Although Dell has historically been known for their inexpensive, basic, desktop PCs, they seem to be giving Apple a run for its money with their new line of “green” products called “Studio Hybrid.” I was actually pleasantly surprised by the product design and overall consideration that went into the development the machines. I’m not sure how “green” those colorful plastic sleeves could be, but according to Dell, the new machines use 70% less power than a typical desktop machine.

This is an amusing new online campaign running for Microsoft Windows; kind of a “we’ve substituted your normal operating system for Folger’s Crystals” approach.

I can imagine it would be a challenging and unusual brand problem for a any company to take on Apple, let alone combat the sort of negative PR that has been generated by Microsoft itself over the past 10+ years.

http://www.mojaveexperiment.com/

Sample of Attik’s original ads for the EV1 (never aired).

GM:

Instead of looking like an also-ran by pursuing another attempted battery powered electric car (see below), break away from the pack and own more fuel-efficient vehicles. Your heritage is not Toyota’s. Evidence suggests American’s are not willing to spend what it would cost to make electric car viable. There is a strong case to be made for fuel efficiency and diesel fuel, which no American manufacturer has seriously owned. 

I heard a news anchor this morning on Good Morning America state that GM was working towards creating their first electric car, the Chevy Volt. What wasn’t reported was that GM created a production electric vehicle, introduced in 1996; available in California and Arizona. They were discontinued in 1999 and removed from the road in 2003.

Why did they kill a car which is now being heralded as a way to revive the brand and lead us towards fuel efficency?

From Wikipedia:

“In late 2003, GM officially canceled the EV1 program. Despite unfulfilled waiting lists and positive feedback from the lessees, GM stated that it could not sell enough of the cars to make the EV1 profitable. In fact, during the later stages of development for the car, GM officials claimed that they stood no chance of ever making a profit on the EV1 itself.”

From GM’s website:

“We are the guys that developed and launched EV1, the first modern-day electric vehicle, back in 1996. We are also the guys that devoted tremendous resources to design, engineer, and market this vehicle. Although the technical innovation and marketing efforts behind the EV1 were unparalleled, only 800 people were willing to lease the EV1. Yes, the EV1 quickly became the worldwide benchmark for electric vehicles, but its timing wasn’t quite right. When GM launched the EV1, gas was cheap, there wasn’t a war in Iraq, and there was less discussion about global warming. There were far fewer reasons for people to make the trade-offs in their transportation lifestyle to make the EV1 work for them.”

One of the primary issues for killing the car was battery technology:

“The EV1 has been called a failure by business publications such as the Wall Street Journal.[26] GM believes that the electric car venture was not a failure, and that the EV1 was doomed when the expected breakthrough in battery technology did not take place.[27] In fact, the NiMH battery packs (or Ovonic Battery) that were expected to dramatically improve range came with their own set of problems; GM had to use a less-efficient charging algorithm (lengthening charge times) and waste power on air conditioning to prevent the battery packs from overheating.[28]”

Much to my surprise, I learned that hybrid technology was also tested in 1999, but GM concluded that commercial viability was out of reach. From a business perspective, what a chronic misstep on the part of GM to kill its electric and hybrid prototypes. None of which is reported when we hear discussions of the prototype electric vehicle.

However, GM proposes to use a lithium ion battery in its Chevy Volt, slated for 2010. This type of battery, found in laptops, cellular phones and other consumer electronics also have their disadvantages.

From Wikipedia:

“Under certain temperature conditions, the batteries have a tendency to become damaged and can sometimes never fully recharge again. In certain situations where the temperature is too cold (below the recommended battery temperature) the battery will still hold its charge but cannot be recharged as a result of the cold temperature.

Li-ion batteries are not as durable as nickel metal hydride (NiMH - the battery GM had originally used for the EV1 vehnicle) or nickel-cadmium designs and can be extremely dangerous if mistreated. They are usually more expensive.”

It remains to be seen wether this vehicle will bring the true benefits and end gasoline dependency as GM and the various news media tout.

Via Pentagram:

Luke Hayman and Radar design director Kate Elazegui have collaborated on the redesign of Radar magazine that launches with the July/August issue, currently on newsstands. The current iteration, its third, launched in 2007, and it also publishes a popular website, RadarOnline. The stops and starts of the magazine left its look largely up for grabs, and the brief for the redesign was tricky.

Radar’s focus is somewhat similar to Vanity Fair—celebrity mixed with serious journalism—but unlike VF, it is not part of the establishment, and its tone is humorous, mocking and more than a little absurd. At the same time it has broken substantial investigative stories (“Gangs of Iraq”) and was nominated for a National Magazine Award for general excellence in 2008.

This mix of the serious, the savvy and the superficial presented a challenge for the designers. For inspiration Hayman and his team looked at legendary anti-establishment publications from the 1960s and 70s: the countercultural newspaper The East Village Other; the satirical magazines Private Eye and Oz; and the classic Nova that successfully combined pop culture, politics and fashion.

The resulting look is antic, fun and flexible enough to accommodate all sorts. Typographically the magazine is bizarre and eclectic, using a varied collection of fonts to create a madcap spirit. Cooper Black is employed for its Pop touch; FF Elementa, a typewriter font, for its ephemeral immediacy and implied journalistic integrity. Plantin is used for the text font and in bold condensed for headlines. Layouts make use of more straight illustration and information graphics, along with the outrageous photo composites the magazine is known for.

The Houston Fence is a temporary outdoor installation on chain-link fences inspired by QR code barcode patterns. These bar codes, when scanned with a mobile phone, allow pedestrians to seamlessly connect to online content such as web sites, blogs and others.

Meant to be read in different scales and speeds (pedestrian, cars, bikes, etc) the two sided fence uses put-in cups as ‘pixels’ to create a permeable pattern. This pattern partially fills in the sixty chain link fences set up alongside Houston Street as safety barriers of the Houston corridor reconstruction project.

The installation, occupying four corners, seeks to identify each segment with color codes that relate to the site, the traffic and the city. Shades of green, yellow, blue and orange will mutate with the progress of the construction site.

The project was built as a result of a commission to improve fences put in place for a major street infrastructure construction project. It is located at the intersection of Broadway and Houston in New York City, a crossroads notorious for its heavy traffic.

Via: Aboud Sodano