Design 21: Social Design Network

What challenges will the next decade bring?

And how are we going to overcome them?

So asked the The Institute for the Future of thousands of participants via its progressive Superstruct online interface to co-create its Ten Year Forecast. Density Design was asked by Italy's Wired magazine to devise a visual synthesis of the forecast which could be used to stimulate onwards discussion by a wider audience.

Density Design is a research lab at the Politecnico di Miano which explores the emergent relationships between communication design, information visualisation and complex systems. It supports the use of communication design to facilitate dialogue within participatory decision making.

Creatively combined with an exquisite concoction of allegorical illustrations, the resulting Map of the Future provides a common visualisation on which to base discussions and analysis of what may lie ahead. The map has already been put to use at the Capitale Digitale collaborative sessions held by Wired & Telecom Italia. Hard to imagine going back to a paltry powerpoint pie-chart after being served up this flavorsome infographic feast.

Download a original (largest) version of the map on Flickr

Pentagram partner Harry Pearce recently devised a project for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNDOC) which provided graphic training tools for the Russian police. Employing national abbreviations (GB, US, RU, etc) the folding posters presented comparative data surrounding drug abuse, intervention, therapy and health related consequences as a way of clarifying various aspects of drug policy during training sessions. (English versions shown here, with Russian versions being used on the ground.)

Read more on Random Specific.

New Zealand’s Student Job Search invested in an effective spot of crowdsourcing via a recent competition that captured the talents of tertiary students nationwide.

The competition was conceptualised with Tardis Design & Advertising & Ikon Communications and handed over the creative direction of the upcoming campaign (appealing to employers to list student jobs) to the students themselves. Prizes included $1000 cash and an Acer notebook for the winning entry plus the kudos of having the campaign put into circulation across the country.

Twelve finalists were chosen from an initial response to each spend a week working on creating their campaign – for which they were compensated by the not-for profit Student Job Search recruiting service. Sebastian Boyle’s “Employ a Student, Employ the Future” campaign emerged as the clear winner with its well crafted copy that offered dynamic possibilities in how it could be used to appeal to various categories of employers.

More surprising was the fact that Boyle is not studying Advertising or Design but rather is in his final year of Law. Helen Milner from Tardis Design noted that “one can see how both advertising and legal professionals require a strong sense of persuasiveness – a characteristic highly evident in Sebastian’s entry.” Her team were responsible for refining the concept and design ready for wider media dispatch.

Boyle expands – “I’ve always had an interest in design and advertising and this seemed l...

Employing a clear spot-varnish, New York-based designer Reiner Tiangco has devised a poster that requires interaction to disclose its pertinent message.

With the proliferation of lip-service being given to the world's increasingly complex challenges – we feel he makes a highly valid point.

See more on Osocio

Twenty thousand South African women of various ethnicities marched on Pretoria’s Union Buildings to protest the Urban Area Act in 1956. The legislation required ‘non-whites’ to carry identification documents. Demonstrators sang a song which included the line “wathint’ abafazi, wathint’ imbokodo.” (you strike women, you strike a rock) and delivered bundles of petitions for the Prime Minister.

In honour of this collective stance, August 9 was declared a public holiday in South Africa in 1994 – National Women’s Day.

See full-size image at Osocio

The DIGITS campaign seeks to elevate interest in science, technology, engineering & math in the United States. It promotes “a middle school program opening minds to math and science. Figure this. Imagine that.”

A collection of illustrators, including Nate Williams, were commissioned to playfully depict hand-drawn chalkboards that would appeal to young minds.

Irreverent, imaginative and inspirational.

See more at Osocio

Mumbai mobile service providers Aircel recently promoted their network via a novel billboard campaign which had a real rescue boat attached which was used by Mumbaikars stranded in monoon flooding.

The initiaive made front page news and although we ackowledge it could be viewed as corporate 'cause washing' it certainly highlights the failings of civic bodies in handling of the plight of those in monsoon effected metros. Plus it brilliantly leveraged the resulting publicity beyond the billbaord itself to further the advertiser's cheeky message to "sail through our network this monsoon."

Giving a whole new meaning for mobile Customer Care! See & read more on the campaign from the Aircel site and at Osocio

Oxfam International has been given a bold, typocentric makeover by Barcelona's Hey Studio which is expected to resonate with a young Spanish audience. Oxfam pursues education, disaster management and health initiatives alongside advocacy and policy research to ensure sustainable development in combating poverty and injustice. The new look highlights issues through confronting icon-typographic mash-ups applied to a vividly coloured range of products from posters to pencils.

Colourful, cause-related and compelling.

See more at Osocio

An ad campaign was conceived for the Salvation Army in Maine which included co-opting more than 50 local businesses to help promote the message “This Ad Cost Nothing” to infer that more money is available for the real issues dealt with by the organisation.

From the Salvation Army Donation Site:

Recently, local businesses in Portland, Maine, helped us launch an ad campaign that cost absolutely nothing. That’s right. Zero. Zilch. Nada. Sure, a big, expensive campaign could have gotten our name out there. But at what cost? See, it’s thinking like this that helps us give 83 cents of every dollar donated directly to the people who need it most. Like our fellow northern New Englanders in need of food, shelter, rehabilitation, elderly services…even disaster assistance.

Noteworthy in engaging communities to transmit as well as receive the message.

See more on Osocio

Launched to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the Bhopal disaster is this toxic bottled water from the affacted area emphasises Dow Chemical’s refusal to take apt responsibility for the disaster.

“A new, beautifully-designed line of bottled water - this time not from the melting Alps, nor from faraway, clean-water-deprived Fiji, but rather from the contaminated ground near the site of the 1984 Bhopal catastrophe - scared Dow Chemical’s London management team into hiding today.”

Read more from the press release.