Google Motion Graphs

This is an amazing gadget add on to Google Docs, which allows you to review 5 differnt data variables at once. Most useful is that it allows one of those variables to be time, so you can see how the data changes over time.
In the graph above, if you hit the play button you'll see 30 cities in China, with 3 highlighted - Shanghai, Beijing and Hangzhou. The vertical axis is time spent online each week and the horizontal axis it time spent watching TV yesterday. The size of the bubbles is population (of 15-24 year olds) and the colour is a warmth scale of how much newspapers they read.
When you hit play, you should see how over just 5 years, the time spent watching TV has fallen dramatically as the time online has increased. I've highlighted Hangzhou in particular where this is especially pronounced. The colour coding also highlights that these 15-24 year olds are reading less newspapers in 2009.
This is a great tool, you should try it.

Data from CHina Media and Marketing Survey 2004-2009

Great presentation design

This 3-minute video presentation called Built to Last won first prize in The Congress for the New Urbanism video contest a few weeks ago. The rules for the contest were simple: "Create a 3-minute maximum video that illustrates how the principles of New Urbanism - density, design and walkability - can effectively respond to current environmental challenges that we face."
(From http://www.presentationzen.com)
It's an interesting message in the video but it's also a great example of how to present effectively. Most people (including me) would not be able to create something this polished, but the style could easily be replicaed with static powerpoint slides.

IKEA Beijing

I had to go to IKEA in Beijing last week and was amused to see several people quite happily having a nice sleep on the furniture. This was about 5 in the afternoon.

Female consumers in China (from CNN)

Crap marketing

There's a really interesting contrast of marketing videos by rival sports brands Adidas and Puma on DesignNotes. One is so-so, the other seems hopelessly try hard. See if you agree which is which...

First off, Puma:


And next Adidas:


I can tell you as a Mancunian that the flat, uninspired drawl of the Ting Tings in the Adidas video has nothing to do with their Mancunian accents and I think everything to do with fact that they are probably reading from a $cript provided by the Adidas marketing department. "Yeah, these are the best kinds of gigs.. [becasue we get paid a $hit load of money for a few hours work]"

Maybe I'm biased?

Media convergence

In an interesting example of media convergence, The Economist has made its entire magazine available in audio format.
From their site, "the audio edition contains word-for-word recordings of all articles published in The Economist, read by professional broadcasters and actors. It is ideal for anyone who wants to listen to articles while travelling, exercising or just relaxing."
If you subscribe to the magazine, the audio is free. If you don't then you can purchase each edition for US$8.
I think this is a brilliant idea, partly because it takes great content and broadens the reach through a very relevant channel, partly because it adds value for their existing customers, and partly because as one the first major publishers to do this, they will surely benefit from a spike in readers/listeners from people curious to sample this new format.
Good luck to them. Have a look here.

Lane Crawford Fashion Blog

Lane Crawford have launched an interesting blog campaign where they have got famous fashion photographer Tommy Ton, to take pictures of interesting fashions he sees out and about while going to the leading fashion shows around the world. I think this is a brilliant example of the company using new media to provide engaging content which is very relevant for Lane Crawford and helps to further establish their positioning as retailer of top end latest fashion.

The only criticism I’d have is that it only seems to reside on the Lane Crawford site and it doesn’t seem as easy as other blogs to become a follower or add to an rss feed. Check it out …