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May 22, 2012
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Tens of thousands of people will pass through Fieldays, our landmark rural trade show, this week. They’ll be greeted by exhibitions featuring solar-powered fences, dogs riding boogie boards and all manner of agricultural inventions. But it’s in the textile industry where sharp minds are harnessing new technologies to redefine the limitations of fabric design and production. The wool market is red-hot right now, and as Sarah Robson writes, the big question is how we can take advantage of that. Follow her blogs on our website and Facebook.
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A bouncing blender. A portable dishwasher. The world’s smallest induction hob. These are the concepts which saw a trio of Massey University design students do NZ proud by making it to the semifinals of the global Electrolux Design Lab competition. From a field of 1,300, 25 ideas from designers based in 14 countries were selected for a shot at a six-month paid internship with Electrolux and €5000. The next hurdle: A panel of industry experts will judge them on intuitive design, innovation and consumer insight.
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Fame and glory in spades—and a giant gem-encrusted paperclip—could be yours, thinkers and inventors, if you’re good enough to claim the grand prize in the newly refreshed New Zealand Innovators Awards. Formerly known as the Bayer Innovators Awards, the initiative is the creation of Bayer New Zealand, Ideas Accelerator and Idealog and is supported by the New Zealand Innovation Council. Entries close on August 12 and are open to individuals, teams, businesses and organisations in health and science; design and engineering; marketing and communications; environment and agriculture; ICT and manufacturing. Finalists will be profiled in Idealog before the winners are
announced in late October at an awards evening.
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Anyone with even a passing interest in gaming will know the name Tim Train. As studio general manager for Zynga’s Baltimore operation, he’s at the forefront when it comes to writing and rewriting the rules of social media and gamification. After all, 50 million players are logging on to FarmVille, CityVille and FrontierVille every day. And on Tuesday, he’ll be speaking at 1885 Britomart as a guest of Kea Auckland about gaming for both social good and profit, from 5.30pm. A drink on arrival, pizza and nibbles are included in the ticket price.
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Democracy rules at Auckland Barcamp, the unconference for designers, developers and creatives where attendees are also the presenters. Now in its fifth year, it’s also hosting a panel on the future of the internet in New Zealand—touching on the copyright infringement bill and ultra-fast broadband, featuring MPs, commentators and industry reps and moderated by Lance Wiggs. If you’re keen, block out July 16 on your calendar now.
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In this mini-documentary, Auckland-born photographer Denis Smith explains how photography saved him from a spiral of drinking, depression and financial destruction. The secret to his distinctive “ball of light” aesthetic? A surprisingly simple yet visually stunning technique called light painting. http://vimeo.com/21338911
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The Icehouse Ice Ideas Conference on July 8 may have sold out, but that doesn’t mean you have to miss out on hearing from a stellar lineup of 30 speakers, including expat entrepreneur Derek Handley and Paypal founder Peter Thiel. Icehouse chief exec Andy Hamilton says they plan to livestream the TED-inspired event for the benefit of those who are interested but can’t attend in person. Stay tuned.
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More kudos for Xero: now available in the Google App Store and the Google Chrome Web Store, the accounting software continues to make inroads into the US market. (The App store alone has more than 3 million registered business users.) This week it also released single sign-on integration with Google, which allows small businesses to navigate between various cloud applications without signing in multiple times.
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Back for another year, the Lifewise Big Sleepout has had politicians, business leaders and other luminaries clamouring for a chance to sleep rough. Raising awareness—and more vitally, funding for services—for the homeless, the event is bringing together figures including Marc Ellis, Dick Hubbard, Mai Chen and Idealog co-founder David MacGregor. They’ll doss down at AUT’s open-air Hikuwai Plaza overnight on July 7; keep up with the latest ahead of the big night on July 7 on Twitter with the #lifewiseBSO hashtag.
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When promoting a common cause, it helps to have everyone on the same page. But unlike, say, the Anzac poppy or the Cancer Society’s daffodil, there’s no universal logo for human rights. Now a global online competition is seeking to change that. Come up with an emblem to represent the cause and your design could become the internationally used symbol for human rights—and net you €5000 to boot.
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Quote of the week
Next minute a bunch of people were
contacting me to sign me up and send me scripts. These are the major talent
agencies in the States, so the same people that they talk about on Entourage and all that. It was kind of bizarre.
- Ash Bolland on being the flavour of the moment
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