Hasta La Ideas

The last time we looked at a suitcase redesign, it proved to be a smash success:
The Trunkster was seeking $50,000 in crowdsourced funding and netted nearly
$1.4 million. There is an opportunity for designers here. More folks are
traveling than ever, and more folks are growing dissatisfied with the design of
their luggage.

This month Japanese design firm Nendo throws their hat into the ring with the Kame.
Designed for Italian luggage brand Fabbrica Pelletterie Milano, the Kame
(that’s Japanese for “tortoise”) opts for a hybrid approach to
materials, going with the standard polycarbonate for the body for rigidity…

…but switching over to fabric for the lid.

Why? Well, in addition to the fabric having a bit of “give” if you need to
throw that extra sweater in there, they’ve re-thought what the prime
functionality of a suitcase’s lid should be. Most luggage manufacturers see the
lid as prime real estate for small-item storage. The trade-off is that a
loaded-down lid becomes unwieldy to open. Nendo’s design approach realizes that
end-users often access the inside of their baggage while on-the-go, so they’ve
eschewed the lid-as-storage principle in favor of creating something more
innovative.

The soft,
segmented lid can unfurl open on two different axes, depending on how the
zipper is undone:

In Nendo’s words,

The lids of most hard suitcases are heavy to open and close, because they’re also
used for storage, but this suitcase is easy to open and close by rolling the
lid to the side.

Unlike most suitcases, the lid unzips from the top as well as the side, making it easy
to take things in and out of the suitcase when it’s upright. It also rolls up
neatly so that the suitcase can be opened even in tight spaces like cars and
crowded, busy corridors. The rolled-up lid can be fastened with an elasticised
band which doubles as a fastener for the suitcase itself when not in use. The
inside lining comes with two mesh pockets and is easily configurable for
contents of different volumes.

Another nice design touch is that you can use the cable lock to shackle the suitcase to
something immobile, which would come in handy in crowded urban areas when you
need to make a phone call or deal with some other distraction and don’t want
your bag to walk off.

And
on the micro level, I’m loving these zipper pulls—I want to reach into the
photo and touch them. 

Debuting tonight on UK TV channel ITV, The Mafia with Trevor McDonald sounds like a firecracker of a two-part series.

The award-winning veteran reporter has been doing a bunch of press ahead of tonight’s debut, and in each case, he has no shortage of colorful production details to talk about. Here for example is a snippet from McDonald’s conversation with Hello! magazine:

“I got a little worried when we were driving through Little Italy in New York with a gangster called Mikey Scars and he saw some guys who have a warrant on his life,” McDonald said.

The 75-year-old, who has spent over 50 years working in journalism and news presenting, added: “I just didn’t ever for one moment think that any kind of remnants of his past associations would be still around, which shows how little imagination I have! But it was a slightly disconcerting moment and I was scared because he seemed concerned.”

Testimony provided in court by Scars, a.k.a. Michael DiLeonardo, helped lead to the conviction of more than 80 members of the Gambino family. When Trinidad native McDonald retired from full-time TV journalism in 2008, he had accumulated more awards than any previous British news broadcaster.

Comically, he told newspaper the Herts and Essex Observer that meeting mafia types was not nearly as scary as his newsman debut:

“I was wetting myself with anxiety over that one!” confesses the veteran news broadcaster, laughing.

For The Nation‘s 150th Anniversary Issue, David Corn has taken a pungent stroll down memory lane, back to 1987 and the congressional investigation into the Iran-Contra scandal.

The picture painted by Corn, who had swooped into D.C. at the beginning of that year, is half-recognizable. There was no Internet, but then as now, many reporters were lazy.

Corn’s Washington correspondent predecessor, I.F. Stone, had counseled him to: “Stay to the end of any congressional hearing you attend and read everything.” He did just that, accepting handouts after many colleagues had left the chamber and reading them late into the evening:

Those papers were often treasure maps for stories untold by the hearings – journalistic gold. One document referred to [Oliver] North possibly signing up mercenaries fresh out of jail. (A committee staffer told me that a British mercenary recruited by North may have accidentally blown up a Nicaraguan hospital.) Another indicated that North and Admiral John Poindexter, who had been Reagan’s national security adviser, had plotted to sink a ship carrying weapons to Nicaragua.

I learned that the Justice Department had determined that CIA assets in Central America had committed “fraud” by using U.S. funds earmarked for humanitarian assistance to purchase weapons. High-ranking Justice Department officials monitored – and probably leaned on – a Miami-based federal investigation into Contra gunrunning. And the Customs Service had killed a federal probe of a White House–sanctioned but secret (and likely illegal) sale of high-tech speedboats to the Contras. In other words, there were sub-scandals and side scandals galore. But consumers of the major news outlets were not told any of this.

There’s also from Corn, currently Washington bureau chief for Mother Jones, some insightful further examples of how he tried to avoid following the D.C. reporter pack, as well as a recollection of how an alt-weekly reporter’s legit question one day was greeted by a sneer from the New York Times end.
 
[Cover image via: thenation.com]

Are you still sending out your resume as a word doc rather than a PDF or trying to hide gaps in employment by experimenting with format (skills-based resume, anyone)? While the reasons you’re chosen or not for an interview can remain a mystery, the resume mistakes that will dampen your chances aren’t.

One thing to keep in mind is the perspective of your potential employer, who may be sifting through hundreds of applications. Make your resume accessible and easy to understand, because the likelihood is that the hiring manager won’t have the time to decipher a poorly formatted resume. Plus, there are other ways to prove a gap isn’t a big deal:

Sometimes resume experts suggest using skill-based formatting to hide employment gaps. However, recruiter [Aimée] Starck urges applicants to just be honest. “They’re going to get to the bottom of it regardless, so I would be up front about it,” she says, whether [the gaps are] due to family obligations, illness or unemployment.

Employers do want to make sure you’re not out of the loop, so be sure to stay informed about your industry. “It’s important to… make sure that if you’re trying to get back into the industry that you can talk intelligently about [trends],” says Starck.

For more, read: 7 Red Flags on Your Resume — and How to Fix ‘Em Fast

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As it’s made from 100% French flax linen, bedding from Australia’s Scottie Store is not only ultra-comfortable, but far more breathable than other sheets due to its loose weave. Available in Queen or King, these chambray and stone-colored sheets will……

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