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AUGUST 27, 1999
> Four Days to Save for Your Ferrari
Seventy-five forms of beauty will be sold August 29th, at Christies' annual "Exceptional Motor Cars" sale in Pebble Beach, California. Maybe you weren't into transportation design in school, but can you resist the tasty curves of a 1964 Ferrari 250 Le Mans Berlinetta? The auction includes another Berlinetta, a 275 GTB/C Competition, from 1966; a 1962 red 250 Nembo Spyder convertible; and a famous Ferrari 340 Mexico Berlinetta Carrera Pan Americana, designed for a race from the southern border of Mexico to Texas. This filmic life can be yours for between $1 million and $1.5 million, depending, as always, on who else is bidding. Apparently, those exist for whom things Italian are not always better things; for them Christies offers a yellow 1953 convertible Cadillac Eldorado, as well as various Rolls-Royces. And, of course, one can always just go to study superb forms.
> Aye-Aye, Mac
Many news sources have reported this week on the new computer products unabashedly imitating the i Mac design identity. The spur to this reporting is of course Apple's suit filed against a company called Future Power, over that firm's planned American distribution of a translucent white-and-blue rounded computer &Mac247; essentially a $799 windows machine in i Mac's trade dress. While one may seethe on behalf of Apple at this infringement, it is remarkable to see these concrete product design issues treated as mainstream news. Jonathan Ive and Jobs have not only got the thrill of product design up on the front page, but its bane as well.
> The Internet, Everywhere You Want to Be
And lots of places you don't. A company called Tokheim Corporation, in Fort Wayne, Indiana, has just signed a deal with BP Amoco to develop a gasoline pump that will let drivers access on-line services. The prototype pumps will be introduced in Japan early next year, and will let drivers check on specific services, like weather and traffic. Six test pumps are planned for the US within the next year.
AUGUST 19
> How to Cheat at Toothbrushing
How to cheat at toothbrushing, let me count the ways. Add one more to the list now, with the invention of "Dental Dots." These are fingertip toothbrushes for that occasional moment one is separated from one's toothbrush. Each roughly one-centimeter circular pad has an adhesive backing and is saturated with toothpaste. This product, from the new "Dental Dots" company of Reseda, Californnia, is sold in paks of six for about $2. Oral-Bware!
> The Wrap
For packaging designers who haven't discovered it yet, or for others getting to know the field, check out the Packaging Network.com Newsletter via http://www.packagingnetwork.com. This is a small and choice update on packaging-related issues. For example, the current issue reviews the following products: a Bead Detection System, a Label Printer-Applicator and a Modified Atmosphere Packaging System. (That last one is for gases and not actually a joke.) It also points to juicy - in package-design-terms - news items, including pieces on Bar Code Patent Infringement, a new Aluminum conglomerate, and soda consumption.
> White House Supports Alternative Plastics
On August 12th President Clinton announced a long term effort to promote farm products and trees as sources of electricity, pharmaceuticals, car fuel and alternative plastics. The EPA and the Secretaries of Agriculture and Energy were asked to plan research and to create markets for these renewable technologies so that their use will triple by 2010.
While much of the research is based on more familiar fuel problems, a considerable section of this effort is directed at our dependence on plastic. The New York Times' coverage mentioned Du Pont's work on a sugar-based polyester. Cargill is also involved in a project with Dow Chemical to produce polylactic acid, a polymer that can replace polystyrene in insulated cups and polyethylene in soft drink bottles, as well as making garbage bags and textile fibers. The acid, which is currently made from corn sugars, completely breaks down in a compost heap.
The action taken by Clinton was an executive order that set the tripling goal, instructed the secretaries to act, and planned research grants and tax credits, but did not yet set aside any new money for the effort. Funding will come from within the existing department budgets.
AUGUST 12
> Point, Click and Sniff
What you have been missing in your electronic experience is smell, isn't it? People at the Illinois Institute of Technology seem to think so. IIT has patented a PC accessory that would create smells as though they were downloaded from the web. The device, which attaches to the computer, involves an absorbent pad and strips of conductive material. The pad is treated with scents, which are released when voltage passes through the strips...While the benefits sound amusing, the downside could be pretty low.
> Digital Disk Recorders on Their Way
NEC will be launching the first digital disc recorder for the home in Japan in September. The downside is that there maybe three other formats. The new NEC format is not compatible with current DVD RAM disks, for example. Panasonic is working on a DVD-based video recorder, and Sony, Philips and Pioneer are working on still other formats. Which one will be 8-track?
> Talk about Design
The world, especially the East Coast of the US, is full of news about Talk magazine, recently launched in New York. The renowned editor, Tina Brown, had left the New Yorker magazine to start this new lifestyle publication. A close perusal of the first issue reveals that among content and advertising there is only one industrial design product - excluding vehicles - mentioned in the whole magazine. There is plenty of fashion, and a truck rates the "Hip" list, but only one thing. That designed product is the Motorola V-phone, in a two-page ad showing off its tinyness.
AUGUST 6
> Blondes Can Too Compute! Welcome the Barbie Personal Computer.
Steve Jobs has promised that computers will now be love objects instead of just boxes for RAM muscle, and apparently Mattel has taken him at his word. In September a silver Barbie computer, with flowers, and a gold Hot Wheels computer, with tongues of flame, will be available to boys and girls with $599. The Barbie PC will come with Barbie accessories and the Hot Wheels model will include a steering wheel. They will both be equipped with children's software from Mattel. How forward-thinking, to reposition a computer as a crossover to the toy market! How uncool to further the sexual stereotypes!
> CoDesigning?
Do you share what you know, or do you protect it? This is always an issue in business, but for some in design, the view of it as an essentially individual creative activity has come under question. Now, for some, design is being viewed, studied and developed in groups.
The CoDesigning 2000 conference aims to report on the current issues and perspectives in the practice of design as a group process. If you are exploring design as a collective, collaborative, or even community process then your work is of interest to CoDesigning 2000. For further information visit the CoDesigning 2000 web site at:
http://dougal.derby.ac.uk/drc/co-design
> ISaloni, the Milan Furniture Fair, Now Represented in New York
design marketing firm founded by George Beylerian, has just announced an affiliation with the Milan Furniture Fair. With the firm's Executive Vice President, Michele Caniato, he will be fielding all American inquires concerning the fair. Beylerian is the founder of the Material Connexion new materials library in New York. iSaloni is at:
Culture & Commerce Inc.,
4, Columbus Circle
NY, NY 10019 212 445 8860
E-mail: bp@interport.net
> When Design Rocked San Francisco
Get ready for November, when curator Aaron Betsky's exhibition, "Far Out: Bay Area Design, 1967-1973," will open at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Not only posters from the music scene, but furniture, clothing and jewelry will be on view. It's the perfect love-bug cultural moment to have an object-based review of sixties style, and with Jefferson Airplane posters and jewel-encrusted roach clips setting the tone, this will be where to tune in.
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