That was the question Trokia + the BBC Electric Proms asked people during the festival last October. Selected SMS / Web submitted answers were projected onto a huge wall at the festival’s headline venue the Roundhouse, Camden.

Several festivals I’ve been to over the years have displayed sms messages from the crowd on screens that often sit next to stage. It does the job but lacks any integration with the event itself, which is why the wall at the electric proms worked so well. The typography and positioning of the text itself worked really well in the space and it provided good material for people to read while they were waiting for friends or queuing at the bar.’

Yasser Rashid, BBC Senior Interaction Designer, BBC Radio and Music Interactive

“…why context is more important than consistency. It’s ok to be inconsistent if your design makes more sense that way. Give people just what matters. Give them what they need when they need it and get rid of what they don’t. It’s better to be right than to be consistent.”

The iPhone keyboard’s spacebar is replaced by web-centric options when you’re entering a URL. URLs can’t contain blank spaces so the iPhone gets rid of the useless key and replace it with ones that add value. Great example of context over consistency.

Via 37 signals

The product launches in the US later today, which means the world wide web is going to be reviewtastic very soon. Here are a couple to get you started…

David Pogue from the New York Times
Walter Mossberg, Wall Street Journal Personal Technology Columnist

Just so you know…

BBC World’s launch has been promoted in North America with interactive billboards, where interaction is offered by a live SMS poll. Visually, the constuction reminds me of the HSBC Your point of view campaign.

On the other hand Brazil’s São Paulo has become a No Logo zone of sorts after Mayor Gilberto Kassab decided to strip the city of all it’s advertising. Creative Review editor Patrick Burgoyne’s article for BusinessWeek provides a commentary of how events unfolded which led to the clearout, the initial public reaction plus some thoughts to the future. Visual documentation of the ‘billboard cemetery’ can be seen in Brazilian photographer Tony de Marco’s flickr set here.

In a bid to help students / graduates find that ‘elusive creative position’, Designers are wankers have launched the Video-Phone Portrait Prize 2006.

Entrants are challenged to create a short video portrait using a mobile phone. The video presenting an opportunity for people to sell themselves to an employer/client by illustrating how their services are of benefit to their organisation.

£5000 is up for grabs, aswell as employment opportunites for the winner.

Closing date 31 August 2006.

This is the second installement of help on offer from D.A.W, following their self entitled publication published last year.

Lots of interesting stuff going on at studio Trokia, where product designers are exploring creative technologies to develop a new approach to advertising and branding.

There is fun to be had with their ‘SMS Guerilla Projector’…

‘A device that enables the user to project text based SMS messages in public spaces, in streets, onto people, inside cinemas, shops, houses etc.’

Trokia recently spoke at the We love Technology gig in Huddersfield, looked like a great event.

Experience Hulgerisation.

‘When we were asked to brief the St Martins final year product design students it was therefore obvious what we were going to ask them to consider: HULGERISATION’

Did you know that mobile company ‘3′ have a new web initiative in partnership with MSN spaces allowing people to upload video’s of them doing stupid stuff?

Well they have, an ideal project for a cash needy student with a 3 contract with loads of time on their hands! So once you’re efforts have been accepted onto the shortlist the videos are then voted on over a few months and the grand winner can scoop a cool £1000.

According to one Katy Adelson…

“This new mobile blogging agreement illustrates a new medium for online advertising and demonstrates the potential value of advertising on a web 2.0 application”