Hasta La Creative!

Agency Spy points to the “fascist regime” north of the border that would dare to limit Crackberry addictions among its workforce.

According to Newswire.ca, Frank Palmer, chairman and CEO of DDB Canada, has issued a new company-wide policy that discourages staff from using their PDAs and other mobile devices, like BlackBerries and cellular phones, during both client and internal meetings.

Inspired by the penalty system used in soccer games, DDB Canada staff will be issued yellow or red cards for PDA misconduct that ultimately may lighten their pocketbooks via a system of fines.

“Over the past year, I’ve become increasingly aware of and annoyed by staff who use their BlackBerries during meetings,” says Palmer. “Whether it’s done openly or covertly under the table, using a PDA during a meeting is completely unacceptable, disrespectful and hinders the progress of the meeting. While these devices are considered time-savers, they’re also extremely intrusive.”

DDB isn’t acting alone. Recently, Canada’s Department of Citizenship and Immigration banned employees from using their BlackBerries between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m. in an attempt to reduce work stress.

Aaaaages ago, when the ‘pc on every desktop’ meme still had to be dreamed of and DOS wasn’t coded yet, a company named the Philco-Ford Corporation launched a pretty foreseeing prototype video of the technology they would see arrive in the homes of people. Philco-Ford was funny enough an aeronautical company, but the devices they’ve placed in the living room or in dad’s home office look a lot like the ones you’d see in the early Bond movies. Despite the age of the movie, things like online shopping, home surveillance, automated backups and online payments were already being discussed. The movie is estimated to be of 1967. Enjoy the flashback.

Video: Digital Life in 1967

via

One step better than Google Street View is EveryScape which allows users to actually go inside buildings. It’s a nice fusion of Google Street View and Google Local in a way – which I suppose is really the best way for a company to develop an idea better than a Google idea: put two of […]

I’ve seen a few campaigns that use the web and mobile interaction but none as engaging as this example. LMFM have created a site for an upcoming book 3 Para that marries film, a mobile application and a voice recognition system, so you dictate what action the soldiers take. Since I’m not in the UK […]

We’ve all seen a touch-screen. But now it’s the turn for a touch-screen scanner that, oddly enough, records the content of an object from the face that we see, not the machine. I think there must be some sort of special camera installed on the ceiling above.
 
The part with the moving mouse is specially cool.
 
Via: ComputerLove.

I posted about this technology a few months ago. This online application allows users to upload an image and resize it dynamically. The image will lose only the areas of the image that are not crucial while keeping the same balance and composition no matter the proportions.
Try it for yourself.

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An interesting technology from the Australian Centre for Visual Technology called VideoTrace. You can download the paper describing the technology here

The simple models it generate are perfect for Google Earth 3D models, low poly video games and Michael Gondry film clips.

With the huge coverage multi touch screens, photosyth and other international based technology has been getting lately it’s nice to see some Aussies doing something interesting too.

The next Siggraph is in LA during August with the first Asia Siggraph being held in Singapore in December 08.

Sometimes you need to post a video online and the number of views, favorites and links doesn’t matter. What matters is quality. Youtube’s quality is a low 200kps and your video, let’s say your show reel or beautifully crafted TVC, looks awful in Youtube’s 320×240 blurry vision.

There is an alternative which offers all the community sharing aspects of Youtube but with increased quality. Not only that it supports HD. Upload a 1280×720 clip and Vimeo will auto create a small version (400×300) and allow viewers to watch the full HD footage. Here’s Vimeos HD FAQ which explains more.

Users have the option of turning off HD at any time and load the smaller clip so bandwidth is not an issue.

Click here to see a comparison of videos on both Youtube and Vimeo.