Blogless

There’s an interesting write-up on the Brand Builder blog about the very funny case of @BPglobalPR.

If you haven’t been following along, since May 19th, someone on Twitter has been publishing updates under the @BPglobalPR handle.

Here is their very first update:

Then things get funny:

1. 20 Worst Drinks in America 2010

I like this spread on unhealthy drinks by Eat this Not That. Illustrating sugar content via equivalent stacks of cookies and donuts is a powerful visual. I’ll never look at bottled teas and water the same way again.

2. We, the users - Facebook users’ Bill of Rights

If you wanted a set of principles from which to base a code of ethics for social media, I’d say look no further than this users’ Bill of Rights from the San Francisco Chronicle.

3. Google Font Previewer

Google is breaking into web fonts with its new Google Font Directory and API, part of a collaboration with typekit. The selection is a little sparse at the moment, but it’s great to think that we might have some more cross-browser fonts (as long as Google’s servers are up).

The font previewer interface is nice, but it bugs me that the new fonts aren’t properly anti-aliased in Windows. Until that gets ironed out (if it can be, as I think it’s an OS problem), I’m not sure it’s worth designing websites around them.

4. 10 Golden Principles of Successful Web Apps

We’re very early into developing a web application, so I found this article and video helpful for wrapping my head around the mindset that accompanies these things. It covers the gamut from technology to branding and marketing with a few insights I hadn’t considered before.

Everyday our mailboxes are flooded with unsolicited offers of porn material, pirate software, viagra, illegal financial services and advice on women seduction: if this is annoying for the average user, we really love it. A quick glance at the spam mailbox always provides fresh inspiration: bizarre subjects guides us in the quest for the definitive answer to fundamental humans’ problems. But the crisis is striking and we must recycle. So, instead of sweeping spam under the carpet, we decided to save some junk-mail in order to turn it into a wallpaper for your house before it’s too late: someday a brilliant scientist will find the definitive solution to eradicate from the web the bittersweet pleasure of spam.

As one who delights in occasionally mining the spam folder for bizarre treasures, I just love this project. See ToDo’s Flickr gallery and project page.

Via.

Via.

Check out this delightful Flickr set, in which Lars Willem Veldkampf asks, “what are your font choices saying about you?”

Some choice numbers:

In the 1980s, video cassette technology made it possible for “mobile cinema” operators in Ghana to travel from town to town and village to village creating temporary cinemas. The touring film group would create a theatre by hooking up a TV and VCR onto a portable generator and playing the films for the people to see.

Cujo (Lewis Teague, 1983)

In order to promote these showings, artists were hired to paint large posters of the films (usually on used canvas flour sacks). The artists were given the artistic freedom to paint the posters as they desired - often adding elements that weren’t in the actual films, or without even having seen the movies. When the posters were finished they were rolled up and taken on the road (note the heavy damages). The “mobile cinema” began to decline in the mid-nineties due to greater availability of television and video; as a result the painted film posters were substituted for less interesting/artistic posters produced on photocopied paper.

Terminator 2 (James Cameron, 1991)

This is via, and see more here.

1. Display Myths Shattered

Everything you thought you knew about monitor specs and controls is wrong. Seriously.

2. Watch out for Cramming

This week, I learned about Cramming, which sounds a lot like the Opt-out schemes we’ve covered in the past. The scam depends on people not paying attention to false charges hidden in their phone bill. Except with cramming, you don’t even have agree to anything! Read on…

3. The Lie of the Game Preview

Ars makes a valid point: When have you ever read a negative preview for a game? Never. Everything developers show journalists is tightly controlled. Of course it looks good!

4. Web Design Trends: 2010

Smashing Magazine published its annual list of the year’s trends in web design. It’s worth a look to see what’s new (and what’s tired).