two (more) awesome uses of Twitter

I’ve been speaking a lot recently about the evolution of Twitter and all the amazing ways it is getting used across media, advertising, politics and family life. I’m going to try to create on an ongoing list building on this previous post. If you know of any I’m missing, please add ‘em in!

1. election.twitter.com
We all know Twitter as the place millions of people from around the world talk about what they are doing. But when you have that many people using a freeform communications tool they are going to bend it to their own voice: like mouthing off about this fatiguing 2008 Presidential Election process we’re in. This election has driven unprecedented content since it began (but that’s another post) and all of that chatter makes a great spectacle if you can get it all in one place. Enter election.twitter.com

First, and most importantly, it is open. Meaning, you don’t have to be a twitter member or user to use election.twitter.com. For many people, it has become a way to check in on (and do their own “chatter” reasearch on who is favoring who (and why). If you are a twitter user, you can join the conversation by posting directly from election.twitter.com and your update will go to everyone who follows you and into the election timeline.

My wife and I love to use it while we’re watching the debates…it has become our own Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K) where we get to heckle and watch people heckle from the front of the room. Awesome.

2.Rick Sanchez

The stunt-blundering CNN correspondent cum anchor who did things like get himself tased, stand out in hurricanes, and simulate how to escape from a car underwater. Love him or hate him, Rick is once again shaking things up by trying to lead “the man’s” ongoing effort to pioneer in social media, Rick (and CNN) might be on to something with this one.

Rick Sanchez has been using Twitter on-the-air during his Saturday and Sunday evening shows on CNN and according to the above tweet, might be branching the show out futher. Similar to the way I use the election.twitter.com example, Ricks hows the Twitter on the screen and talks back to and about the tweets as they pass his screen. Talk about interactive mash-ups. This model isn’t going away folks and more people will experiment with it. We know many anchors try to comb through emails while on air - this is an evolution of that concoept (and probably a more valuable one). Sanchez has accumulated quite a few followers already. You can follow him on Twitter here.

Is it working? It’s probably too early to tell, but check this out: Steve Garfield (One of the Internet’s first video bloggers) has a flickr account that is getting hammered because he posted a shot of Rick Sanchez pointing at his tweet on air.

See the photo below.

_{There is some controversy on this photo as Rick removed a URL from the tweet (cleansing) for his use.}

At the time I posted this 25,456 people are following Rick on just less than 700 updates. Follow this one closely, folks. More discussion of CNN’s use of Twitter can be found here and here.

Ford Parental Control 2.0?

Meet MyKey Ford’s new programmable key/dashboard that does three basic things: it allows parents to limit a vehicle’s top speed, it allows parents to limit the stereo’s volume up to 44% of its max, and it allows them to set a sustaining chime if the seatbelts aren’t being used.

I applaud Ford for their efforts trying to take a proactive stance at attempting to make driving a bit safer for teenagers. But the new Ford MyKey is taking the driving nanny thing too far. Ford, sometimes you can over-do it with technology and this new innovation takes the cake.

Parents: talk to your children. Teach them about their automobile. Healthy relationships have a foundation of trust. When parents respect and trust their children their relationship matures. When parents trust their children and their children make a mistake (like a speeding ticket or god forbid, an accident) - lessons are learned - valuable lessons.

I can admit to learning some big driving lessons when I was a teenager. I sometimes think back at how lucky I was being able to walk away from some of the predicaments my car and I found ourselves in. And today, I cringe in fear at the thought of my children driving someday and making their own choices behind their own wheels. But, as scary as it is - I’m OK with that the responsibility I have as a parent to let my children make their own decisions and help them learn from their mistakes. That’s what parenting is about. And if there is one thing I learned from being a teen with too much energy - any attempt at bridling my spirited nature - was met with much retaliation.

I for one don’t want Ford teaching my son about automobiles. I’ll happily take that task on myself.

if you do one thing today, read this awesome post

Awesome. When I first saw this stationary on SwissMiss today, I thought, man that really speaks to me. I’m always starting up things (projects, postings, exercise routines…) that I never finish.

But today I’m inspired. Today I have this notepad to rid me of my non-starter multitasking hell. Today I’m going to tell you all about this notepad and why it speaks to me so. Yes sir, today is going to be dif

watch the breeders music video the way you want

Check out this neat music video for The Breeders song “Walk it Off”. Click the numbers and you can change your POV of the action as the video is playing. Everything hits “in time” with your clicks. Super cool and some really rick thinking I might add. Just another notch for the music scene and the constant marketing innovation we’re seeing come out of it.

We all know online video won’t exist solely in the “flat” format we consume it in today and little advancements like this show the depth of the medium waiting to be unleashed.

now that's some schmart thinking

Stealing your co-worker’s lunch is a downright contemptible act, that is, if it’s perpetrated by someone other than you. But, if you’ve ever had your lunch stolen, you know the the frustration and anger it causes. You know the revenge and ill-will it inspires. And you know that no matter how well you try to hide your lunch bag at the back of the refrigerator, something’s gonna be missing when you open it. Well, lament no more. The Anti-Theft Lunch Bag to the rescue…

Anti-Theft Lunch Bags are regular sandwich bags that have green splotches printed on both sides. After your sandwich is placed inside, no one will want to touch it.

If you’re interested in getting your hands dirty with these bags, please send an email to skforlee@gmail.com and you thank Sherwood Forlee for saving your egg-salad on rye.

this is just awesome

So I found this site today. There is something about this app that celebrates Typography in every way my brain is inclined to see it. Play with it…and don’t forget to enter your own letters. Really amazing stuff - for such a simple toy.

Typography is a special thing for me. I wouldn’t say I’m the best Typographer - far from it. But I am always fascinated by typefaces and their relationship to how expressive a designer can be in any medium. I’ve found over the years (and it has always amazed me) how certain designers can really have communion with Typography while other so called “Designers” don’t even scratch the surface. To me, Typography is something that appeals to all senses. It’s a design adventure. (Just ask my buddy Erok (and his Typography Friday experiments.

trip it!

Hey there. I discovered this neat little single-server today: Trip It!

what is it?

Trip It is an instant travel planner. Book your hotel. Book your back massage. Book your air fare (just not on Delta, apparently) and sent it to plans@tripit.com and Trip It will organized your itinerary and send it to you. Awesome. Would have been a Rich Idea if ANY of your favorite Airline or Hotel brands thought of it first. But they didn’t. So now one will have to acquire them. :P

eMail roulette?

I’m always hunting for new/interesting social web games. There is so much stuff out there that people are already playing (and we can learn A LOT from). I just discovered this tonight and haven’t had a chance to play, but it actually seems pretty interesting. Email Roulette could be a great way to meet people (blind dating meets forum lurking?) or at the very least give you a few hours of random entertainment.

from the site:

When you sign up for Email Roulette, you provide your email address and choose a user name. For security reasons, your password is emailed to you automatically. Upon receiving your password, you have log in to start playing. When you submit your message, it gets sent randomly to another player who has signed up. They have the option of responding to you or not; you won’t know who it went to unless they write back… so you better make it interesting! Of course, it goes both ways. If you want to send emails, you have to receive them as well. When you get a message, it will tell you the username and email address of the sender. You can choose whether to write back or not - the sender does not get any information about you unless you choose to provide it. One way we try to keep Email Roulette interesting is making everyone send at least one Email Roulette every six months. If you go past that time, your account will be deleted.

I think I’ll try it. Anyone wanna play?

fabrication, fashion, and futurecraft: the new "sweat"

Hokay soh, I’m not much of a fan of virtual worlds though I’ve dabbled here and there. You prolly already know this. But  recently discovered Stephanie Rothenberg’s latest project doublehappinessjeans, a Second Life sweatshop that produces designer denim by the underpaid labor of virtual avatars; producing the goods in both physical and digital form. Wait.  What?  Yeah.  Watch:

Unfuckingbeliveably mindblowing opportunities for discussion around Personal Fabrication (the ideas that one day manufacturing of complex products will be conducted digitally, through digital fabrication machines, while only bits (design information) would be transferred around the world.) Basically designs would still be centrally distributed while manufacturing will become clean and compact enough to happen anywhere. Doublehappinessjeans suggests that the sweatshop endures regardless of the sophistication of design or manufacturing.  Through the virtual world, low-cost labor continues to be exploited, whether to design or fabricate real or virtual goods, either through ‘gold farming‘ or simply because design itself creates interesting / easy / creative opportunities for the “workers” to produce monetizeable stuff. I need to stop thinking about this before I explode.  Incedentially, tweet my business partner @neonarcade for more on gold farming.  He’s well more versed in its ins and outs than I.  Rock on.

From the site:

Invisible Threads is a mixed reality performance installation created by Eyebeam artists Jeff Crouse and Stephanie Rothenberg. The project explores the growing intersection between labor, emerging virtual economies and real life commodities through the creation of a designer jeans sweatshop in the metaverse Second Life. Simulating a real life manufacturing facility that includes hiring Second Life “workers” to produce real world jeans sold for profit, the project provides an insider’s view into current modes of global, telematic production.

google olympics

I’ve never really been much of an “Olympics buff” and I suppose if I were to pick a game I’m most into it would probably be the Winter Games. So I was just as surprised as you are when I really got into the Beijing games this year. The much awaited Beijing Olympics 2008 have started, and funny enough, I had a trip to Mexico planned  right in the heart of the games. I was a bit worried about how I was going to stay on top of the Beijing Olympics action.  

Well, between http://tvgratis.tv  and a slew of awesome stuff by Google, I’ve genuinely aggregated enough Summer games content to keep my fix. Here is a collection of Google’s updated maps, gadgets, videos, sites, searches, 3D images and some Google powered Chinese sites that are purely dedicated to serve Olympics.

Google has designed a seris of web pages for the Summer Games. Among them, the home page for China has a bit more pizazz than our US home page, but both offer a stream of updated Olympics news, links to associated articles and video. The updated interactive US page offers a collection of Olympics related Google apps in the form of gadgets, maps, news, one box search and videos.
_{I’ve embedded one of the apps below.  Click the tab to expand the map.}

Google has updated its maps for Beijing Olympics. If you cant make it to Beijing than track it through Google maps by exploring 3D stadiums, tracking medal counts and watching live sport results. They have also recently released a new Mobile search tool that allows its users to enjoy sports results at the top of every search results. On typing sports name or medals in your search query by heading to Google.com from your mobile, it will return all the details with respect to Olympics. In true Olympic fashion, the tool is multi-lingual (36 languages in over 60 countries) and covers almost all the different events.

Rock on.  I’m off to the beach to score an Olympic-sized Mojito. 

nerd patches: QR CODES for your jacket

P8tch We’ve all heard of qrcodes by now - basically - TinyURLs for mobile. Well, these you can wear! Each two-by-four-inch, velcro-backed twill p8tch has a Mysterious Commando Design on the top, and a QRCode on the bottom. The QRCode on the p8tch contains a URL. If you scan the code with your iPhone, Mobile Safari will take you directly to that URL. Or, if it’s a Google Maps link, directly to the Google Maps app. Or, if it’s a YouTube link, it’ll show a movie. Cool, right?

Neat!

thsrs: a thesaurus for Twits

Popular new social networking services like Twitter, where users write extremely short messages about whatever’s on their minds, present a challenge: How can you intelligently get across a complex thought in just 140 characters without needing to use ugly abbreviations (e.g. “w/o needing 2 use ugly abbrev’s”)?

If only there were a service that helps with the struggle of rewriting a 146-letter message to fit in a 140 character limit. Well now there is: Thsrs, the thesaurus that only gives you synonyms shorter than the word you’re looking up. Just enter one of the longer words in your message, and Thsrs will suggest shorter words to use instead.

Try the tool out and bookmark www.thsrs.com so it’s always handy when you need it. There is also Thsrs available as a plug-in for your browser!

smart car vending machine

Showing and not simply telling is the foundation to forming Rich Ideas and marketing as a service. This neat little ad is a Smart Car “vending machine” giving the user a choice between coupe or cabrio information. Pushing the button on the vendor doesn’t relinquish a car, but it does dispense a branded tube containing pamphlets on the new models, dealer information, and a sheet of Smart Car stickers featuring the available colors.

experiences not messages

Holding a full-size Smart Car, the faux vending machine is a nice idea that fits right into the Japanese love for instant gratification on-the-go. In not sure there are many other automotive brands that can pull this off (saving Mini perhaps). And in true Rich Idea fashion, the user walks away smiling - having felt different about the brand because it involved them in a valuable and information-based experience.

Fantastic idea conveying the quirkiness, size and simplicity of Smart Car ownership.

JetSuite: aye, believe I can fly?

What if jet ownership were re-thought to a point where overall travel costs could be reduced to a level that’s actually comparable to first-class commercial travel? What if you could come and go as you please and take off from airports that still have parking spaces? What if you had access to travel the way it was meant to be?

What if you were friggin’ loaded? Well then, the creators of JetBlue (my favorite way to travel) might have yet another refreshing air travel idea for you. It is an interesting alternative to small chartered flying. JetSuite is assembling a fleet of 100 Embraer Phenom 100 jets, with the twist being that the company is lobbying private buyers to buy the jets. Did you catch that? You own the jets. Then, when you don’t need your aircraft, JetSuite charters it to someone who does. The new idea? Unlike the private time-share competition, no matter how much (or how little) your plane is flown, you’re guaranteed a monthly revenue stream.

How? JetSuite will pay the owners $25,000 per month in exchange for allowing JetSuite to use and maintain the jets during their down times. (You know, when you’re not frolicking from coastal golf course to strip club on the weekends. Sure, you’ll have to drop $3,000,000 but that $25,000/month could pay for your fuel costs to Cabo.*

Full disclosure: I have spent much of my career creating marketing programs, interactive ideas, brand launches and web redesigns for brands like JetSuite in the Travel and Hospitality industry. It is by far my biggest corporate passion. Couldn’t be happier to see a new idea like this in the wild.

*No it won’t

learn to type 42 nerds per minute

Newzflash. You can now add OpenSocial applications to your Orkut profile (kinda like facebook).

Currently the Orkut directory includes only a limited number of applications but one thing that Orkut has is the ability to congregate people into interactive sessions (like a physical chatroom of sorts - think network gaming).

One such app that I stumbled upon today is called TypeRacer - a typing game that lets you race your Orkut friends, in real-time, using your hard-earned keyboard skills and compare your typing speed with other Orkut friends in real-time. The faster you type, the sooner your car will hit the finish line. I’ll be honest - at first I thought this was a terrible idea. Until I used it. It’s fun and kinda addictive! What’s more, it kinda teaches you to type a helluva lot better than that Mavis Beacon crap back in the day. My own speed went up in the 5 minutes I was messing with it.

You start with a little car on the left side of the screen, and you type the given text to make your car move all the way to the right as quickly as possible. Your score will be saved, and your Orkut profile will show how you rank among all of your friends. You know, so they can know how fast you type I guess.

It seems you can add a maximum of 25 apps to your profile. Unlike Facebook, where you can clutter your own profile page beyond recognition with “It’s Brittany Bitch!” iconography. :)

Oh yeah, and if you’re like the rest of North America and not on Orkut, just head to typeracer.com to play for yourself.

radiohead of the class

I Love this radical move: Radiohead’s new single “Nude” can be remixed in GarageBand. (Full disclosure: I still haven’t bought the album.) I know…I know.

The separate sections (bass, voice, guitar, strings/fx and drums) are available for purchase iTunes in the same way that you purchase any other song.

Remix galore.

Finished tracks can then be uploaded to the Radiohead site where Radiohead faithful can vote for their favs.

Lather, rise, repeat. Cool!

high fidelity part deux

I couldn’t be more of a High Fidelity-esque music geek. I love to make top-five lists and my music library seems more like a generational patchwork quilt than 31 year old’s typical music collection. Music surrounds my life..from friends bands to going to shows to playing guitar hero. It fits my moods, it makes my moods and in many ways defines the emo dork I am. I mean, who among us hasn’t turned to music when we’ve felt sad(or happy), or wished that Bruce Springsteen or Thom Yorke would talk to us directly like they speak to us through their music?

Growing up with music in my life was a huge deal for me and the mix-tape (and most recently “play-lists” always captured all of that and more. Recently I discovered Muxtape. I love anything that’s dead simple and useful. And you can’t get anymore simple than Muxtape. The online service does one thing — let you create and share mixtape-like MP3 playlists with friends. The signup is quick and the value is deep. Music geeks like me should definitely give it a spin.

One of my favorite actors is John Cusack. He sums Mix-tapes up wonderfully for me.

“To me, making a tape is like writing a letter. There’s a lot of erasing and rethinking and starting again. A good compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do. You’ve got to kick off with a corker, to hold the attention (I started with “Got to Get You Off My Mind,” but then realized that she might not get any further than track one, side one if I delivered what she wanted straightaway, so I buried it in the middle of side two), and then you’ve got to up it a notch, or cool it a notch, and you can’t have white music and black music together, unless the white music sounds like black music, and you can’t have two tracks by the same artist side by side, unless you’ve done the whole thing in pairs and…oh, there are loads of rules.”

Mix-taping is an evolved form of messenging. So. What are your mix-tapes? Do you have rules? Does any of this make sense? Go whip something up at Muxtape. My username is Meat99. Rok.

it's the walker two point oh!

El Camino :)Call me a dirty hick, but this thing is friggin’ awesome! Sadly, this post isn’t about design. (You can read me lusting after this thing here.) So what else is awesome? The smart peeps at GM’s Marketing department took advantage of the obvious naming surge (for the record I’m supporting, “El Camino”) that this thing would cause online and created a community naming site. Cool!

The site is up ready to go for auto-show season. So guys, head over and give this baby it’s rightful name :)

“EL CAMINO.”

See more photos of the car here.

commuters unite!

Hmm. Here’s another Twitter app. IMHO, (sorry Foamee, which i kinda dig) this is a much better use of what Twitter has to offer. And frankly (did I just say “frankly?”) it really speaks to me seeing as I spend somewhere between 8 and 20 hours week held hostage by some sort of train or car.

Hokay soh, you’ve heard of navigation systems now with updated traffic info, yeah? Cool.

but what if they crowd-sourced that data?

Enter Commuter Feed is a free service that lets you post reports on traffic and transit delays in your local area using Twitter.

For those of you in NYC - heres the feed for our area. Nothing much up there yet - but as it goes with crowd-sourced data the machine relys on user input. Let’s see how this one goes…

dropio pants!

Just came across Dropio. A drop is a ‘discrete’ chunk of space you can use to store and share stuff (pictures, video, audio, docs, etc) privately, without accounts, personal registration, or an email addresses. Drops are not ‘searchable’ and not ‘networked’, they just exist floating in space, as points for exchange for individuals or groups.

really worth a peep.

You can create as many as you want in what seems like a ridiculously easy 1-step process. Things like a password, whether others can add to the drop, and how long you want it to exist all make this thing really flexible for both family and business public and private situations. The Drops are a simple platform for sharing which are by default private, but can be flexibly used in a range of ways from sharing family photos and videos to collaborating on work documents. Each drop has three primary input methods – the web, email, and voice – and a few secondary ones like ‘widgets’.

I’ve noted up there that each drop gets its own dedicated email address (for input) phone conference # and its own fax #. You can Fax documents right into the Drop feed! This thing is a huge innovation (and seems like an amazing extranet tool…) I bet a zillion bucks it blows up at SXSW this year…

Weeeeeeeeee!!