• Led Zeppelin ride at new “Hard Rock Park” theme park
  The park is scheduled to open in May in Myrtle Beach, S.C. The centerpiece will be “Led Zeppelin — the Ride,” a 155-foot-tall steel roller coaster. Jimmy Page named the ride himself…some clever writing by Mr. Page to come up with that one?

Award winning artist Ken Danby died this week. I could not have recalled his name, but his painting At The Crease was iconic. I still remember seeing the print in my childhood ear doctor’s office. Post-mortem, the long-running mystery of the goalie’s identity has been cleared up.

On Tuesday nights from October 9 to November 13 I’ll be teaching a weekly two hour class, aimed at providing first-hand knowledge and training in core design research methods.

This course is part of the Involution Master Academy (an educational program for experienced professionals in design and related fields) in Sunnyvale, CA. Class size is being kept quite small to make sure that participants get significant hands-on time with instructors. Registration opens today, so sign up soon!

Full Description
This course will provide first-hand knowledge and training in core design research methods. At its root, design research emphasizes learning about people and using the insights gained to inform and inspire design. We will focus on exemplary models of what research is, what it looks like, its role in concept generation, and what it produces.

Students will develop their own design research philosophy, learn how to think about people, behavior, and culture, as well as the importance of being open to new perspectives. They will also learn tactical skills they can immediately put into practice: how to conduct observations and interviews, find research participants, and interpret and synthesize results as fodder for design and storytelling.

The schedule includes:

Week 1 – Introduction to Research
Week 2 – Methods and Research Planning
Week 3 – Problem Refinement, Interviewing & Fieldwork Planning
Week 4 – Analysis & Synthesis
Week 5 – Ideation
Week 6 – Presentation

Additional Involution Master Academy Courses:

Product Architecture Symposium
Instructor Andrei Herasimchuk
Saturday October 27, 2007
10:00 AM-6:00 PM

Strategic Influence by Design
Instructors Luke Wroblewski and Tom Chi
Saturday November 17, 2007
10:00 AM-6:00 PM

Steve just finished teaching a 6-week course in Design Research Methods.

Does this poster for Mr. Woodcock seem at all familiar?

Remember BASEketball?

• What is gazumping?
  A UK term found in housing discussions; when a seller accepts an offer from one interested party, only to accept a higher offer later on from someone else.

In honor of the start of the school year, Core77 has put together the definitive set of tips, tricks, and lifehacks for design students: Hack2School. Divided into 5 groups–Classroom, Dorm Room, Represent, Crash Course, and Cheat Sheet–everything you need to survive a design education has been hunted down, written up, and offered to you on a blue foam platter. So to all the returning students, we say “welcome back.” And to all the new ones? Well, maybe you better read this first.

Super Bonus: Guest essays from: Ralph Caplan, Alissa Walker, Alice Twemlow, Steve Portigal, Jessica Helfand, Scott Klinker, Steven Heller, Sam Montague, and Jill Fehrenbacher.

My contribution is Practice noticing stuff and telling stories.

• Cheap UK Car insurance and home insurance quotes comparison from Confused.com.
  Looks like a placeholder site, but they are actually advertising on TV for this service. Strangely amateurish logo. But mostly, the brand is rather negative. Their names represents your problem that they aim to fix. In other words, do you call your restaurant “Famished” or “Satiated”
• A Designer’s Vacation Photos
  Gagan Diesh shows some great examples of noticing stuff and making sure to tell stories about it. I may try the Paris bicycle thing next weekend.
• Dumped - Reality TV meets enviro-chic
  They’ll be living in rubbish, building rubbish, even sleeping in rubbish. Contestants don’t know that they’ll be brought to live cooperatively in a giant dump near Croydon, UK. Perhaps in the future all reality show concepts will be derived from disparate plot elements from the Simpsons.

I strolled through an interesting area south of the Thames, near the Borough Market. All the pubs had basically spilled into the streets, and people were hanging out any place they could, quite comfortable sitting amongst pylons, palettes, and rubbish, socializing in small groups with a pint of beer. It was almost shocking to see beer consumption going on “in public” as if this was somehow immoral, but that was just my outsider’s eyes.

The vibe was so positive and enthusiastic. And as I came upon the sign (see the last image) that marks the end of the area, I realized that it was a sanctioned behavior in a specific region.

• London Sep 07 - a photoset on Flickr
  I’ll be adding pictures from the next two weeks here. A few up, many more taken and not yet uploaded, many many more too be taken, no doubt!
• What’s a Fuzzy Brush
  A unique ‘all in one’ toothbrush and breath freshener, designed by dentists. All you have to do is place the soft mini toothbrush in your mouth and chew, just like a piece of gum …Whilst chewing, the natural action of the brush cleans your teeth as you manoeuvre it around your mouth. At the same time a fresh minty flavour is released from the brush to freshen your breath, which lasts for up to 20 minutes… quick, easy and very effective!