By/Association – Social Innovation Network

Earlier this week I stumbled on By/Association, the latest in a line of social innovation projects from alldaybuffet.

“Innovation is an emergent phenomenon that happens when a person or organization fosters interaction between different kinds of people and disparate forms of knowledge.” — Murray Gell-Mann

‘By/Association seeks to reinvent the traditional notion of “networking” by enabling substantive interactions and long-term relationships. By/Association is for people who want to make their lives, ideas, and networks richer by meeting other remarkable people. It’s not about getting help with your current need or project. It’s about connecting to people that make you better — to inspire more action, better ideas, and new ways of seeing the world.’

For all information about memberships, visit ByAssoc.com

Filed under: On Community, On People, On Social Design , All Day Buffet, By/Association, Network, Networking, Social Innovation

Kept – Things don’t have to be rubbish

Founded by More Associates Director Luke Nicholson, Kept is a new movement celebrating the “stuff” that can be kept in the world, stuff that isn’t rubbish. “Together we will help the people who still design and sell rubbish to embrace the change”, he explains.

Of course, we are in the throes of a worldwide recession, and we also face the urgent global crisis of climate change. Most of the new materials we take out of the ground to drive our economy are rubbish just one month later. This makes a huge contribution to both problems. If we’re going to ’spend our way out’, we shouldn’t be buying products that are designed to go into landfill.

Most of the stuff we can buy today is rubbish, and it was designed to be rubbish. Literally. Now, that’s not easy for us to say; we invented some of it, designed some of it, photographed it, advertised it, wrote about it, composed music for it and in the end we went out and bought it. Kept has been started as a way to make things better. Companies have to make products and services that meet our needs without extracting virgin materials from the ground, and without creating systems that routinely bury products that still have life in them. This will help them – by using fewer materials and less energy in clever ways, they can actually become more financially successful.

Kept represents anyone who wants to have great stuff in their lives, and who wants stuff to be better. Kept will be working with companies who care about the stuff they make, and wouldn’t want it to do harm. And will help government to understand what they can do (or not do) to bring about the improvements we all want.

To get involved, Kept is asking you to tell your stories and share what “things” you value and cherish. Submit your stories about the things you have kept, big or small, by visiting www.kept.it or if you use twitter just add #kept to your tweet!

You can follow the project news @keptintheloop and please join the project the Kept Facebook Group where we will be raising questions and sharing news, insights and debate.

Filed under: On Community, On Culture, On Education, On Sustainability , Design, Kept, Luke Nicholson, products, rubbish, stuff, Sustainable, things don't have to be rubbish, Waste

Bruce Mau: In Good We Trust 2010

In Good We Trust

Filed under: On Community, On Culture, On Ethics, On Events, On Social Design, On Society , Bruce Mau, In Good We Trust, Massive Change

The Age of Stupid

The Age of Stupid is a 90-minute film about climate change, set in the future, which will have its world premiere in London on March 15th 2009 and then be released in UK cinemas on March 20th 2009, followed by other countries. Oscar-nominated Pete Postlethwaite stars as a man living alone in the devasted world of 2055, looking back at archive footage from 2007 and asking: why didnt we stop climate change when we had the chance?

Filed under: On Community, On Culture, On Ethics, On Research, On Society, On Sustainability , age of stupid, Change, climate change, Film, future

Waking Up Tomorrow…

Moving picture company Crush + Lovely have been asking hundreds of people one simple question.. see the project and responses here.

(Thanks to Ravensbourne undergraduate Megan Riera).

Filed under: On Community, On People , Fifty People One Question, Happiness, Social, Wake Up

Tie Me To Your Favourite Thing

If you had to tie a red balloon to your favourite thing, what would you tie it to?

As part of her undergraduate project Douceurs, post graduate service designer Lauren Currie, (a.k.a Red Jotter), took a dozen red balloons to a park in Edinburgh, and to encourage traditional communication between the public asked people she met to tie them to their favourite thing.

Filed under: Art & Design, On Community, On Culture, On People, On Social Design, On Society , Balloons, Community, Design, Douceurs, Lauren Currie, RedJotter, Research

Service Design Project nominated for Design of the Year Award

Last Tuesday the UK Design Museum announced the nominations for the 2009 Brit Insurance Design of the Year award, including a nomination for the first EVER service design project to be included in the awards – The Social Innovation Lab for Kent (SILK), by Engine.

SILK is a project and a platform Engine have been developing with Kent County Council (a local government authority in the UK) that helps users and providers of public services create better services together using design tools and processes.

Read the full story at Engine and see a video here.

Filed under: On Community, On Culture, On Ethics, On Social Design, On Society , 2008, Award, Brit Insurance, Design Museum, Design of the Year, Engine, Service Design, SILK, UK

The Messenger/Receiver House

The Messenger/Receiver House is a project by design students Chris Knox, Colm Keller and Bastian Bischoff, studying on the Master Programme in Design at HDK (The School of Design and Crafts at Göteborg University in Sweden). Conceived to collect and analyse public opinion about homelessness, the graphic and product design students created this eye-catching public exhibit. As MocoLoco reported, the future of the M/R House project looks to involve “smaller versions to be decorated by homeless people and well known creatives to be auctioned off to raise funds for organizations that deal with homelessness.” Via. DirtyMouse.

Filed under: On Community, On Culture, On Graphic Design, On Social Design, On Society , Design, HDK, homeless, poverty, public, students, The Messenger/Receiver House