Hasta La Ideas

As any successful high school debater can tell you, the faster you speak, the more you can say. And yet branding guru Nathan Reddy of GRID managed to speak at a reasonable pace in his Pecha Kucha presentation at this year’s Design Indaba Expo, the curated showcase of South African design that coincides with the annual Design Indaba Conference in Cape Town. For the uninitiated, Pecha Kucha (Japanese for the sound of conversation) challenges presenters to make their case with 20 images, each of which is shown for 20 seconds each. In the video posted below, Reddy shows you how it’s done, as he reviews seven brands developed by GRID, including Virgin Mobile, Converse, and South Africa—the brand. But don’t let those stunning images fool you. “Branding,” notes Reddy, “is not just about pretty pictures.”

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(Photo: Steve Bartel)

Brandishing a whip and clad in gold lame pants, mediabistro.com founder Laurel Touby reprised her ringmistress role as she welcomed hundreds of media types to the second annual Mediabistro Circus, which kicked off today at the TimesCenter in New York City. The theme of this year’s media-meets-technology confab, explained Touby, is “Extraordinary Impact: Do More with Less.” The focus of the doing? Data, data, and more data, according to many of the day’s speakers. But don’t count out design.

“Data is king,” said self-promoter extraordinaire Timothy Ferriss, who lives to generate buzz and deduce ways to prolong visitors’ stays on his many websites. “The big idea, the one big bet favored by Madison Avenue, is not only irrational, it’s also expensive.” For Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Workweek (now in its forty-first printing in the United States, he noted), technology and social media offer ways to constantly analyze, adjust, and re-analyze everything, from how to create a successful blog post (aim for evergreen content, omit dates, people enjoy watching short and ideally incomplete videos about how to peel hard-boiled eggs) to how to sell a book (try for the least crowded-channel: face-to-face communication). Thanks to Google analytics, crowdsourcing, and click patterns, life is one long beta-test.

Where does this leave publishing? In flux, according to “From Gutenberg to Movable Type,” a panel discussion ably moderated by Dan Costa, executive editor of PCMag.com. Panelist Eileen Gittins, founder and CEO of Blurb, the self-publishing company, is a believer in the power of branding to best communicate with niche markets. “Gone are the days when you have to guess who your audience is,” she said of Blurb’s print-on-demand model, which eliminates warehousing and adds a new agility to publishing. “Books no longer need to be static things, where you print one—kerplunk—and then maybe come back later with a second edition. Books can now be the starting point of communication.”

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How much modern design-themed fun can you squeeze into a weekend? Find out next month in Los Angeles when our friends at Dwell host the three-day design extravaganza that is Dwell on Design (the cool kids refer to it as DOD, not to be confused with the Department of Defense). Among the attractions: an exhibition, home tours, a movie night, and a design conference featuring keynote speaker Daniel Pink. UnBeige editor emertius Alissa Walker has been writing up a storm about DOD on Dwell‘s website and recently interviewed Pink. The author, design advocate, and manga fan—who is himself in the throes of a Dwell-style home renovation—gave Alissa a sneak preview of his DOD talk, which will address motivation and creativity. “The people and the organizations that really flourish prize autonomy, the sense of doing something out of self-direction rather than being pushed by somebody else—the sense of mastery, which is the desire to get better and better and better at something, and also the sense of purpose, which is about doing something that outlasts yourself, in the service of a cause larger than oneself,” said Pink. “And in a lot of ways these three keys to true motivation are embodied by architects and designers very strongly.” Flattery will get you everywhere, Mr. Pink, and special codes will get UnBeige readers discounted tickets to DOD. We’ve posted them after the jump.

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All work and no play makes for a dull design conference, and so the decidedly non-dull folks at LVHRD set out to plan a “non-conference.” They redoubled their efforts in the wake of Rick Poynor‘s stirring call to arms (“Design Conferences: Isn’t in Time We Demanded More?“) published last year in Creative Review. “After reading [that] article…our team at LVHRD knew that if we were going to throw a non-conference it was going to have to be really heavy on the non and pretty light on the conference,” notes the LVHRD website. “And that’s exactly what we’ve set up.” The event, dubbed WRK/PLY, takes place this Saturday in New York City, and tickets (or TCKTS, as the case may be) are available here.

What to expect? Seven hours, six speakers, and one open bar. “I’m a little nervous, honestly, and excited,” said LVHRD co-founder Doug Jaeger, a panelist at this evening’s New Frontiers of Graphic Design panel discussion. “I don’t really know what’s going to happen. And that’s a good thing.” The WRK/PLY speakers were chosen for their success in blending play into their work lives, which involve everything from architecture to music: dress code (architecture and design), Chris Rubino (art and photography), Steve Hindy (culture and lifestyle), Gavin McInnes (media and technology), 88-Keys and Izza Kizza (music and performance), Rebecca Turbow (fashion and style). Added Jaeger, “I’m describing it as four years of college squeezed into one day.”

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media

One of the best conferences of the year occurs without much fanfare (but with plenty of sartorially astute attendees) at the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, helmed by the extraordinary Valerie Steele. This year’s two-day fashion symposium takes place on Friday and Saturday—a bit earlier in the year than usual but perfect timing for those in New York City for Fashion Week. In conjunction with the museum’s current “Gothic: Dark Glamour” exhibition, the symposium will feature designers, musicians, photographers, authors, and curators who will discuss fashion and subcultural style.

Among the featured speakers are Steele, Goth historian Mick Mercer, artist and writer Jane Wildgoose (who designed the costumes for for Clive Barker‘s horror film, Hellraiser), and Tokyo street style authority Tiffany Godoy. We can’t wait to begin our Valentine’s Day with historian Peter McNeil, who will give a talk entitled, “The Prince of Wales: Last of the Dandies or the First Sub-Culturalist?” (Stop, you’re both right!). Rounding out the agenda is a Saturday afternoon discussion between designer and rock/goth design pioneer Anna Sui and Andrew Bolton. Thanks to support from the Coby Foundation, the event is free to all students. Non-students can register at the door on Friday morning: get there about 15 minutes early, Goth getups optional.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media