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Jaguar C-X75 Concept Car

25 May

jag.jpg Just in from the UK ~ Justine just checked out Clerkenwell Design Week!

One of the highlights of Clerkenwell Design Week is Jaguar’s C-X75 concept car. Jaguar will produce 250 of the striking hybrid supercars in association with Williams F1. As for design inspiration - “The C-X75’s designers found inspiration in the innovative engineering and functional design elements of cars like the 1950s C-Type and D-Type racers and unique 1966 XJ13 Le Mans prototype.” Additionally it’s leather is sourced from the Scottish Bridge of Weir, one of the most environmentally efficient leather producers in the world… and up to 50% of the C-X75’s structure is made of recycled aluminium! Stunning, right? Especially in contrast to the old industrial, woody setting of the Farmiloe Building that was once home of Victorian lead and glass merchants! Despite how much the display tries pull you in to photograph it, it’s pretty irresistible. But enough talk, more photos after the jump!

TO PAGE 2 of "Jaguar C-X75 Concept Car"! ----->

(Want more visual goodness? See NOTCOT.com + NOTCOT.org)
 
 

What Are The Hardest Languages To Learn? (Infographic)

25 May
This simple chart shows the process of studying foreign languages. It explains which languages are too difficult to master, how much time it requires to finish the studies and how many native speakers are in the world.

It is common sense that many Romance languages are gauged as “easy,” based on their similarity to English, but I was surprised that Russian is only “medium.” Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean comprise the list of “hard” languages to learn for native English speakers.

More Infographics.

Click to Enlarge.

Source: voxy

 
 

30 Inspiring “About Me” Pages

25 May

Advertise here with BSA


"About me" pages have the ability to engage and inform your site visitors in a personal and friendly way. For web professionals, our "About me" page can be critical in establishing a true connection with potential clients, and it can set us apart from a sea of other designers and developers.

For different types of websites, keep in mind that the About page could be structured differently. For example, an About page for a blog or news site can be vastly different when compared to the same page for a portfolio website.

In this collection, I’ve rounded up 30 excellent "About me" pages from the web portfolios of amazing designers, artists, illustrators, and developers. Enjoy!

Toby Powell

An interesting use of a cutout/silhouette sets this designer’s About page out from the crowd. A halftone self-portrait and a concise biography of the site owner rounds out this web page’s design.

Guomundur

Most designers use a professional headshot photo of themselves on their About pages, but this designer from Sweden presents an interesting and unique perspective with his overhead shot. Bold typography draws you in to create added visual interest.

Guomundur

Dan Joe Design

The designer used a grid layout in the layout of his About page. Contemporary colors inform you of the designer’s style, while a status message of his availability to take on new projects makes it clear to prospective clients whether he’s available or not.

Dan Joe Design

Tim Van Damme

A unique and effective way of organizing your personal information on the web is to create an online business card (vCard). In doing so, we learn who the designer is, other places to connect with him, and how to get in touch with him.

Tim Van Damme

James A. Reeves

The About page for James A. Reeves is simple and modular, allowing for the large-scale photography in the background.

James A. Reeves

Janis

The artistic design of Janis’s website is very captivating. It gives you a glimpse into the designer’s personal aesthetic style, while supplying the information you need to hire him for your next project. The use of large photography can leave a lasting impression on the visitor if done effectively, as shown in this About page.

Janis

Dan

Here’s another example where the designer used a self-portrait in a unique and engaging way. Including a large self-portrait on your site gives a potential client a real person to relate with.

Dan

Jared Christensen

Jared Christensen used a humorous, catchy self-portrait on his About page to not only allude to his sense of humor, but also allow the client to see his creative side a little more personally.

Jared Christensen

Jason Reed

Jason Reed uses a nice illustration of himself in his About page. The use of an illustration is another way to grab the visitor’s attention and add a more character to your About page.

Jason Reed

Soh Tanaka

This designer organized his credentials in an easily digestible format. Large photography offsets the information and gives you an idea of the site owner’s style and influences.

Soh Tanaka

Emerge and Bloom

On this website for a design studio, information is organized efficiently, both giving you an idea of their services while presenting attributes of the designers behind the company.

Emerge and Bloom

KitFolio

Here’s another striking About page. As you can see, the design is simple, but fun and illustrative.

KitFolio

Alex Dawson

Alexander Dawson (a Six Revisions writer) presents his About page in a very efficient, functional manner. From looking at his credentials, you get a quick overview of who he is, what he does, and the services he excels in. It’s really all you can ask for from an "About me" page, right?

Alex Dawson

Adham Dannaway

Through the use of a grid layout, Adham Dannaway achieves a simple, straightforward About page that also gives you an idea of his skills, illustrated as graphs.

Adam Dannaway

egopop

The About page for egopop presents a large-scale photo of the designer as well as a simple biographical statement about himself and his history as it relates to his profession.

egopop

Monkeyworks

Monkeyworks uses a clean, structured layout on their About page. Not only are the illustrations captivating, but the typography stands out and the graphics used add a nice touch.

Monkeyworks

Darren Hoyt

Great use of typography is what stands out in this "About me" page. Not only does the type make the page easy to read, the grid layout increases readability as well.

Darren Hoyt

Mark McGall

The designer took their About page to the next level by superimposing their face on Mount Rushmore. Tastefully done, this tactic adds a unique and memorable visual to an otherwise straightforward page.

Mark McGall

Mr. Joe Payton

The About page of Joe Payton presents a short bio about him in a beautifully laid out format. The designer also presents information for following him on various social networking sites.

Mr. Joe Payton

Elliot Jay Stocks

The About page of Elliot Jay Stocks is laid out rather simply, but the typography is carefully thought-out and makes you want to explore this designer’s work further. The designer, who is also a speaker and author, presents you with links to pertinent information related to his professional activities.

Elliot Jay Stocks

Kitschen Sink

The compelling website for Kitschen Sink made me want to explore the About page. I found out that they’re a jewelry and accessories shop and I learned the history behind the company. Although it’s laid out very simply, captivating branding led me to the About page through curiosity.

Kitschen Sink

Matt Mullenweg

Matt Mullenweg sets the backdrop for his About page on a highly textured background. These visual layers compelled me to read more about the founder of WordPress.

Who is Leon

Who is Leon

This beautiful About page features animations and depth to draw the visitor in. Clear typography and a monochromatic color scheme set this About page apart.

Matt Mullenweg

Amour Chaleur

This designer’s About page is really simple and straightforward. It includes a short bio, links to relevant info, and her library. It’s always the neatly designed pages that attract me the most.

Amour Chaleur

Owltastic

This beautiful About page of designer Meagan Fisher lets you know all the pertinent information about her and the services she provides. Included are links to social networks and other affiliated websites, all organized into a clean and inviting format.

Owltastic

Lord Likely

This compelling About page’s character is what draws the visitor in. Inspired by Victorian-era design, the designer implemented old-world style in creating a unique and professional page that serves as an introduction to himself.

Lord Likely

Dustin Curtis

This unique About page presents a timeline of the site owner’s life — from birth to his projected death.

Dustin Curtis

Ian Mintz

The beautiful watercolor illustrations grabbed my attention on this website. As you can see, his About page is laid out very simply and elegantly. We get a sense of his design influences, on top of his skills and education, through this clean and straightforward approach.

Monsieurlam

Large-scale photography is what sets this "About me" page apart. The page is laid out in a clear format, providing information about the designer and where he can be found.

Monsieurlam

Floating Asian Kid

The interaction on this website intrigued me enough to explore its About page. You can see from his short biography what the designer specializes in and how to reach him.

Floating Asian Kid

Related Content

About the Author

Stephanie Hamilton is a freelancer graphic and web designer who runs her own design studio, Stephanie Hamilton Design. You can find her on Twitter @SHamiltonDesign and Linkedin.

 
 

Google Correlate: Find Search Queries that Correlate with Real-World Data

25 May

google_correlate.jpg
I guess Google Correlate [googlelabs.com] is a dream come true for any person appreciating statistics and social science (or just likes to explore which line graphs match up). It is Google's newest addition to its already rich and powerful collection of data tools, which already include Google Data Explorer, Google Trends, Google Insights for Search, Google Fusion Tables, Google Visualization API, Google Chart API, or Google Wonder Wheel. The online service allows users to find search query patterns which correspond with those of real-world trends, such as those that correlate with winter time (i.e. 'alpine touring', 'colds' and 'wedding soup').

Alternatively, users can upload their own time series data, and let Google's algorithmic wizardry and computing power let do all the hard work in identifying the search queries that match best over time (e.g. those that match 'visualization' or 'crisis'). In addition, queries can be correlated according to their location according to U.S. states, so that it becomes a statistical fact that the annual geographic distribution of rainfall corresponds to search queries like 'Disney vacation packages', 'mildew remover' or 'pink raincoats'.

Oh, and if you really want to know: 'infosthetics' correlates best with 'wikipedia how' and 'tn580', a Brother laser printer.

In other words, Google Correlate provides a glimpse in our our crowd-sourced psyche like never before.

More information available at the Official Google Blog.

 
 

Newly Discovered Bacteria Lives on Caffeine

24 May

Think you live on caffeine? You're still no match for a newly described bitty bacteria called Pseudomonas putida CBB5. These little guys can feast on pure caffeine all day--and presumably all night--long. And researchers have now located just how they accomplish this arguably admirable feat.

Celebrated and cursed, caffeine is actually an alluring blend of carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen and oxygen, and the clever bacterium uses specialized enzymes as it "breaks caffeine down into carbon dioxide and ammonia," Ryan Summers, a doctoral researcher in chemical and biochemical engineering at the University of Iowa, said in a prepared statement.

[More]
 
 

60 million chemicals

23 May

There are now 60 million chemicals in the CAS Registry, that’s a number equivalent to 3G users in China, the population of the Roman Empire in 70 BC, the age of the Rocky Mountains in years, the number of casualties in WWII, and the votes cast in American Idol. The last time I mentioned the CAS count was September 2009, when it reached 50 million entries. I remember it reaching the 10 million mark in 1990 (a year or so after I’d started working for the Royal Society of Chemistry, RSC). That seemed like a major achievement given that it had taken CAS 33 years to go from 0 to 10 million.

 

 

The 60-millionth substance in the CAS registry is a putative antiviral agentt and has the CAS # 1298016-92-8. It was discovered by researchers at the Institute of Materia Medica, in China and is a patent pending derivative of 2-amino-1,3,4-thiadiazine.

60 million chemicals is a post from: Sciencebase Science Blog

 
 

Capitalists never liked capitalism

19 May

Capitalists tend not to like capitalism. Milton Friedman pointed this out long ago. Too much competition. Too much risk. Much better to have the government keep out competitors and subsidize losses. Floyd Norris at the New York Times has just discovered this in an article called “Capitalists Who Fear Free Markets” (HT: Catherine Rampell):

Capitalism is supposed to produce losses on bad investments.

But all too often it has not.

In Tokyo this week, corporate executives were outraged when a Japanese government official suggested that banks might have to take losses on loans to the company that produced a nuclear catastrophe.

Yukio Edano, the chief cabinet secretary, had the temerity to say “the public will not support” the injection of government money into Tokyo Electric Power, also known as Tepco, unless banks share in the pain. Tepco says it would like to pay compensation to victims, but needs government cash to do so.

The president of Japan’s largest bank, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial, was shocked by the very idea that a bank should lose money if it lent to a company that could not meet its obligations. Mr. Edano’s remarks “came out of the blue,” said the executive, Katsunori Nagayasu. “I felt there was something wrong about them.”

Consumers like capitalism, not business people.

 

 
 

Facebook Smear Campaign Has No Lasting Effect on Facebook or Google [STATS]

19 May


Despite major blowback from a Facebook-funded smear campaign against Google meant to raise questions about Google’s privacy settings, the perception of neither company has been significantly damaged.

According to data from social media analytics firm NetBase, which processed data from more than 70,000 news stories, blogs and forum posts, tweets and comments on social networks, the sentiment about both companies changed very little in the aftermath of the news.

Negative sentiment about Facebook — particularly mentions that also included Google — rose May 11, the evening the news broke, and peaked the next day. But by May 13, sentiment was largely positive again, and by May 17 sentiment about Facebook had returned to its pre-smear levels even when mentioned with Google. Google, it appears, was hardly affected.

Woe to the 24-hour news cycle and our short attention spans, I suppose.

Facebook Net Sentiment
Click for full-size view.

Facebook Sentiment, When Mentioned With Google

Google Net Sentiment

More About: facebook, Google

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How 5 Non-Profits Are Innovating With Mobile

19 May

phone nature image

Holly Ross is the executive director of NTEN: The Nonprofit Technology Network, where she helps her members put technology to use for social change. You can follow her on Twitter at @ntenhross and read the NTEN blog.



Even before that first cup of coffee, an increasing number of us are reaching for our mobile phones in the morning. That makes mobile the perfect fit for non-profits that want to capitalize on every and any moment an individual is inspired to act on behalf of a cause. 


While the Red Cross made text-to-give campaigns famous after the Haiti earthquake, there are a variety of additional opportunities to use mobile to engage your audience in a cause. In fact, it doesn’t take an expensive investment in a custom built application to make mobile work. Dozens of providers have emerged in the last several years to serve the non-profit market with off-the-shelf solutions for a variety of mobile needs.



Non-profits, both large and small, are using mobile to educate, activate, and engage audiences of all sizes. Here are five examples of non-profits rocking mobile for social good.





1. WNYC and NYT Bird Map


birdmap image


As it turns out, you don’t have to head to the Bronx Zoo to find wildlife in New York City. In fact, over 355 bird species live or spend time in New York throughout the year. To highlight the avian side of the city, WNYC and The New York Times asked their listeners and readers to text BIRD to 30644 and share their favorite bird-watching spots.

Results are compiled in an online map. Hundreds of people have responded so far, with the Red Cardinal topping the list of most-spotted winged creatures.




2. California Teacher’s Association


cta image


Wisconsin’s teachers may have been in the spotlight this February, but in California, where over 40,000 teachers have been laid off due to severe budget cuts, the California Teacher’s Association (CTA) is fighting to preserve teaching jobs and restore other education funding.

They are able to text their supporters and, when the supporter responds, automatically connect that supporter to their state legislator via a phone call. In the first few days of the campaign, hundreds of calls have been made because of the texts, saving CTA time and money compared to the traditional phone tree method.







3. Alliance for Climate Education


haiku image


Forget a string tied around a finger. If you want today’s teens to remember to do something, you need to text them. That’s what the Alliance for Climate Education (ACE) is doing. When ACE visits a school to present an educational assembly, instead of encouraging the audience to silence their mobile phones, they ask the kids to take them out and text in a pledge — one thing they will do to make the environment better.

Students are also asked for their email addresses that are integrated directly into the organization’s database, allowing them to follow up with each student about their pledge in multiple ways. So far, over 90,000 students have texted pledges and the organization is looking to integrate mobile into other campaigns, including a Halloween haiku contest.




4. Planned Parenthood Federation of America


planned parenthood image


Sexual health isn’t an issue most teenagers find easy to ask questions about, but having the right answers about it can change — and even save — lives.

Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) is making it even easier for teens who are looking for answers about delaying sex, birth control, STD prevention and treatment, emergency contraception, sexual orientation, pregnancy testing and abortion to get the information and services they need.

Spots on MTV and banners on the PPFA mobile site direct teens seeking support to text the organization with questions, which are answered by trained professionals who point to information and, in some cases, can book the teens for an appointment at their local clinic — all via text.






5. The Marine Mammal Center





marine mammal image

If you’ve ever visited San Francisco, chances are you went to Pier 39 and heard (if not saw) the famous sea lions. The Marine Mammal Center (MMC) wanted to capitalize on the popularity of the wildlife to educate a wider audience about their work to rescue and rehabilitate sick and injured marine mammals.

Using signs at the end of the pier, MMC offered new text subscribers a free seal ringtone. Subscribers got the ringtone, as well as an invitation to visit the nearby Marine Mammal Center. Since the campaign launched, they’ve recruited nearly 1,500 supporters to the cause.




The Future of Mobile and Social Good


While mobile is still a new strategy for the social sector, consumers are moving rapidly to this channel. “When people get online now, they are increasingly using their phone instead of a laptop or computer,” says Doug Plank, CEO of Mobilecause. “And when you look at the history of online giving, how quickly it was adopted by non-profits and donors, mobile is outpacing it. While mobile campaigns have begun to produce impressive results for causes on [their] own, it can be even more impressive as part of an integrated campaign that also includes email and even direct mail.”

“We know that the opportunistic timing of email and mail can boost response,” says Jessica Bosanko of M+R Strategic Services. “Non-profits are often seeing similar results with text messaging now — with supporters who are signing up for texts far outperforming the rest of the file, and strategically placed texts capable of increasing performance to email messages.” 



Michael Sabbat of Mobile Commons sees the sector getting smarter about how it uses mobile, bringing business intelligence to mobile strategies. “Organizations can be smarter about how they communicate with supporters. If the supporter uses the mobile web, they will be texted a link to donate. If the supporter doesn’t use the mobile web, they receive a phone number in their text. We’ve come a long way to know who the supporters are, so we are not just blindly sending everyone the same message.”


Has your non-profit embraced a mobile strategy? Share your experiences in the comments.

Disclosure: The PPFA is a member of NTEN


For more lists, how-tos and other resources on this topic, check out Mashable Explore!

Image courtesy of Flickr, Srdjan Stojiljkovic

More About: charity, Mobile 2.0, non-profit, nten, social good, social media, tech

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WordPress.com Drops Support for IE6

19 May

WordPress Dashboard

As the Internet Explorer 6 Deathwatch continues, another web service — WordPress.com — has announced that it is ending support of the nearly decade-old web browser.

Citing “increasingly complex code trickery to make the WordPress dashboard work,” the company announced an end to IE6 support.

The dashboard will still load for IE6 users, it just won’t function very well. IE6 users will be alerted that their browser is outdated and given direct links to browser updates or to download an alternative browser via the Browse Happy website.

In addition to dropping IE6 support, WordPress.com has also rolled out some new features, including a revamped and redesigned dashboard and a new distraction-free writing mode.

These features — as well as the end-of-life for IE6 support — will make their way to self-hosted WordPress installs with WordPress 3.2. The beta version of WordPress 3.2 is available for download now and the final version is expected to land sometime in June.

WordPress.com, which hosts millions of websites, joins a long list of providers that have officially decided that enough is enough in regards to IE6. In March, Microsoft launched its own global campaign calling for the end of the browser.

More About: IE6, internet explorer, WordPress.com

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