I was walking around Cape Town and spotted a bit of chalk graffiti on a building and thought it was pretty cool. I then spotted the same thing on the pavement and then saw it all over the place.
It was a clever little marketing campaign by Puma.

The use of imagery allowed for their message to be translated by almost anyone into their own language and gives the vibe that the World Cup is near.

Twitter just added notifications like you see on Facebook… will save you from having to click refresh or home all the time.

A little Perspective (Digg, Twitter and Facebook)
A great short piece on how these three mega online brands hold up today by Michael Arrington of TechCrunch.

Seth Rotheram from 2Oceansvibe.com was treated to an advanced driving course at Killarney recently. I’m going to spend the day there in 2 weeks for a F1 race day.

VW and drivers say good-bye to the iconic Citi Golf after providing 25 years of getting you from A to B at a very reasonable price.

Last week, at Facebook’s “roadmap edition” of the Facebook Developer Garage, the company announced a series of large changes to the Platform (19 to be exact). Today, the company just released an FBML Bookmark button, and posted a few more details on the new “Counter” API.

Yet while Wave has had momentum as a consumer tool (people are still clamoring for Google Wave invites), its viability as a business tool has been questioned. Will businesses really adopt Wave as a way to communicate collaboratively and share business docs?

Textures have become more popular and been put to greater use in recent years. They’re not limited to Web design either; textures of all kinds are used in print design, illustration, traditional art, TV commercials… you name it! Texture is one of the best ways to add depth to your design, whether it’s subtle noise on a clean vector illustration or a lot of grunginess throughout a layout.

How To Persuade Your Users, Boss or Clients

Web designers often have to nudge people in the direction they want them to go. It is a vital skill they all have to learn. We’re not talking about manipulation. Underhanded techniques, and certainly lying, won’t get you anywhere. But you can present yourself and your arguments in ways that make people more receptive.

Idea Paint

A lot of companies are born out of brainstorming sessions. IdeaPaint, however, might be the first company that set out to improve them. As a freshman in Babson College‘s entrepreneurship program, founder John Goscha would often hang large pieces of paper on his dorm walls, creating a makeshift canvas where he and his classmates could sketch out their business ideas.

Bit.ly eating other URL shorteners for breakfast

Last month, Bit.ly surpassed TinyURL to become the Web’s most popular URL shortener. This month, the story is about separating from the pack.

Google Wave, The Fuss Explained In Animation

Google Wave is a real-time communication platform, which mashes together the functionality of email, instant messaging, wikis, web chat, social networking, and project management into one application.

Future phones dazzle with design

Some interesting new concept phones made an appearance this week at CEATEC, the Japanese equivalent of the Consumer Electronics Show. These included a chameleon-like phone that could change its skin depending on its surroundings, a phone whose casing is made of wood and a phone with a flexible screen that can assume different configurations.

This weeks eMarketing Roundup covers some news, tips and more on Facebook, Freelancing, Top Gear, SEO and some Design Tips.

More Than Half of Employers Now Block Twitter, Facebook, MySpace

According to a new survey of 1,400 CIOs of companies with 100 or more employees, 54% now completely block employees from accessing social networking sites at work.

Freelance Contracts: Do’s And Don’ts

In the world of freelancing, the entrepreneur has to take on a number of tasks for themselves that would normally be handled by a separate department at a bigger company. Most of these tasks are not part of the creative processes that freelance workers are used to, but rather are more tedious, left-brain paperwork.

Top 10 MUST DO SEO Checklist

For each new SEO client we get, there is a list of items that we go through that are essentially the ‘basics’ of SEO. These items will help get you started off on the right foot in your SEO endeavor.

HOW TO: Integrate Facebook With Your Blog

Integrating with Facebook is a great way to get additional exposure for your content, whether you re-publish your blog content directly on Facebook, or you use something like Facebook Connect to add the Facebook login/profile experience to your own site.

The Ultimate Round-Up of Print Design Tutorials

Although web design is everywhere nowadays (even when we’re not at the computer it still manages to squeeze it’s way in to our everyday life), print design is still a huge part of the design industry and is everywhere we look: newspapers, posters, prints, manuals, restaurant menus, business cards – the list goes on and on. So how do you make sure that you leave a good impression on people holding your piece of art in their hands? This is where experience and advanced print design skills come into play.

Top Gear in America’s redneck country

Of all the hair-raising escapades in the show, being chased by murderous Alabamans was the scariest says presenter in new book

I attended the 2009 Loerie Awards in Cape Town on Friday night and was blown away. Walking down the red carpet, posing for photos and chilling in the VIE (very important ego) Lounge felt like you were at an event in Hollywood.

Jax Panik was the opening act for the Friday night awards and were incredible. From there Marc Lottering took over with ease and was a great host – he delivers those filthy jokes so well.

Awards were given to those who deserved them and there were some incredible displays of the talent that the South African creative industry holds. The after party was held in Long Street and was buzzing with intoxicated Ego’s from all over South Africa.

The winners can be found here.

For more photos and information – visit the Loeries site for Cape Town.

The Egos - via capetown.travel

Jax Panik - via capetown.travel

Very Important Egos

]]> http://www.mikemet.com/loerie-awards-photos-2009/feed/ 0 http://www.mikemet.com/weekly-roundup-mint-com-augmented-reality-and-design-tips/ http://www.mikemet.com/weekly-roundup-mint-com-augmented-reality-and-design-tips/#comments Thu, 24 Sep 2009 12:40:33 +0000 Mike http://www.mikemet.com/?p=206

10 Useful Usability Findings and Guidelines

Many studies have been done over the years on various aspects of Web and interface design, and the findings are valuable in helping us improve our work. Here are 10 useful usability findings and guidelines that may help you improve the user experience on your websites.

The Kid Behind a $170 Million Website

Aaron Patzer launched Mint.com as a user-friendly alternative to Quicken and other personal-finance software out there. Little did he know that just two years later, Intuit, which makes Quicken, would fork over $170 million for his website.

Bionic Eye: Augmented Reality on the iPhone

It’s called Bionic Eye, and it’s not entirely sure it’s legal (Apple said they’ll let developers create AR apps come September; well, September is here, but we’re not sure the embargo has been lifted), but it’s currently available in the App Store.

Enhancing User Interaction With First Person User Interface

Though many computer applications and operating systems make use of real-world metaphors like the desktop, most software interface design has little to do with how we actually experience the real world. In lots of cases, there are great reasons not to directly mimic reality.

9 Things to Do To Make Sure Your Next Blog Post is Read by More than Your Mom

Two days back I explored the myth that all you need to do is write great content on a blog for it to get readers and introduced the idea of ’seeding’ content rather than ‘forcing’ it upon readers. Today I want to take the ’seeding’ idea a step further and give a few examples of ways that you can do it…

CONFIRMED: Justin Timberlake Cast in Movie About Facebook

Variety confirms that the core cast for the upcoming David Fincher film, “The Social Network” (AKA, “The Facebook Movie”) has been set.