Article
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Marie | Article
Invention in extreme climates
Peter Bil'ak's editorial on the latest issue of Work That Works. -
Marie | Article
The Office Cubicle
The egalitarian origins of the office cubicle (The Action Office) highlight how design intention can sometimes fail to meet market necessity. -
Mathew | Article
£5m on red rubber bands
That’s how much the Royal Mail spent on four billion red rubber bands over a 5 year period. They’re all beige now though which isn’t nearly as fun. -
Mathew | Article
Passing on a chance to steal $13,000
While not an active theft, the taxi driver in this story from filmmaker Casey Neistat could have effectively stolen equipment worth more than $13,000. Watch, read and as Casey puts it, have your faith in humanity restored. -
Mathew | Article
Big things have small beginnings
A nice post from Google Ventures' MG Siegler on how successful big products start humble before they get big. The absence of cruft and bloat and over complication. -
Ben | Article
Nicole Scherzinger made Snow Patrol mum cry
Singer at the top of her CRAFT (see - this *is* craft-related) makes Gary Lightbody's mum cry by singing a song with an Irish accent. Funny. -
Jenifer | Article
No, I am your father... and your uncle
Gets a bit tl;dr but I believe the gist is that marmosets often have their twins' genetic babies - man, genetics is MAD! -
Jenifer | Article
Ravelry vs US Olympic Committee
Ravelry’s a great resource, knitters (it hit 4 million users last year) and we get grumpy when you diss us - London 2012 would’ve been SO good if only the knitters of Ravelry hadn’t boycotted Team USA. -
Mathew | Article
You'll be outraged at how easy it was to get you to click on this headline
The psychology of clickbait. -
Marie | Article
Llyod Godson's Biosub
In 2007, with the help of a live your dream sponsorship and Australia Geographic Magazine, this guy built an under water habitat out of old steel and lived at the bottom of a lake for two weeks! -
Mathew | Article
Affective and physiological markers of pleasure at outgroups’ misfortunes
Not a direct link to the paper by Dr. Mina Cikara but a shorter article about it and how (paraphrasing and over simplifying a bit) the basal ganglia reward process is to blame for schadenfreude. -
Mathew | Article
11 images that capture the incredible vastness of space
Bless our tiny little existence. -
Marie | Article
The Nether
This play currently showing at The Duke of York's Theatre is a bit mad but definitely worth a visit. A crime drama, set in 2050, exploring virtual gaming in the future. -
Jamie | Article
In Search of the Mysterious Narwhal
Ballerina turned biologist Kristin Laidre gives her all to study the elusive, deep-diving, ice-loving whale known as the “unicorn of the sea”. -
Anna | Article
An IT disaster waiting to happen
Technical debt in banking: "The banks would like to move to new systems but it would be like trying to change the engines on an aeroplane while it is in flight." -
Anna | Article
The Pizza Box Mystery
Adding fuel to the fire of the Weekly WA Recycling Debate (catchy). -
Anna | Article
I would prefer not to
A German office worker sent a Bartleby-esque retirement email saying "Since 1998, I was present but not really there." -
Jenifer | Article
How does copyright work in space?
I’m somewhere between incredulous that this is a ‘thing', and impressed that 'months were spent hammering out details with Mr Bowie’s representatives’. Someone’s written a paper “Space Copyright Law: the new dimension” for gawd’s sake! -
Anna | Article
Libertarian Police Department
“Mark my words: we’re going to figure out who did this and we’re going to take them down...provided someone pays us a fair market rate to do so." -
Anna | Article
The Tetris Effect
Even ex-Tetris-players with amnesia see blocks turning as they drift off to sleep. Via Gray. -
Mathew | Article
People who taste, feel and hear colour
Synesthesia is an almost unimaginable neurological phenomenon for those that don’t suffer from it. Fun test: Discover friends that have it mildly by asking what colour your name is. Bet you find more than you’d think. -
Ben | Article
How It Works: Inside The Machine That Separates Your Recyclables
I'd been wondering for a while how mixed recycling was separated. -
Mathew | Article
Explain a television remote control to me like I’m five
M.G. Siegler on the historically awful piece of design that is the TV remote. Scroll down for the wonderful ‘Grandma hack’, an even better version of which appeared first in Designing Interactions (2006) by the late great Bill Moggridge. -
Erin | Article
How technology makes cheating easier
Cheating the system: from chess to pub quizzes, how technology has made breaking the rules easier than ever -
Mathew | Article
Closure Experiences
An interesting and fairly new term being championed by ex-ustwo™ Global Design Director Joseph Macleod. All these products and services we design and set up: What happens when they finish? Or when we finish with them? Designing experiences for endings. A lovely idea I think (and reminiscent of Nat Hunter's 2012 Metaphwoar! talk). -
Calum | Article
Exercise While Sitting at Your Computer
This seems like dumb stuff, but it’s well worth re-iterating; if you spend long hours at a computer, make sure you’re not ruining your everything! -
Marie | Article
China's last lotus feet
Jo Farrell published this project last year, produced over the course of 9 years, photographing 50 elder women across China. -
Brendan | Article
Michelin Stars
So how did a company selling rubber tires become the world’s authority on restaurants? -
Anna | Article
Bringing oysters back home to Britain
A man’s quest to reinvigorate the coastline’s sea life. -
Anna | Article
Craft vs Kraft
'Americans have hardly kicked their addictions to salt, sugar or fat, but the experience of the big food companies shows they are trying.' -
Anna | Article
Frank Lloyd Wright tried to save the city
"Modern cities are hives and tangles and piles." -
Jamie | Article
Marmosets are stars of Japan’s ambitious brain project
Japanese researchers have bred a substantial population of marmosets to study cognition and cognitive brain disorders such as schizophrenia and depression. -
Brendan | Article
Lack of Taste: Peter Lik’s Recipe for Success: Sell Prints. Print Money.
Inside the machine of the man who recently sold the most expensive photograph ever. -
Erin | Article
Dazzle Shoes
Following on from my link last week, here's a pair of dazzle shoes. I don't they there were very successful Ronaldo didn't win the Ballon d'Or in the year after they were released. -
Erin | Article
The Gates Foundation
One of the 4 programs of the Gates Foundation is to improve the health and lives of people in developing countries. -
Mathew | Article
Atomic blast shot at 1/100,000,000th of a second
As if nuclear weapons weren't scarily powerful enough already, these super fast photos add an extra spooky and ominous edge. -
Erin | Article
Freedom to and freedom from
The Handmaid's Tale explores the different types of personal freedom -
Mathew | Article
What do those squiggles on the pavement actually mean?
"Look down at British roads and pavements and there's often a slew of squiggles, dots and arrows, painted in a plethora of hues. But what do they actually mean?” -
Marie | Article
The Hard Problem of Consciousness
A look a the debate between philosophers and scientists. -
Jamie | Article
Seymour Papert
Creator the Logo language and author of “Mindstorms: Children, Computers and Powerful Ideas”. This guy’s rap sheet is as impressive as it is playful. -
Erin | Article
Pixar's story rules
Over a month and a half Pixar story artist Emma Coats tweeted out a series of lessons she learned about how to create appealing stories: -
Mathew | Article
Optimizing UI icons for faster recognition
"What makes an icon a valuable addition to the interface, rather than a mere decorative element?" UI designer Alla Kholmatova has some nice thoughts on the matter, including the refresh symbol. -
Mathew | Article
Katie Scott's beautiful book, Story of Life: Evolution
A great behind the scenes from It's Nice That, showing the work behind a truly beautiful illustration of evolution. 'Evolution' being the longest running and most successful sequel franchise of all time, with the Marvel Cinematic Universe in a close second. -
Erin | Article
The Kardashev Scale
The Kardashev scale is a method of measuring a civilisation's level of technological advancement, based on the amount of energy a civilisation is able to use. -
Anna | Article
Google buses working for equality
Catch an exclusive bus to a job where you can level the playing field of information -
Anna | Article
Five children, five years
A Guardian journalist spoke to some kids in Kent every year from year 6 through till their GCSEs. -
Anna | Article
A magazine for redheads
Hopefully the sense of loss over your favourite emoji will pale now you’ve got yourself a whole magazine. -
Jamie | Article
A landmark in procedural absurdity
“The self-filibuster represented a landmark in the Senate’s long history of procedural absurdity…” -
Brendan | Article
In defense of the selfie stick
The selfie stick is an old-fashioned solution for modern photography. -
Thomas | Article
I embrace you with all my heart
Albert Camus' letter to his former school teacher after winning the Nobel Prize for Literature.