The biggest stories of our time, visualized

Thanks PG for forwarding this link!

View screenshots of infographics from David McCandless’ book titled “The Visual Miscellaneum” on this link – “Fastcompany.com Slideshow.” From what I’ve seen, it looks great and I’ve added it to my shopping cart!

What is Information?

The opening line says it all, “Do you know what information is?”

It was an eye opener and having watched the video, I can say that I have a brand new lens with which I can view the world.

If you liked the above video and want to see/read more, I urge you to read the blog post from Maya.com -
“http://www.maya.com/the-feed/what-is-information-architecture” and also watch the video they made about Architecture.

The History of the Internet

So far, this is my favourite example of pictorial communication language in action. 

Watch this movie by Melih Bilgil outlining the history of the internet. According to the blog, the history of the internet is told using the **PICOL icons on picol.org , which will be available for download soon (as of 02/16/2009). 

You can also view this video on http://blog.picol.org

**PICOL is an project for providing free and open icons for electronic devices. The project’s aim is to find a common pictorial language for electronic communication.

Elizabeth Gilbert on Creativity

“Eat, Pray, Love” Author Elizabeth Gilbert muses on the impossible things we expect from artists and geniuses — and shares the radical idea that, instead of the rare person “being” a genius, all of us “have” a genius. It’s a funny, personal and surprisingly moving talk.

Garr Reynolds on Presentation

For those of you who have read Garr’s book on presentation, some of the contents of this video might be repetitive. Never the less, it is a good watch and worth your time if you are looking for thoughts around better presentation and how to avoid the common phenomenon ‘Death by PowerPoint’!

Productivity: Managing BIG problems!

I re-read a beautiful quote recently and thought that I would share it on my blog, especially because of the management lesson it holds.

The quote echoes from the Mines of Moria in Tolkien’s, “The Lord of the Rings”. In it the lead character, Frodo discouragingly voices to his friend and mentor Gandalf about the gigantic responsibility that he is faced with and wishes that it had never come to him.

Gandalf takes a pause and replies,

“So do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to
decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given
to us.”

Drawing parallels in our daily work and personal lives as well, we sometimes find ourselves in situations where we are not sure about a course of action or are overwhelmed by a challenging goal that is seemingly unattainable and are tempted to despair. In our minds, the fear of failure is so overwhelming that we tend to magnify the issue many fold.

I’ve been in this situation on a few occasions and have found that observing the fundamentals of a problem and then breaking it down into smaller manageable chunks really helps bring out solutions that I wouldn’t have otherwise thought about.

The other wisdom in that quote is the aspect of prioritizing. By simply ranking the many tiny pieces in a problem and taking care of each one in its order of importance is in itself a de-stressing experience.

What about you? What are your thoughts?

Design is never done

‘Design is never done’ is my favourite message from industrial designer, Yves Behar in his video presentation. I value this video for the insights he provides into great product design. Click the link below to view the presentation hosted on TED.com.

Yves Behar: On designing objects that tell stories

Visual and Creative Thinking

This slideshow is ultimately about great communication and why it is so important in our lives. Tell me, did you see the same thing?

Bangalore carpool

For everyone who hasn’t seen the Bangalore Traffic Authority’s online carpooling initiative, please visit –  http://www.btis.in/carpool.htm.

You can easily sign up to offer or use routes that match your specifications. Go for it!

Start

Writing a blog’s first post is pretty much like standing alone in your cubicle after office hours with your hands on your hips hollering, “Hey guys, I have something to say! (no response) It’s really insightful. (silence) .. Is anybody listening? (silence).”

‘How about if I throw in a few lovely samba dancers?”