Flickr for Hire

For decades, people have been taking photos and home videos and sharing them with their friends and family. But it wasn’t until YouTube that UGC (user-generated content) became a legitimate – albeit mind-numbing – mass-market entertainment form.

Now I’m certainly not one who believes that Fred and LonelyGirl15 are going to replace Seinfeld and GossipGirl, but when the most respected stock houses in the world — GettyImages — announces the launch of its “Flicker Collection“, it makes you wonder if the rules of publishing are being rewritten as we speak.

Getty is calling their Flickr feed, “handpicked images with an originality and authenticity rare in stock photos” — [yet as familiar as the photos you can take yourself]…? But hey, if a brand wants to use photos of my kid sister’s Quinceañera party for their next print ad, all I can say is “CHEESE!”

A Type of Art

Whether by creating patterns from, collaging together, or exploiting its corners, Greg Lamarche takes type from backup dancer to centerstage diva.  Check out the rest of his work here.

2010 Census Countdown

With less than a year to go, national census planning is in full swing. We only have once every 10 years to get it as right as possible, and is a tremendous endeavor on an organizational level (and has turned into a slight obsession for me, especially as it applies to information design). Required by law, it calls upon everyone in this country to take part. Christopher Walken and SNL help remind us, once again, that the data’s only as good as the information we provide. Garbage in, garbage out!

Facebook – 200 Million Users Strong

An online success story that began in a Harvard dorm room has quickly become a worldwide phenomenon — uniting more than just school-age kids, it’s bringing together moms, business people and brands all across the globe.

To commemorate brag about its now 200 million ACTIVE user base, Facebook put out this video to put the big 200 into real perspective.

(too bad they didn’t want to “share” this video outside their site, though…)

UPDATE: Women older than 55 make up the fastest-growing age group on Facebook

I Can’t Stop.Motion

What can I say… I love stop motion animations! A while ago I blogged about Taproot’s “Wherever I Stand” music video — created out of over 8,500 still photographs.

Since then I’ve been finding more and more really cool stop motion videos on YouTube. But while most have merit simply by virtue of the frame-by-frame-by-frame detail involved, I stumbled upon the creation of one young design student from Japan who not only was able to tell a compelling story but also toggled betwen multiple layers and dimensions. Check it out!

iPhone App-etite

Apple touts that there’s an iPhone app for just about anything. Well, a couple of clever bakers created their own set of apps — for any appetite. Sweet!

Working Meals

A working lunch can be a great way to increase productivity, but laptops on the diner counter can be cumbersome and notes on napkins seem to always get tossed with the trash. London-based, Italian designers Sara Ferrari and Marcella Fiori have worked it all out — during a lunch meeting, no doubt — they’ve designed a book of place mats for note-taking during meals.

Eat it up!

Twitter: The New Celebrity Ring Match

At long last Drama Queens have a new public place to make a scene. Although we’re used to snarky debate on the web, Twitter has now become the public square for tongue- tweet-lashing — not from fans — but rather between celebrities themselves.

Celebrities often complain about the media sticking their noses in their private lives. But apparently for Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson, all is fair in love and war — when you live a digital life.

Chronicles of the digi-catfight are on Perez.

Flutter vs. Twitter: 26 is the new 140

If you txt more than you talk, have a blatant disregard for vowels in sntence cnstrction and you tweet everywhere from the subway to the shower than it’s time you meet the next big thing you never knew you always wanted needed… move over micro-blogging, here comes “nano-blogging” — cause 140 characters is way too long for your shrinking attention span.