Hewlett-Packard collaborated with five local artists in Singapore recently, to present the ‘Touch the Future, Now’ Light Show. The artists were invited to share their visions of the future based around five key areas: music, art, communication, gaming and cityscape. Creative community Awe50me had a sizable representation and included four of the five artists: Ben Qwek a.k.a Mr.B, Brian Chia a.k.a Brick, Michael Ng a.k.a Mindflyer and Eeshaun. We like what Brick had to say about the future of music:

“The future invites interactivity between the user and music, welcoming them into a world where they can fiddle with the tonal quality [...]

At the PSFK Conference Asia 2008, Piers Fawkes (PSFK) sat down with leading experts in Asia’s creative community to explore the emergence of a new generation of multi-skilled creative minds.  These young individuals feel they can turn their hand to multiple product and service offerings, often challenging the way established industries operate.
Focusing on how this ‘creator class’ leverages the internet to hone their skills and market themselves to a greater audience, the panel, including Brian Tiong (B-Side), Paul Tan (POOL/AWE50ME), and Jason Anello (Yahoo!), explore how agencies and companies can collaborate with this unique group of talented individuals.
(apologies for the [...]

At the PSFK Conference Asia 2008, Floydd Wood and Jerry Clode (Flamingo International) look at the specific ways Chinese youth are creatively re-working their identity – an emerging trend vital to those wanting to address this demographic on their own terms.
Focusing on ‘retro’ and ‘youth identity,’ the two researchers explain how Chinese youth are re-interpreting their past to construct new identities.  Drawing upon historical events and traditional lifestyles for inspiration, today’s youth are carefully extracting aspects of the their past to form their own identity.  But as Jerry states, “looking back [in China] is not always a comfortable process.  Tumultuous [...]

At the PSFK Conference Asia 2008, Nick Barham (Wieden Kennedy, Shanghai) explores the anxiety, opportunity and extravagance of the Chinese middle class.  Deliberately not speaking about the “Olympics, the Dali Lama, Tibet, the earthquake, their amazing economic growth, or all the reason why the West is scared or worried about China growing,” Nick focuses on the aspirations of China’s middle class and the broader social changes that are happening at that level.
Noting that the number of new credit cards issued in China jumped from 3 million in 2003 to 90 million in 2007, Nick describes how the middle class are [...]