I love Twitter. It covers such an incredible spectrum of information; but recently it’s begun to feel out of control. The signal-to-noise was wrong and stuff from people I cared about was being drowned out.

I started by unfollowing a few heavy/active users. But I enjoy a lot of the stuff they share so it didn’t feel massively practical. Then @sermad suggested I made more of lists. I created a few and moved a bunch of people over.

Great! But my timeline was still too noisy.

I tried unfollowing a few more people but couldn’t create a clear mental criteria in my head.

Take my friends and ex-colleagues at glue as an example. I don’t want 180+ people on my timeline, but once you start to add a few, you’re into a strange mental world of… If I add X, I should add Y, because we did X together. In the end I was trying to do something ridiculous like:

People I worked with for more than 4 years + that I regulary went out for beers with + that use Twitter regularly + but not so much that they drown everyone else out = Following.

It wasn’t working. I got frustrated.

So I went BIG and unfollowed everybody.

WOOHOO!!

It might’ve been a bit impulsive but it’s democratic and I can slowly add people back over time.

I have a nagging doubt though. It’s counter intuitive. Lists guarantee I see peoples stuff; but they think I’ve unfollowed them. Not great really. But I needed to wrestle control back of the timeline so I’ve taken the plunge.

I’m sure some people will unfollow me.

Or add me to Lists…

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WEBGL Twitter visualisation + real life holographic installation data eye candy goodness.

The goal of CNN’s Ecosphere [cnn-ecosphere.com] by Minivegas and Stinkdigital is a real-time Twitter visualization that aims to reveal how the online discussion is evolving around the topic of climate change. More specifically, the visualization aggregates all Twitter messages on the topic of #cop17 (in case you wonder, this is an abbreviation for “The 17th Conference of the Parties (COP17) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)”.

The online visualization consists of an interactive 3D globe, described as a “lush digital ecosystem” that closely resembles the look and behavior of real plants and trees in nature. In practice, the virtual plants in the 3D Ecosphere grow from those tweets that are tagged with #COP17. Each tweet about climate change feeds into a plant representing that specific topic or discussion, causing it to grow a little more.

The result thus becomes an mesmerizing, real-time visual representation of how the world “sees” climate change (try clicking on one of the tweet messages), or… an interactive Tron-like Lindenmayer forest, whatever you fancy the most.

http://cnn-ecosphere.com/

by Minivegas and Stinkdigital.

via

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A lovely example of people connecting with people, not brands.

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Vitro conceived this video wall as part of its campaign for the New York City Marathon.

It shows long distance runner Ryan Hall running at marathon speed across a tunnel in NYC’s Columbus Circle subway station – and challenges the public to keep up.

Lets just say the pace is pretty quick….

via

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Chrome: SBTV
The first ad in the first break of the new series of X-Factor was this ad for Google Chrome, featuring youth site SBTV, and its founder Jamal Edwards. Inspiring da yoots. Excellent work.

DC Shoes: Ken Block’s Hollywood Megamercial
Gynkhama is back, this time he’s tearing around on the backlots of Universal Studios, California.

TableDrum
A virtual drumkit which syncs the sound of any object to high quality drum samples of your choice. /via Ad Bright

DragonTape HTML5 Mixmaker
Dragontape is an easy to use HTML5 video & sound editor that enables anyone to create mixtape playlists (up to 3 hours long) from YouTube and SoundCloud clips. /via Rubbishcorp
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Nike+ City Runs
An installation for Nike retail stores which visualized a year’s worth of runs from the Nike+ website. Made with OpenFrameworks.
http://yesyesno.com/nike-city-runs

MIT Media Lab’s Brilliant New Logo Has 40,000 Permutations
The algorithm can create 40,000 logo shapes in 12 different colour combinations, providing the Media Lab an estimated 25 years’ worth of personalised business cards.
http://www.fastcodesign.com/1663378/mit-media-labs-brilliant-new-logo-has-40000-permutations-video

Watch YouTube With Friends
Possibly the most interesting recent Google+ feature is a new button on YouTube that lets you start a hang out with friends around a video you’re watching.
http://mashable.com/2011/08/18/watch-with-friends-youtube/

Wearable Electronic Sensors Stick Like Temporary Tattoos, Present Endless Possiblities
A team of researchers from the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign have developed small electronic devices that can be worn on the skin.
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CAMPAIGNS / IDEAS

Fred Pretty: The Hidden Concert Series
Mishmash of tech on display here. Somehow it all comes together beautifully.

Nike: Take Mokum
Another nice combination of Facebook and real world events.

Mini Maps
Smart use of Google Maps and Facebook. Create a car and a map. Race with friends.

Volkswagen: Side Assist Office
Take a product feature and dramatise it. Smart branded utility from VW.

McDonalds: Interactive Pong
Nice campaign using HTML5 and geo-location instead of an app. Simple redemption too.

Heineken: Bluetooth Bottle Opener
A connected bottle opener that invites your friends over for a beer.

Google+ Demo
New site for Google+ with a very cool custom hack off the Maps API.
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IKEA Lullaby
So many things I like I about this. Gorgeous HTML5 website, leading to branded content in Spotify and iTunes.
http://demo.fb.se/pr/ikea/lullabies/

INNOVATION / TECHNIQUES

X-Men First Class – NFC
Posterscope, Proxama, O2 and Nokia team up. The possibilities are HUGE!

Daft Punk – Anatomy of a Mashup
The entire piece is composed from the latest HTML5 and CSS3 technology (canvas, audio, transforms & transitions).
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MIT Mood Meter
Isobar have already teamed up with MIT to look at applications for brands.

Androidify Dance
Kinect + Android avatar. Love it.

Aurasma
Object tracking non-QR AR for iPhone with multiple media (geo-located).

Paper Record Player
A paper record player wedding invitation.

Kinect Live Music Performance
Chris Vik uses Kinect with Ableton to control sound samples and produce an amazing live music performance.

YooToob Interactive Youtube Music Machine
Just use your keyboard. It’s the Youtube interactive music machine.

The Wheels Of Steel
Turntables in your browser with HTML5/CSS/JS and some Flash. Needs a kickass browser and machine. http://wheelsofsteel.net/

Human Jukebox
This man is an owner of an electronics store in Stockholm. He swallowed a custom-made wireless soundsystem. People then request a song over the internet.

Borg & McEnroe Play Doubles on YouTube
Separately, they are alright. But when played simultaneously, they interact perfectly.

The Verbalizer by Breakfast NY
Enhancing Google Voice Search. Smart. Fast. Etc.

Face Projection Mapping
Responsive projection mapping where everything is triggered by his face. Up close and personal.

Richti-Areal Augmented Reality Installation
iPad controlled projection mapping.

Video Time Machine
Handpicked popular culture from 1860 – 2011.

RobotFlaneur
The idea is simple: pick a city, and every 30 seconds it will take you to a random place and show you the Google StreetView image. Each view is not important. What’s interesting is if you leave it running and occasionally glance at it. You might recognise some views in some cities, otherwise there’s a lot of mundanity: suburbs, motorways, traffic signs. These are the grain of the city and vary wildly. /via Dentsu Blog.
http://robotflaneur.com/

Future Music
Really smart use of the Storify platform to continue the conversation.

Phil Collins: Requirements
The site geolocates you, and updates the album artwork depending on the weather. London. 18º. No Jacket required.
http://www.philcollinsrequirements.com

CULTURE

Glasto 2011
Nice vid made from 1000s of photos.

Masterchef Synesthesia
Swede Mason steps up culture smash.

Three-Toed Sloth Crossing The Road In Costa Rica (Sloth’s Perspective)
What’s not to love?

Cat In Tanks
Love.

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