Smart Packaging

i was craving for some sweets and decided to look for recipes on the internet

and i came across this interesting thing….

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ITS PUDDING!!! or….tofu?…..

anyways! u poke the balloon packaging and out comes ur food xD

but i wondered how they got the pudding inside in the first place…

i think they use pudding powder instead…

secondly, since the package is plastic, its quite harmful to the environment

since we are going to create more waste, although, there is no argument that it is a beautiful packaging idea

My Movie Ratings + Comments :P

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

My rating : 8.5/10

Seriously, for those who thinks the movie was totally awesome, its not= =

first of all, what’s up with the transforming this time? it was very fast and unclear compared to the first movie

Transformers 1 had more of a wow response as you look at the cars transform into their walking talking form.

The 2nd movie had no storyline at all; it was all combat.

I guess its what most people(guys)  want anyways =/ but the action was great

The movie started with fighting. And….progressed with more fighting….and! it still does have its funny elements…

i think the girl got hotter than the last one lol

The ending was HORRIBLE= = maybe they ran out of money and time??TOO SHORT MAN!!

Anyways, there will definately be transformers 3: revenge of the fallen, AGAIN….

UP in 3D

My rating : 9.5/10

An extremely touching movie. It starts with a quick flash back of the main character’s life, i cried =(

On the surface its a funny animation film about the story of a man and his adventures ;

the bird was hilarious, the asian boy was random and extremely innocent and asian!!

the dog was adorable ; “i was hiding under the porch because i love u” ;

“oh please please be my prisoner” , it would be cool if dogs really could talk.

On the deeper level the moral of the story was to live your life;

as the old man flips through his wife’s adventure book, and realized that her  dream was to spend her life with him,

and the old man realized that he should start living  his life, and move on.

HANGOVER!

My Rating 8/10

my bf is SO not getting a bachelor party >=( at least not in vegas

This is the BEST “guy movie” i ever watched

Hilarious in every way, very very stupid and random

Week five Reading Response

I  like this particular phrase from this week’s lecture video:

“Charity is where the community shares interests, ideas, and goals, and communicate. Where by doing so the good feeling can last more than just a moment, and the internet makes it possible to extend that good feeling”

Web 2.0 is user-generated content that doesn’t need to go through the complicated steps of “filter, then publish”. Back then, writers had to submit their works to editors for them to be edited or rejected before their work ever gets published. Interaction of the web has changed publishing into the concept of “publish, then filter”. Participants can now express their knowledge, feelings, and opinions through their blog sites, facebook, Digg, etc, for free. In fact, we are only limited to fully understanding the new social media is that we are still living in the “Gutenberg age” where we still believe in filtering for quality, then it gets to be published. Clay Shirky in “Here comes everybody” informs that we have to learn how be our own editors, as well as filter the sources down to information that we can trust.

The media often criticize content on the internet for being unedited, for its’ low quality in writing, images, and design layout. But the Internet is actually strongly edited. Platforms like Wikipedia allows everyone to edit posts, and Instructables lets readers to tag and rate contents so the popular and featured works receives more viewers. Public sites also enables the audience who are interested in someone’s work to subscribe to their site, which draws a clear line between bloggers who blog about something worth reading, and the people who are worth ignoring. Another explanation to this can be, as artists and designers, we don’t have to read or listen to all the criticism we receive; we can filter out some of the useless comments, and just learn from the ones that are useful to us. This way, we can avoid information overload, and raise the quality of what gets read, without needing to control what gets written.

Week Four Reading Response

Internet media, along with its various platforms for collaborations, allows people to share and cooperate. Clay Shirky suggests that easy to use Web tools like Flickr and various blogging sites encourage more photographers, artists, designers, and writers to do more of what they like to do, because there is no need to go through a complicated process of publishing when everyone can be their own publisher. The Web allows artworks and ideas shared within minutes through googling and for others to learn more of what they are looking for.

The practicum this week is an example of sharing. Where we take something that someone has shared on the web and re-mix it to our liking with one or more of another thing that was shared by someone else, where again, we upload our new works onto…well any platforms, really, to share. There is no “material mutual benefit” in sharing, thus, as Shirky suggested, it is an easier and less complicated activity. It may benefit the person searching for a photograph on Flickr, but the person who uploaded the picture doesn’t expect anything in return. Cooperation is active through email, wikispace, msn, etc, where everyone input their ideas that others could add on to, and together, they end up with a brilliant idea or solution, such as the first chapter of “Here comes everybody”. Cooperation is benefitial for both sides; people want to benefit from others, therefore they try to be beneficial to others, like, of course, teamwork. But aggressiveness happens more in cooperation because of disagreement and lack of input from others.

Google maps aren’t always reliable =P

So my friend is going on an exchange to Beppu, Japan.

And she was bored and decided to Google map how to get there from Vancouver

Please take the time to look at the instructions Google map gave her…

ya, they told her to KAYAK across the Pacific Ocean

Week 3 Reading Response

In this week’s readings, Tapscott and Williams explained the many advantages for companies to release their APIs. Where by doing so, it allows people to remix them with other applications, thus creating more open platforms that benefits everyone. Open platforms are mass collaboration in action; it allows the company to create a broader stage which various partners can build new businesses and add value to the platform. Not only can remixed platforms provide service in advertising products but it also brings out humanity’s finer traits where millions of people work together to fundraise, and reuniting families. Like what Ethan Zuckerman said:

“The goal was not to over engineer our tools for the data entry effort, but to build something very quickly that would let people lend a hand. The solution we cam up with was adequate to let 3000 ppl participate. And three thousand ppl, lightly coordinated, can do impressive things (188)”.

Facebook is an example of platform for participation where it releases API to allow users to add their own applications to the site, which generates a lot of interesting content for Facebook users. It also enables game companies like Playfish to apply their content onto Facebook. And since every activity is automatically shared, as Facebook users play with those applications it advertises it self on the user’s profile page where their friends can comment, as well as try out the application themselves. So companies will benefit from Facebook’s large user base, and facebook receives more content without creating any of it themselves. This is why opening APIs for others to develop for is beneficial to everyone.

The practicum and lecture this week was not only about sharing, connecting, and collaborating, but also about radical trust when using social medias like Wikipedia. The advantages to this self organizing platform is that each topic is a collection of knowledge that is shared from all parts of the world to make the solution to someone’s problem more rich and inspiring. However, the information can be changed within minutes, and replaced by something that may be unreliable. Even though we hear “people are inherently good”, it is impossible to not have negative thoughts. In my honest opinion, the only person we can trust the most is our selves. We should be able to determine what information to trust, and what should be further researched as we are welcomed into the age of new mode of production.

New design works

This is a poster and a flyer that i volunteered to design for an event at a temple. It is a Summer Youth Camp for students grade 3-7, on june 27 +28. The theme of this year’s camp is based on environment and sustainablilty, where many other volunteers and I will teach the children about protecting our environment through short classes and activities.

2009 Summer Youth Camp flyer by Amy Liao is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.

2009 Summer Youth Camp Poster by Amy Liao is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.

Week 2 Reading Response

“I Share therefore I Am”

The two things that I questioned myself from last week’s readings are, would there still be a need for professionals in the future if we can solve our problems using the internet, and how can designers share their ideas without it being “stolen”. This week’s readings helped me answer these questions.

After listening to the lecture and finishing the reading, my own understanding of peer production is that when something new is created to replace other things, we shouldn’t reject it, but to adapt to this new mode of production, and realize how we can benefit from it. Like what Jody had said in our lecture “With every new invention, more jobs are created, even though the old ones are no longer needed”. Using myself as an example, my first encounter with the pencil tool on Mac was quite frustrating for me; why would we need to learn how to draw with a mouse when we can draw with a real pencil? It was only last year that I realized it is essential to know photoshop and illustrator, and the many fascinating things I could do on those softwares that I cannot do with just a pencil. It is just another way of creating something.

This week’s lecture also mentioned my question, “Will we need professionals in the future if designs are freely shared on open platforms?” My opinion to this question is that we do still need professionals, or someone who has studied or had some experience to lead us in the right direction. Secondly, I don’t think anyone is a professional. For those who attend school, they are just willing to learn and gain skills in the fields that they are interested in. For those who are willing to share their skills with other people are those who take part to in advancing our education, society, economy, and technology.

As a designer I like to challenge myself to see if I can go beyond what others can do, and by sharing with the world, there will be no limit to creativity. With Creative Commons, I feel safer than before as I share each of my new creation online. I really appreciate how free and easy it is to obtain, like many other production tools such as Youtube, Myspace, and Facebook, as well as having the permission to remix some people’s works making us active producers.

But how much can we remix? Or how little?
Below is a design by a clothing brand, WrongWroks.

The brand is quite popular in both Canada and in Asian countries. The character is a cross over of two well known characters, Spongebob, from Canada, and Doremon, from Japan. Confusion was my first reaction; should this be considered creative or uncreative? The designer merely took two creations from someone else, and fused them together. My belief is that, as a artist or designer, u have to create something new each time, and it has to look dramatically different from your inspirations, and not directly use it. Yet, consumers are falling for it. Would they know the original creators of the two characters? How would the original creators be credited if no one knows who they are? Creative Commons are saying “as long as you credit ther person”, but how are we sure the people who remix other artworks would actually do that?

Korean Scientist

i came across this funny video starring Bobby Lee on MadTV and i want to share it with everyone 😀

Week 1 Reading Response

It is fascinating how much our technology and economy had grown if we compare the travelling time when getting a message over to someone centuries ago to what is now an instant conversation, even when the other person is all the way on the other side of the world.

In the book, Wikinomics, Tapscott and Williams introduced the benefits of mass collaboration as a new way for our economy to grow. The Internet replaces the traditional corporate structures and allows everyone to be able to learn from one another as each person organize, share, navigate, communicate, and advertise, which also gives people opportunities to make money.

For organizations to develop, they will need to work with the billions of connected individuals to build relationships, market, and compete, where they will produce products that not only benefit the companies, but for participating individuals as well

An example I found on Youtube of companies working with their consumers for their input is the video on Sims 3 : Creators Camp Showcase, where hardcore gamers are invited to a sneak peek of the Sims 3 and create custom content.

In chapter one, Wikinomics: the Art and Science of Peer Production, when McEwen shared Goldcorp’s problem of finding the gold on the web, he was amazed by the variety of participants that took part in the problem solving. What I take from this is that, we are in an era of growing accessibility of information where people from all parts of the world with different professions like mathematicians, engineers, scientists, artists and designers, can work together on solving serious problems, such as global warming. But because of the growing accessibility of information, would there still be a need for professionals when everyone could just share their problems online?

My own opinion on mass collaboration is that it help raise the standard in art and design, and in other fields as well. When artist and designers share their projects or links either on their personal sites or through social book marking, it not only does it inspire other artists and designers, but also connects people with similar interests, thus new artworks that are produced becomes better