A Malaysian scientist has discovered a revolutionary method of producing aerogel using waste rice husks. Known for it’s ghostlike appearance, aerogel has many possible applications including insulation and as a shock absorber. The strong, light weight substance (it’s 99% air) is made of silica, which composes 20% of the weight of rice husks. Using husks as the source of silica for Aerogel drastically cuts the cost of production.

Treehugger reports:

Aerogel was invented in 1931. But at $3000 per kilogram, it’s use has been limited to visionary projects and unique structural applications like reinforcement of tennis raquets. But that could change soon. Halimaton Hamdan, a Cambridge-trained professor of chemistry at the Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (Technical University of Malaysia), has announced the discovery of a cheap process for turning waste rice husks into aerogel. Actually into “Maerogel”, as Hamdan has dubbed the “Malaysian aerogel”.

The translucent, smoky material weighs only three times as much as air. It is, in fact, mostly air; air cleverly trapped in a silicon matrix which gives the material insulating properties 37 times better than fiberglass. The image demonstrates the insulating capability as a layer of aerogel prevents a blowtorch from burning the hand below.

Aerogel can also bear mechanical pressure of up to 2000 times its weight. The combination of low weight and strength make aerogel a multifaceted green construction material.

[via Treehugger]

Toronto based street artist Posterchild has produced series of artworks that continues his Mario Blocks theme. Combining vintage video game iconography with guerrilla gardening, he’s created a batch of flower planters that look like fire flower power up blocks from the Super Mario Bothers video game. Nice way to inject a dose of fun and beauty into plain city streets.

Last October, Australian Fashion Week went ‘trans-seasonal’ as a response to the seasional change the (European) fashion industry has traditionally dictated. Now we see more signs of this change in attitudes within fashion: In an article on the JC Report, Robert Cordero looks at the trend against fashion ’seasons’. While the autumn/winter and spring/summer collection cycles have always driven a fast pace within fashion (and the fairly recent trend of mid-season ranges have just added to it), Cordero argues that a growing number of designers are beginning to question the need for speed:

A growing number of designers, however, are beginning to question this headlong pace and its relevance to the way we live, instead promoting flexible, seasonless collections… Brian Janusiak and Elizabeth Beer of Project No. 8, a discerningly merchandised fashion and design outpost in New York’s Chinatown, also believe in seasonless garments. In addition to stocking Kostas Murkudis’ 96 dresses, a collection of chic frocks meant for all seasons that’s been covered in these pages, the duo also have their own seasonless line under the Various Projects umbrella. “What excites us about the seasonless approach is that after decades of forced obsolescence by design in retail, people are beginning to rewrite the rules on what is an acceptable rhythm in the fashion cycle,” says Janusiak.

…While it would be easy to view these initiatives as strictly anti-establishment efforts, there are compelling signs that a truly seasonless fashion future may be on the horizon. First and foremost, global warming is rendering seasonal temperatures increasingly unpredictable. At the same time, subtler shifts are occurring, such as retailers placing increased importance on resort/cruise collections. As Diane Von Furstenburg did in her s/s ‘09 resort outing, a number of designers are beginning to include more seasonless pieces in their collections to give their jet-setting customers more flexibility. Soon, a truly global, all-weather lifestyle could be within our reach.

JC Report

We are excited to have Amit Gupta of Photojojo joining us at PSFK Conference San Francisco 2008 on our “San Francisco Snapshot” panel,where passionate locals, including Liz Dunn of FunnyOrDie and Jeremy Townsend of The Ghetto Gourmet (led by moderator Colin Nagy of Attention) will discuss what makes the Bay Area tick and what aspects of SF/Bay Area culture inspire them the most.

First, who are you and what do you do?

Hi. My name’s Amit Gupta. I am a creative, hard-working, honest young man who likes to create fun things online.

I run a company called Photojojo, we’re the world’s awesomest photography newsletter.

We’re also working on a book that will be published by Random House next year, and some new ways for people to have fun with photography online.

I’ve started a lot of different projects and companies, and am always working on something new. Most recently, I started a casual coworking event called Jelly while living in NYC. Since then, it’s spread to 20 cities around the world and been on the Today Show, Wired, NPR (twice), etc.

You’ll be speaking on our “San Francisco Snapshot” panel. Can you explain what you find inspirational about the Bay Area and why? What makes it different than any other place in the world?

People here are not afraid of failure.

There’s a great entrepreneurial spirit here, and startups seem to grow like weeds, but it has less to do with the weather, the proximity of venture capital, or history, and more to do with the culture. Here, it’s okay to try something and fall on your face. You just get up and try again. That’s not normal anywhere else.

Some sites that provide you with inspiration:

Mostly these days my inspiration comes from my friends, almost always through one of these three:
Tumblr
Flickr
Twitter

Thanks, Amit!

Photojojo

Amit Gupta

To hear more from Amit come join us at PSFK Conference San Francisco 2008!

BoingBoing recently found itself in a public tiff with one of their former writers, Violet Blue, after the website’s editors decided to delete every one of her posts with no identifiable reason. BoingBoing insisted that they hadn’t censored their ex-blogger, but rather just ‘unpublished’ all of her work.

In response, Gawker has posted a funny if characteristically snarky post clarifying some of that obfuscating language (such as ‘unpublished’) being thrown around by all of us in the blogosphere when we’re trying to cover up what’s really going on (or what we really mean). Some highlights:

- Brand advertising = Bad clickthroughs. “We have a clickthrough rate of one in ten thousand, but we’re more of a brand destination.”

- Update: Fix. On a blog or in a program, an update means something was broken.

- Experimental: Failed. Everyone secretly hopes their projects take off, so they can say “Oh, it was just a fun little project!” More often, the project gets just the attention it deserved: none.

- Platform: Vague idea. Instead of a useful tool, a tool for other people to make useful tools. Possibly a cash cow, but boring. (For a geekier set, a platform is for those too lazy to code; an API is for those too lazy to write a platform.)

- Beta: Broken. For some web services, “beta” is as regular as PMS until Google buys the company.

- Viral: Cheap. Of course, sometimes that’s the kind of ad a brand deserves. Note which brand was faster to jump on viral videos: Not Coke, but Mentos.

- Contextual advertising: Bottom-of-the-barrel ads. What’s left over after “brand advertising” and served with “user-generated” content.

Gawker: The 15 Most Useless Internet Euphemisms

For some reason this morning I had my good citizen cap on my walk to work down Broadway between Union Square and SoHo I went into two stores to complain that they had their doors open and their air conditioning on. The reason I chose these two stores rather than the Best Buy or Urban Outfitters was that these brands (American Apparel and Body Shop) both trade on their conscious credentials.

There’s an element of ‘doing good’ in both retailers’ brand values. Body Shop has a ‘Protect Our Planet‘ mission. American Apparel doesn’t talk much these days about it’s eco credentials but it has major concerns for what it considers as the community.

Some of you might not know but there is a strong debate in New York about stores that leave their doors open while their air conditioning units were going - and some officials in New York have suggested a law against it. Saying that, maybe the debate is all in the media and none in the street: when I asked the assistants in both stores if anyone had complained before about their open doors and they said no. The Body Shop girl seemed fairly concerned about the idea, the American Apparel girl and her manager seemed to just see me as somebody ten years too old in the store and not minding his own business. Well, at least some brand values ring true.

Ricoh is building an nature powered billboard, scheduled to go up in Times Square this December. A first for New York, this solar and wind powered giant ad is only the third in the world. The other two are Pacific Gas & Electric’s in San Francisco and Ricoh’s original eco billboard in Tokyo. The ad’s lighting will be powered by 45 solar panels and 4 wind turbines. Strangely the system lacks any kind of back up power source. If there’s a cloudy day with no wind, the ad will not be illuminated.

[via Live Science]

Opening tomorrow (July 4th) on Montague Place behind the British Museum in London is a new temporary cultural space designed by Carmody Groarke Architects. Called the Sky Walk, the installation is the centerpiece of the Bloomsbury Hub of the London Festival of Architecture. Sky Walk is a series of elevated ramps that take visitors on a meandering journey exposing them to new views of the architectural details on the surrounding historic buildings. Over the next three days, Sky Walk will serve as a backdrop for performances, and exhibition, and a continuous picnic of locally produced food.

Sky Walk was constructed over the past three days out of reusable staging components. It’s covered in a translucent black mesh. The ramp reaches a height of over 13 feet at it’s tallest point.

The event is the first step in the total transformation of the street into a usable public space and a destination in its own right. The design firm of Burns+Nice have already developed proposals to redo the street and surrounding areas.

[via WAN]

German car manufacturer Volkswagen have released a site called “Volkswagen 2028″ that sketches a scenario of future automotive mobility, 20 years from now. The site kicks off with a short introductory movie set in the future, where a father takes a walk with his son talking about the old times where you had to search for a parking-lot. Future times according to VW are about smart, on-demand car delivery services, skinnable car exteriors and the death of traffic jams as we know them.

A series of interviews with VW researchers and designers unveil their visions of electric-driven Single Occupant Vehicles, holographic projections, gesture controlled dashboards, and emission free automobiles.

While the entire site is in German, it’s still worth having a look at their future scenarios.

Volkswagen 2028