www.inabirgitte.no

One of the advantages of being a Hyper Island student is having the opportunity to participate in wonderful lecturers and workshops. Yesterday we had a visit from Steve Pearce, head of creative at Skype, and Nicolas Nuzzaci from Doberman. They have both worked for the award winning digital agency Poke in London. Poke were the geniouses behind the Balloon Race, a campaign for Orange that really caught my attention (and many many others) a while ago. They also showed us “15 things we’ve been thinking about this week” – a collection of really interessting and inspiring trends and websites, to mention a few; garlik, zopa, kayak, the global rich list.

According to Steve Pearce, we should think of icebergs when we think of brands. There is a visible part, and a interactive part which is below the surface. The visible part has to play a successfull roll to make people want to jump in and have a go. We need to try and encourage people to interact with the product. A good experience becomes an object that someone wants to share – it becomes viral. Even though I think I am aware of this, it’s easy to forget and start working from the top of the iceberg rather than from the bottom-up. 

A funny thing, it seems like a lot of agencies really belives in us Hyper Island students. They think we are so great, and that we are exactly what they are looking for. But are we actually as great as everybody thinks? Feel like I have a whole lot to prove when I’m off for my internship next year…

OK so I figure it’s about time to do a post on what’s been eating up a fair chunk of my time recently. The last 4 weeks have been quite intense. I developed a concept with my group which included a business plan, budget, concept book and presentation. We spent 10 swetty minutes in a fancy conference room on Östermalm convincing the jury to invest in our idea. It all went swimmingly. We received great feedback on both the presentation and the overall concept. They even liked the concept book, which I was a bit worried about, but it surprisingly seemed to hit spot on! Well deserved mingle and booze awaited for us later that night at the web agency Britny.

Not much blogging going on at the moment, I have so much on my mind that when I try to write it just becomes a total chaos. I keep thinking about the lecture we had with Caj Malmros last week, it was so goddamn inspiring. I wish I knew him so I could listen to more of his stories while sipping to a cup of tea. Tea, now there is something. My true savior this time of year. It’s so cold, dark and depressing now, but oh so photogenic. Expect more November photos soon.

Sometimes it can be hard to be norwegian in Sweden, but people like Johan makes it a lot easier. Check out his blog, where he daily posts a norwegian word (with swedish translation).

It’s time for the Experience Technology module with developer and former Hyper student Robin Gavin. Each group will be given one of these technologies: RFID, Interface Components, Arduino or Wii remotes. We are supposed to “develop functional technology driven prototype solutions that explores human computer interaction”. The results will be presented as an exhibition here in Stockholm together with the digital media students from Karlskrona. 

Did some research today and I’ve come to the conclusion that RFID (radio-frequency identification) is a really fun technology! The company Violet, behind Nabaztag “the first Rabbit connected to the Internet”, is about to market a device called Mir:ror which connects to the computer via USB with a built-in RFID reader. It comes with RFID stamps that you can stick on to any physical object. This means I could be able to tag a potato and place it on the mirror to make it give me recipes for potato dishes! Well, maybe not the most useful way to use RFID but the possibilities seem to be endless.