembled quantum
nano-wires for his MSc, before enrolling for a DPhil at Oxford
University, researching complex adaptive systems and collective
intelligent systems.
Hungry now
The Garbage Plate? OMNOMNOM!
Job of the Week
Interactive Web Developer with Design Experience (P0488) North Shore Location • Working within the Marketing Team • Great Opportunity My client is a North Shore located international company. They are looking for a strong junior to intermediate web developer who also has a great creative eye and skills in web design. This role sits within the Marketing Department, working with a young fun team. In this role you will also work with the Graphic Designer, however you will be responsible for all web related work. You will have had 2 years commercial experience and have experience working with CMS, CS2, have Flash, HTML, and ActionScript and Javascript experience. This role will allow you to up skill and learn any new programmes that are necessary for certain projects that arise. This is an outstanding opportunity for a great junior to advance or an intermediate web developer looking to make a move.
Contact Louise Lawton on 09 379-9303, or apply on our website.
Ten of Microsoft’s best
We’re all about intellectual property and ideas, and pleased to see that Microsoft is too. They’ve invented some really cool stuff over the years, like the multi-touch screen. What’s that? No, it doesn’t look like Apple invented that at all.
Our favourite however is the “Portable
Information Device and System and Method for Downloading Executable
Instructions From the Computer to the Portable Information Device”. Makes us all floppy and happy, it does.
Invention is the key
Super-kawaii key hider, crafted in just seconds. Upcycling is a great term too.
Webwards
Next
week, the wonderful Webstock hits Wellington (weally). For us, it’s a
highlight of the year. If you’re quick, there may still be a few tickets left (this morning there were just 22).
If
not, and if UX, Flex, JQuery, CSS and XHTML rock your boat, check out
Web09. This two-day event features speakers from Microsoft, Google,
Adobe and Xero, as well as local dev shops like Cactus Labs. Web09 runs
between April 17 and 18, at the SkyCity Convention Centre in Auckland,
with tickets costing $745 plus GST.
Head over to their website to check out the details and register.
Quote of the week
When we first thought about it, we said ‘what could go wrong?’ If we’d
known then what we know now, perhaps we wouldn’t have started.
—Simon Woolley on the lessons learnt in the making of the Antipodes mineral water brand.
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
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