Art: Spiral of Michael Jackson
Work: 10 basic productivity tricks
Web: Etherpad, real time sharable writing board
Green: almost waterless washer…or 90% less water
Read: How industries Fail by Michael Nielson
Architecture: really cool large cube space.
Art+Design: Space Jello mold competition
Fun: Airplane toilet trick video
Odd: Fish with human like teeth
Style: Neat floors

Waterproof bags have always been popular in protecting your goodies from getting soaked. Taking it a step further is Timbuk2 and their new Dolore Chiller bag ($110) that not only prevents water from coming in but also keeps it from going out, hence making a pretty nifty bag that also acts as a summer Cooler holding some 20 drinks with ice and a bottle opener on the side.

Sometimes doing the opposite makes something better.  I recall a story about kayak shoes, where previous shoes prevented water from getting in, but the problem was that once some water got in it was really hard to get out. So Puma took a flip side and said, hey, let’s make a shoes that lets water in really easily which will let it out easily, hence the puma k1 shoes!

via coolhunting

It’s about time crayon like children scribbles made it into the tattoo world thanks to artist Yann Travaille at YourMeatISMine.com! Very simple, fun, and clean.

His work reminds me a bit of our good friend Sam at ExplodingDog.com.

via neatorama

I’ve seen clouds, real clouds, and web clouds, but I’ve never see cardboard clouds, created by Fantastic Norway,  which give a pixelated environment of brown clouds which looks pretty awesome in a huge warehouse space. If you have a huge space to do something, go make cardboard clouds! Reminds me a bit of the styrofoam robots!

More pics after he jump!
via core77

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I think I’m going to require any cool space to have Super Sized Stuffed Animal Dolls by Florentijn Hofman from now on, which is on exhibit at Galerie West in The Hague (The Netherlands).

About the show:
“Dushi: A solo show inspired by the toys and (cuddle)sculptures of children, where the change of scale completely changes their function and feeling. ”

Whenever I see a large room with space to fill, I’m going to think it needs a super sized stuffed animal to jump onto.

via todayandtomorrow
source: florentijnhofman

more pics after the jump!
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A convenient  wall of outlet plugs. I’d prefer an inductive wall with magnetic plugs! Anyhow, this beats finding the darn outlet each time hidden beind everything… though I’d fear a flare up.

“Instead of hiding your outlets behind furniture and worrying about the mess of wires tangled behind your entertainment center, consider making an entire wall that’s nothing but outlets. Then you can artfully plug in your appliances wherever the cords look pleasing to you.”

via ironicsans

Some wise words from our favorite marketing guru of all sorts Seth Godin about a rather amusing video:

“Paul just sent over this video of a dance tribe forming spontaneously at a music festival.

My favorite part happens just before the first minute mark. That’s when guy #3 joins the group. Before him, it was just a crazy dancing guy and then maybe one other crazy guy. But it’s guy #3 who made it a movement.

Initiators are rare indeed, but it’s scary to be the leader. Guy #3 is rare too, but it’s a lot less scary and just as important. Guy #49 is irrelevant. No bravery points for being part of the mob.

We need more guy #3s.”

YawnLog (beta) simply lets you log your sleep time. Once you start using YawnLog you’ll understand your sleep time a bit more, how much sleep you get a day, week, month, or even how your sleeping patterns compare to friends, families, schools, cities, etc. Eventually these logs will be broadcast via twitter, facebook, etc, but what I’d really like is someone to figure out a smart way to auto log these sleeping patterns.. maybe connecting some sensor to your bed or pillow, alarm clock, lights, or something to automate this log.

I’ve only tested Yawnlog for a week, but it’s pretty obvious I don’t get much sleep on the weekedays, and hibernate on weekends. I do have this thought that students at art schools get much less sleep than other schools but who knows.

I’m one of those crafty types that fold the paper sleeve you get with chopsticks in a restaurant to make a neat little stand to rest the sticks on, though usually I’ll get lazy and just fold the sleeve a few times. We’ll, if your one that likes disposable chopsticks, but want something a bit more clever, simple, and fun, check out these Bambu SnapStix which add an extra cut on the back end of the chopsticks which snap off to become a stand. sweet!

You can get them for about $2 each.

Moq7 introduces the world to some pretty clever projects such as the Brush and Rinse fountain toothbrush before they become real. The idea is to expose great ideas to the world and let them decide if it’ll ever make it out to the real market by reaching an MOQ (Minimum Order Quantity). An MOQ is needed before a manufacture will actually produce that specific product for a given cost. The more (thousands) orders, the lower the cost.

The benefit to Moq7 is that early purchasers act like supporters, where an early order will get you the real product for a great price, but also help reach the MOQ minimum allowing them to hopefully manufacture many more to retailers around the world.

Give Moq7 a look, check out some cool concepts, and submit any ideas you have. It’s very similar to Threadless in the sense that people submit ideas, people place orders, and once a certain order amount is made by the thousands of other people in the world, it becomes real, and people are happy.

We help manufacturers meet their concept product MOQ’s by offering consumers the opportunity to pre-order next generation goods at closeout prices in a concerted effort to boost innovation and create jobs.

MOQ (Minimum Order Quantity) is the number of units that must be manufactured in order for a product to be produced and sold at a reasonable price – high volume / low cost.  We pre-sell items prior to production to help manufacturers raise the start-up capital they need to produce the item.   The sale price is further reduced for our buyers to reward them for placing orders prior to production.

All money is refunded should we fail to meet the manufacturer’s MOQ.  The numbers of units sold and the respective MOQ’s are listed with each concept product on this website.”

If you’re not familiar with Ideablob, it’s a pretty simple, but brilliant, concept. Participants (or blobbers, as they’re called) post an idea, and the ideablob community votes for what they think is the best. Winners receive, in addition to the prestige of being a champion blobber, 10,000 seed capital towards the development of their idea, and there’s a new winner every month. Simple, but brilliant.

This month, we’re proud to announce our friend Sami Nerenberg is a finalist with her idea, Room by Room! Room by Room is an eco-home redecorating reality show for low-income housing where ten inner-city high school students will participate in six weeks of eco-design bootcamp for a chance to win a health home make-over. Sami is brilliantly talented and incredibly motivated, serving as the youngest adjunct faculty at RISD (where she’s also an alumn), a member of Grain Design, a Timberland Earthkeeper Hero, and an all around awesome person. She’s got tough competition (including Paul Polak, who we also love), but with the Brown University’s Community Environmental College behind them, the Majora Carter Group as their media consultant, Timberland as their publicity outlet, RISD as their cohorts,we think they’re in good shape.

You can vote for Sami and see the Room by Room preview here!

A classic foundation project that occurs at RISD during one’s freshmen year is making a chair with no glue or cuts with only folds using 1 large sheet of corrugated cardboard, and bonus points for including a table of some sort.

The above video is a result of Danny Kim’s quick exploration on this project. There are a few more online if you dig around, but I’ve always wondered why such great projects like his never make it to market even if using a different material? Cost, manufacturing, longevity, uniqueness, business, too creative, market.  Maybe I’ll just make a few for my house.