It's going to get mighty warm around here...

And it's not pretty. I show the previous version (up until 2009) in my design sustainability lectures, and it's compelling. This update just makes it more so, particularly for those of us in Australia, scheduled to be badly affected if predictions on global warming are near the mark.

Says it all, really

Cartoon by Clay Bennett.

The frightening thing is that this is what is happening in the world right now: society is happier continuing as normal, rather than getting up from the couch and addressing these issues in a positive way. I'm interested in how we can escape the numb brainwashed existence and live in the real, exciting world.

Some of the problem is the doom put forward by such documentaries as "An Inconvenient Truth". Once we have accepted the science, and it seems that the global paradigm has shifted in this direction, what do we do? What can we look forward to? I'm interested in developing messages promoting an exciting future, somewhat akin to the optimism of Science Fiction in the 50s and 60s. How can we make Science FACT just as thrilling?

100% of consumers are people.

A truly marvellous talk given by Simon Sinek, a highly-regarded ethnographer and member of several think tanks. It goes for 30 minutes, so make a cup of tea or whatever is your poison and settle in to either have your life and work choices reaffirmed, or changed for the better.

Power to the Poster

I came across this great site that uses designers' powers for good, not evil. Based in America, anyone can submit a poster design to the site, and anyone can download and print them. Some of them are compelling, beautiful, shocking. This is designers doing what designers should do, and has been done throughout the centuries, from the printing of Martin Luther's reformist ideas, to news of the Russian Revolution being projected through Constructivism and Agit Prop.

Which brings me back to the point that my home town has such draconian graffiti laws that it would be madness to print something like this out and paste it up. This means that in Brisbane, advertising wins. Advertising lies and consumerist propaganda are our only visual cues, and we see around 4000 of them per day.

We need to lobby council for a laneway street art area like Melbourne has, or imagine our own version, so we can stick these things up, and make our own. I want to read the people's words and visual creations, not corporations' manipulative slogans.

Grow your own solar cells?

photo: Vasant Dave (www.sxc.hu)
Amazingly clever researchers at UC Berkeley have developed a way to cajole tobacco plants into growing photovoltaic cells which can then be harvested and sprayed onto specially-receptive surfaces. Basically, grow-your-own solar cells!

The thrilling research uses a virus to reprogram the tobacco's cells into creating the tiny structures. Cheaper, biodegradable, and a much better use for the evil weed. Bravo!
read more here