Tetris nostalgia

How to play Tetris when you’re bored of your little computer screen…

Via

Urban freak

How to cross the street discreetly…

Please take a seat!

 

Amazing picture on Space & Culture…please, take a seat!

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In Banksy’s Footsteps…

My colleague Filip and I were working at a presentation on creativity and innovation by Tom Peters (who was kindly invited, or mainly extremely wel $$, by Flanders DC) in Antwerp, when we ran into Pietel. So checked out his blog today in search for some pictures of that event. Instead I saw this on his blog:…

If you’d like to see London – or maybe colourful Bristol – from a different angle, you might wanna have this Zeeman map in your pockets. It indicates the exact locations where you can admire the work of Banksy, a.k.a. the moments’ top shot in Britain’s/the worlds art land.

…or you might fancy these geotags on Flickr where you can actually see a picture of Banksy’s work and its location.

London presents its new Olympic Stadium

The designs for the London 2012 Olympic Stadium, were revealed today, and according to the press report this new stadium marks a new approach to the design of sports stadia. “Why?”, you ask? Well…because it has a capacity of 25,000 permanent seats that will be surrounded by 55,000 detachable temporary seats that will vanish together with the Olympic spirit at the end of the games.

What’s not innovative is that (and I cite the London 2012 website) “it will be a sustainable and vibrant facility, attracting other
businesses and investment and acting as a hub for the communities
living in and around the Olympic Park”. Now I’ve been to many stadia around Europe, both for watching games and just during the day, and I haven’t seen one that’s vibrant outside the tension of a sports competition or music concert, not even considering a stadium could be a hub for communities living close to it. If you know of any, please let me know, cause I’m desperate to find the first one!

Here’s a slick sales video of the design…or you might consider a more critical voice by Jonathan Glancey of The Guardian.

 

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Helsinki City Wall

I’ve been studying in Helsinki for a while at the University of Art and Design (UIAH/Taik), as part of the program MA in European Urban Cultures. Everyone who’s ever lived there probably knows it’s a nice place, even though the centre of the city is quite small. But since Finnish people are also quite closed (except when they’re totally hammered), they try to find other ways for people to interact (proven the slogan “Nokia, connecting people!”). Here’s another nice example: the Helsinki City Wall.

Basically it’s an interactive wall, located right in the middle of the centre and at a place where many people pass (the Lasipalatsi media centre), and which shows pictures and movie clips. The touch screen allows you to play with the content. Everyone can contribute by sending content to a certain email address  or by posting it on public sources like Flickr or Youtube and tagging it ‘Helsinki’. The content will then be picked up.

“The installation has three objectives; First it aims at creating Awareness and Presence of City Events in an engaging installation where passers by playfully manipulate media and learn about anniversaries, events and festivals. Second it is aimed at supporting active visitors and social media motivating users to actively and collaboratively make sense and play with media. Third CityWall proposes a platform for Media Literacy which can deliver rich media experiences to the widest audience. Anyone with the most basic computer skills can learn and use the CityWall in a few moments.”

Cosmic fools leading cities

Just read this on the news (in dutch): Police in Mechelen takes action against skaters
The local police in Mechelen started an inconvenience-team. Last summer the team arrested a 13-year-old boy and his friends for skating in and on a newly regenerated area, a former brewery called Lamot. What an inconvenience…
Have they really not understood anything of the discources by Florida, Landry and the like? Does ‘regeneration’ only imply ‘gentrification’? Should a city not be a place where you can life? That children and adolescents can use as a playground? Never heard of the conept ‘maintenance’? Should renovations really be something like musea: ‘look, but certainly don’t touch!’? Are we only welcome if we have money to spend? The only other place to skate in Mechelen is at leisure park De Nekker…for which even kids have to pay € 3 entrance fee.
Mechelen has been trying to promote itself lately as a ‘city for children‘. Well done mair Somers. Once again you proove that city marketing is in many cases just an image you create, but in reality you’re selling just an empty box.

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