Interactive

IDEO looks into the future of the book

by Armando Alves.

On his latest post, Tim Brown talks about the future of the book, and how it shows up as an experience on tablets.

From share of voice on Nelson, reading list suggested by your coworkers with Coupland and rich, contextual narratives with Alice, IDEO explores some of the themes we’ve been discussing at Fullsix recently: think beyond the hardware and instead push the limits of what you can do with content and social technologies.

For those interested in UX, mobile and new forms of publishing, head to Big Conversations Facebook page and share you opinions.

iPad Light Painting makes future magic

by Armando Alves.

Making Future Magic: iPad light painting from Dentsu London on Vimeo.

The first film by Dentsu London with Berg, depicting their vision of Making Future Magic:

By Making we mean craftsmanship, an attention to and understanding of materials, and an emphasis on collaboration.
By Future we mean something not seen before, something new and unexpected. Not so much sci-fi, as near-future.
By Magic we mean surprising, culturally powerful, unusual, capable of delighting.
By Making Future Magic we mean all three, and that’s the combination we look for in all our creative endeavours.
We believe in the superpotency of properly balanced commercial and cultural ambitions. And we don’t want to add to the overflowing cultural landfill. The ambition behind Making Future Magic is to make work that’s as culturally powerful and sensitive as it is commercially effective

Coke: The Secret is Out There

by Armando Alves.

Loving the new YouTube based campaign for Coke by Wieden+Kennedy Portland.

Centered around the keyhole bottle icon, symbolizing Coca-Cola’s mysterious secret formula, the video has several overlays leading to unique digital experiences.

I’ll throw a few spoilers linked on the video overlays:

On Twitter, you can follow Dr.Pemberton, Coke’s 179 year old inventor, and ask questions about Coke’s secret formula.
On Facebook, send your friends a polar bear video message (and the chance to win a free Coke, US only).

Not to mention the video feed tracking the safe where the secret formula is probably hidden.

And by sending a Coke bubble on www.mycoke.com/smileizer , Coke will donate $1 to the National Parks Service for each laugh.

Something tells me that this is not the end of Dr. Pemberton’s adventure. There’s probably more to it.

Home and Away: the visualization of war

by Armando Alves.

Stamen Design just published their new visualization for CNN, that maps coalition casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Home and Away goes beyond the regular news reporting, showing real data that is now becoming a platform for participation, with “people using the map to post memories and share stories about their lost loved ones”.

I’m no Jay Rosen or Jeff Jarvis, but the future of journalism will be relying a lot on information visualization and social experiences, acknowledging that readers are not only consuming information, but they want to actually participate (beyond the regular comment box).

Source: Stamen Design

Creative coding with Cinder

by Armando Alves.

Andrew Bell, Robert Hodgin, and The Barbarian Group just released LibCinder, a creative coding framework in C++.

It’s a cross platform, open-source project, very similar to Processing or OpenFrameworks, but with better memory management and OpenGL support. Features include standalone applications and screensaver creation, Cocoa touch support (iPhone, iPad), OpenGL texture classes, webcam capture support and full Quicktime support. Besides the tech specs, what can it really do?


The most famous example is probably the Augmented Reality cover on Esquire but there’s lot of video goodness by Robert Hodgin (aka flight404) below.

A new ride for McLaren

by Armando Alves.

With the new Formula One season starting, McLaren rolled out a new website developed by Pirata London, giving a glimpse of the backstage action, with a live video stream handling almost 200,000 people in a day.


The whole aesthetic spans throughout the website which becomes a live dahsboard, with some web engineering powered by jQuery, @font-face embedding and a custom CMS running on a nginx webserver. Besides, the visuals are a nice escape from a testosterone drive automobile industry.



Other highlights include a dedicated mobile website, a fan community an lots of (light)boxes :)

MySpace Fan Video

by Armando Alves.

Never thought Alicia Keys would sing a song for me, but here she is:

Well, not really. But it was really surprising the seamless personal experience delivered by MySpace, BBH and Domani Studios (which are becoming one of my new favorite interactive companies).



But better than the tech wizardry behind the thing is the “LOVEABLE MAGIC”, as @FranHazeldine calls it:

With the Myspace Fan Videos, the magic isn’t in the tech. It’s in the moment when 50 Cent hangs a picture of you on his wall, or Alicia Keys sings you a song. Sure the magic is tech-fuelled, but it’s the twisted cultural content, the playful reference to things I love or hate, that really makes it. Tech is the means, not a magical end in itself.

Tech magic is out. Loveable magic is in.

Details like the reflection of your Facebook profile pic in the glossy piano surface on Alicia Key’s video show that the magic is beyond tech and is more about making it simple, collaborative and easy to share.

Create your own video at http://www.myspace.com/fanvideo

Source: BBH-Labs

LG sets the image free

by Armando Alves.

Yes, the Internet is wonderful and all that stuff, but sometimes we do indulge ourselves with a good sofa evening, watching a film on TV.

To celebrate this escape from the smaller mobile and laptop screens, the Image Freedom movement was launched a few days ago.

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You can find lots of video testimonials of people playing around this idea, with channels on Vimeo and YouTube feeding the large video experience on the website.

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And just a few minutes ago, LG launched the product website at liberteaimagem.com, a full 3D experience, showcasing the borderless concept of the LG SL9000 model, the new high contrast LED with ultra slim design.

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Go ahead, give the site a spin (literally) and check the gallery for some nice product footage. And maybe, just maybe, you’re free to choose LG when getting the new TV model for your living room.

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So, if sometimes i don’t update this blog that often, then perhaps it’s because I’m actually working on stuff like this. Enjoy.

Credits:
Agency: Fulllsix Portugal
Creative Director: Rui Vieira
Interactive Design: Daniel Teixeira, Victor Afonso
Copywriter: Claudia Ribeiro
Web Strategy: Armando Alves
Account Management: Ricardo Costa, Sofia Delfim
Guerrilla marketing : Torke

Tales from the microsite crypt: the rise of social zombies

by Armando Alves.

Since 2006, Web 2.0 and the growth of accessible publishing platforms, the microsite (also called hotsite or campaign site) has been on life support, with a near death as new forms of interaction extend to multiple touchpoints. Many have declared the death of the microsite — hyperboles are good linkabait — as the social web became increasingly important, both for consumers and companies.

The age of microsite featured the usual broadcast tactics, pushing “shiny flashy objects” and applying the usual recipes of “spray-and-pray” or “build-it-and-they-will-come”. From those days, the web graveyard inherited thousands of zombie pages that became lifeless, after broadcasting their ephemeral commercial message.

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FWA 2005 Site Of The Month: 4 out of 12 are no longer online

The kind of campaign websites listed above, is pretty much careless of what happens after the “campaign” ends. Not even the decency of doing a simple 301 HTTP redirect, with users stumbling upon a parked page, filled with AdWords by someone with a sense of opportunity. Don’t tell me that a company can’t spare a lousy hosting bill for an old sucessfull campaign or $10USD for a redirected or masked domain.

But enough about microsites, that i personally call “the web’s non-recyclable garbage”. Fast forward to 2009, where one would expect that some lessons from the previous days would turn companies more wiser when defining an integrated Internet presence. Well, not quite.

Zombies in San Francisco
Photo by Laughing Squid under Creative Commons

Meet the social zombies

These are the kind of corporate presences on social web platforms and services, created only to serve a temporary tactical purpose. As with microsite, they’re nurtured during a few weeks with fresh blood (regular updates, a widget, a viral wannabe), but then left dying on the same kind of web graveyard. But now with a more bloody consequence, taking with them all the community (fans, followers, viewers, etc) that they’ve built while alive.

Examples include the usual Twitter account created for the yearly event, a Facebook page activated only for a new product launch or a YouTube channel with the 500 views viral wannabe. This “social media bribery” is again leaving pieces of rotten digital flesh all over the web.

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DharmaWantsYou.com (An ARG for TV series Lost) has won a Primetime Creative Arts Emmy, but is now defunct (or should i say lost)

dharma-wiki
A sustainable solution could be a wiki on the same domain, highlighting the narrative and interactions.

Sometimes it’s just brands experimenting and failing, and i’m ok with that. The problem is not caring to clean the mess once finished, on a bad example of interactive sustainability (how’s that for a buzzword?).
The social web is also about brands creating a sustainable presence on conversational destinations and managing the digital footprint for the long run (Google doesn’t forget). Once a campaign ends, don’t stick only to analysis, with the follow-up also including a post-mortem curation, by informing (updating the bio or description) or reaching out to the community (Tr.im open-sourced their service). And please, don’t just limit yourself to profile euthanasia.