Jeff Chausse
Digital Strategy + Design
Fun With Inattentional Blindness
Check out this quiz and this video. I can’t say much more without revealing the secret, but these both demonstrate how oblivious the human mind (yes, even yours) can be.
Amazing Optical Illusion
Even better than the rotating snakes, and Mr. Angry and Mrs. Calm – check out The Big Spanish Castle.
Water Bottles as Building Toys
Not only is “Y water” a healthy, organic drink for kids, the bottles become building toys when empty.
Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.
Cecropia Unveils “Personality Gaming” Demo
A while ago I posted about Cecropia, a game company which had pioneered a totally unique video game called “The Act“.
Using a simple knob, the player smoothly adjusts the silent protagonist’s personality, causing the characters around him to react accordingly. All the action takes place in ultra-smooth Disney-quality animation, with absolutely no UI elements – creating the first true interactive cartoon.
Unfortunately, Cecropia has had a real problem with “The Act” – namely, how to market it. It’s far too short to make into a console game, and the knob (which most users don’t have) is pretty much critical to the experience, which would require a special hardware investment for most people. The animation quality is far too high to package into some kind of Flash game. It really would make a perfect arcade game. Unfortunately, the market for this kind of arcade game died out in the early 90′s.
So, anyway, they’re taking their technology in a new direction, facing up to the realities of today’s gaming market, and trying their hand at interactive Flash “advergaming”. They’ve put up a demo on Cecropia.com. I won’t tell you how it works (figuring it out is part of the fun). If you’re at all involved in interactive marketing, get in touch with these guys. What they’re doing is truly groundbreaking, and they deserve a lot of attention (and money). And, who knows, maybe someday The Act will see the light of day, in some form or another.
Imagining the Tenth Dimension
OK, my mind is officially blown. Enjoy:
The Omni Future Almanac on Inflation
A while ago, I bought one of the coolest books ever – the Omni Future Almanac. The Omni Future Almanac was written in 1982, and its purpose is to describe what life will be like, well, now.
An entire blog could be devoted to the contents of this book. Sometimes it’s spot on, sometimes it’s way off, but the most interesting parts are the ones where life could easily have turned out they way they describe if a butterfly flapped its wings in just a slightly different way.
I’ve kept this book on a table in my office that I always walk by, and I’m constantly picking it up and perusing a random page. Today, it was about the effects of inflation. So, without further ado, here are the prices we’re looking at in 2010, three years from now (p. 158).
- Hamburger (1 lb.) $22.71
- Dozen Large Eggs: $18.00
- Magazine: $30.00
- Calculator: $50.00 (he he)
- Postage Stamp: $2.25
- Cup of coffee: $4.50 (OK, they kind of got that one right, in a weird way)
- Three Room Apartment Monthly Rent: $10,000
- Three Bedroom House: $1,000,000
Oh, but wait:
- Gallon of Gas: $2.00
Well, the good news is that a factory worker will be making $197,000 a year to help pay for all this stuff (p. 159).
ReQall – Way Better than Voice Memo for iPhone
As someone who often thinks up brilliant* ideas while driving, I’ve been looking for a safe way to make note of them in the car. I’ve got me this iPhone here, but it has no Voice Memo feature. Nor is it possible to leave myself a voicemail with it. (At least not without some crazy setup). What’s a guy to do?
Well, I just discovered ReQall.com, and it is way cool. Just sign up, call a special phone number and leave a message whenever the urge strikes you. They will then take that message and transcribe it to text – using actual human beings – (you can request a no-human version if you’re paranoid, though you risk set so doubling the killer delete select all).
You can then peruse your memos online later via the regular web or via a special iPhone interface.
I’m not sure how these guys make money, but there are plenty of hooks in the system for them to throw ads into. Haven’t hit them yet, though, and I’d be willing to put up with an occasional commercial message for this service – as long as they don’t affect the memo recording process.
* ideas may not be brilliant
Kickass Band Alert
The Pipettes. Yes. Listen to them.
Another Brush with Reality (TV)
I’m pretty sure I just saw Pradeep from VH1′s The Pickup Artist in a local eatery. A couple years ago I ran into “Brian W.” from Average Joe at CompUSA. In neither case did I approach the subject, but it got me thinking…
What’s the proper approach when saying hello to a reality *ahem* star? I mean, with “real” actors, even if you know they’re jerks in real life, you can ignore that fact and just say that you “loved you in [whatever]“. But with a reality TV dude, it’s just, like, “Hi, saw you in The Pickup Artist. Um. You were a jerk.”
Not that I’m saying Pradeep is a jerk. But he refused to apologize after accidentally slapping another guy in the face really hard. What’s up with that?
Perry Bible Fellowship Book
Perry Bible Fellowship is, by far, the most clever comic strip online, and now it can be obtained it in book form – woohoo!
The Perry Bible Fellowship: The Trial of Colonel Sweeto and Other Stories (Perry Bible Fellowship)