Decapitated advertising

via popurls

File this one under guerilla anti-advertising.

If you’re squeamish about bloodied, headless, bus stop advertising, DO NOT CLICK THIS LINK -->> The Decapitator Flickr set.

(I clicked it—and thought it was great!)

All Signs Say Paul Rand

I was poking around online for some inspiration (always a fun way to circle a task), and I was led, breadcrumb by breadcrumb, to this site about Rand that is the work of Daniel Lewandowski of Atlanta.

Here's what Lewandowski has to say about Paul-Rand.com:

"This site is meant to honor and pay utmost respect to the life and work of Mr. Rand. When I first began this project, I discovered that there were no “single-source” references to Mr. Rand or his works anywhere on the internet. Thus sparked the idea to build this tribute/archive site. I am in no way a philosopher or critic of design but have a great respect for the history of our industry and the people who have shaped it. In the course of building the site, I’ve been able to more greatly appreciate their thoughts and theories on design and develop my own opinions on the subject."

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There's a dearth of images in the galleries as of yet, this looks like a work in progress, but I was drawn to this page of writings and video interviews that might be of general interest to us design types.

I particularly liked the interview with Steve Jobs about working with Rand for the NEXT logo (logotype?)

Learn to type and type faster

via popurls

What does typing (as in using a QWERTY keyboard) have to do with design? Well, since computers are both the main design and communication tool for graphic designers today and the keyboard is one of two primary ways to control computers… uh… that’s what typing has to do with design.

Anyway, if you don’t know how to touch-type or you’d like to type faster, check out Learn How to Type Faster With These 8 Sites at mashable.com.

And, Happy New Year!

Everyone’s a typographer

Or, at least everyone knows what fonts are.

Since everyone and their brother (or sister) has a computer with Microsoft Word and Print Shop Pro Publisher Deluxe, we’ve all become skilled typographers, right?

Uh, no.

In an effort to educate the general Microsoft Office-using public, The Sacramento Bee offers What’s your type? (<-- This link is to the Printer version of the article, which apparently doesn’t force you to register in order to read the entire piece. You’ll have to click [Cancel] when the print dialog box comes up though.) In any case, give the article a read and get a glimpse of how the general populace views and uses fonts.

Design, Spin, and “Greenwashing”

via e-mail from Roland

Have we gone wrong, design people? The New York Times’ article, Be It Ever So Homespun, There’s Nothing Like Spin muses on the design analog of what Michael Pollan described as “supermarket pastoral”—dressing up industrially-produced certified organic foods with green meadows and happy cows so we can feel good about our food choices. And here I thought we were only supposed to use the power of design for good.

Ignore, for the moment, the debate about the benefits (or not) of Big Organic vs. the accessibility (or not) of Sustainable Agriculture. Instead, check out the There’s Nothing Like Spin article to see how design influences the hearts and minds of supermarket shoppers.

Okay, back to my Natural Cheetos.

Helvetica Soundtrack iMix

For your listening pleasure.

Ugly Colleges

via Daring Fireball

While there’s tons (literally) of construction going on around Cal, I think you’d be hard pressed to find someone who thinks the entire campus is ugly. Parts of campus? Definitely (Lower Sproul, anyone?). But the whole campus? No.

It seems like the writer of The 20 Ugliest Colleges in the USA seems to agree—Cal doesn’t appear on the list. The list is arbitrary, so take the selections with a grain of salt. I will, however, endorse the inclusion of selections 5 and 13. I’ve been to both campuses and would have been surprised if they hadn’t made the list.