Category Archives: Design

Cool design

Welcome. Coffee?

September 29, 2015 Alexander 2 Comments

This is not a coffee shop - this is the reception at one of our clients in Denmark. They can greet you, get you a visitor's badge and notify the employee your meeting with. And while you wait for them to come meet you, they can also … Continue Reading ››

Best of site, Design, Happy At Work

10 seeeeeriously cool workplaces

October 5, 2006 Alexander 535 Comments

Physical space matters. It's easier to be productive, creative and happy at work in a colourful, organic, playful environment than in a grey, linear, boring one. And I'm not talking about the outside of the building. Many companies have buildings that are sleek, modern, architectural glass-steel-and-cement sculptures on … Continue Reading ››

Design, Happy At Work, Innovation

BMW sez: bureaucracy sucks

May 19, 2006 Alexander 10 Comments

The latest BMW ad campaign has very little to do with cars and focuses instead on the corporate values of the Bayerische Motoren Werke. One version of it says:

We say no to: Compromise Complacency Bureaucracy Red tape Lowest common denominators Middle managemet Second guessing Herd mentality So we can say yes to good ideas.

BMW fights bureaucracy. This is cool. Why is it … Continue Reading ››

Design, Speaking

CC-licensed PowerPoint-Free Zone logo

May 19, 2006 Alexander 6 Comments

I'm with Edward Tufte and Kathy Sierra on this one. I never use PowerPoint in my presentations because it:

Limits interaction and spontaneity
Focuses people's attention on the slides rather than on what's happening in the room
Often requires dim, snooze-inducing lighting

There are great uses of PowerPoint too, but why risk … Continue Reading ››

Design, Open Source Business

Open Source Car

March 3, 2006 Alexander Leave a comment

The OScar Project is an attempt to design a car using an Open Source, web-based approach. Anybody can contribute to the concept and design at the website. I loved this quote from the site:

You can't treat a car like a human being. A car needs love. - Walter Röhrl

Design

Why features don’t matter anymore

February 28, 2006 Alexander 2 Comments

The success of the Apple iPod should serve us all as a reminder of this fact: Simple is good. And in case we forget, there's this excellent article by Andreas Pfeiffer who formulates it very succinctly using 10 simple rules. Here are some examples:

10 fundamental rules for the age of user experience technology: 1) More features … Continue Reading ››

Design

Sure you can!

January 27, 2006 Alexander Leave a comment

Great new website; nice, simple execution: Can I crash?

Patricia and I already put ourselves in there.

Design, Happy At Work

VW’s sci-fi car plant

January 7, 2006 Alexander Leave a comment

Solange de Santi's excellent book Life on the Line about her experience of working under cover (she's a journalist) for 18 months in a GM van plant gave me the sense that car factories are noisy, dirty, dangerous places. Apparently they don't have to be - they can also be amazing, beautiful, friendly, ergonomic and … Continue Reading ››

Design, Silly

Olive solitaire. Olitaire?

December 7, 2005 Alexander Leave a comment

This made me laugh. Clever.

Via BoingBoing.

Design, Happy At Work, Learning

Death to PowerPoint

December 5, 2005 Alexander Leave a comment

Creating Passionate Users is the best blog I've found recently, and Kathy Sierra's post on how not to use PowerPoint is very funny and smart.

Sometimes the best presentation is... no presentation. Ditch the slides completely. Put the projector in the closet, roll the screen back up, and turn the damn lights back … Continue Reading ››