Proving once again that everything is made in China, it has emerged that the banned flags of Tibet are actually manufactured in Chinese factories! I read it on the BBC, although it sounds like something The Onion would come up with. Do I need to really say anything else?

This story also reminds me of the [...]

// a tale of China, design, national identities
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I just finished reading Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking. And I wouldn’t be writing about it except for the fact that it was absolutely brilliant!
If you are at all interested in human psychology, cognitive recognition, subliminality, symbolism, colour theory, or biochemistry, (which as designers, I would hope you are) [...]

// a tale of New York, advertising: tv/radio, brands & branding, design: history, design: packaging, the industry
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This site has been in its current incarnation for a while now — about 15 months by my count. Not a terribly long time, but in Internet years, that’s ancient. Is it time for a redesign?
Considering I built the template using CSS and web standards, the transition should be seamless — upload a new theme [...]

// a tale of design: web, this website
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Here’s something that I find odd, even by New York standards. First, a little backstory:

In recent times, the Empire State Building has gone batty for their coloured lights. You know, those segmented series of lights at the tippy-top of the building, just below the radio tower. It started innocent enough — red, white, and blue for [...]

// a tale of New York, music
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Bad news for Starbucks, the brand I love to blog about. It seems that profit forecasts won’t be quite so perky, leaving stockholders disappointed. The BBC has a quick study of how the sluggish US economy has hurt the coffee giant.
I guess they haven’t been selling enough of those $1 Short brews.
Business types will analyse [...]

// a tale of brands & branding, national identities
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Usually, my commentary, scathing or not, concentrates on established, large-scale, and often multi-national brands. But today, I have to examine a web startup that is only a few years old and may be unknown to many netizens.
PodShow is a company that delivers video and audio podcasts. The best way to describe them is to liken [...]

// a tale of brands & branding, computers & gadgets, the internet
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Have you heard of the radio show/podcast called “Spark” from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation? Well, it rocks. I learned about firstly from part-time contributor, Amber MacArthur. The show is good stuff, and a great resource for all things geeky.
In the most recent episode, host Nora Young chats with Virginia Postrel about typography in the age [...]

// a tale of design, the industry, the internet, typography
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