Ashley Ann Vaness

Looking for a good resource of free high-quality images? The service, FreeDigitalPhotos.net provides photos for web use, free of charge, with proper attribution. They’ve got cool images too, like the one I found below.

Photographer: Francesco Marino

Go visit Lunch Breath’s Flickr stream. His work kept me entertained for way to long. Some samples of his work below.

To me, secrets are inspiring. They connect people to people through shared experiences. They make the world seem less lonely. The PostSecret books, created by Frank Warren, have moved me. His latest video takes it a step further; Seeing people admit their secrets aloud in public brings his project to a whole new level. Whether the confession is joyful or sad or humorous or full of anguish, it is beautiful to see people trust you with their confession. I highly recommend his latest book, PostSecret: Confessions on Life, Death , and God. Actually, I recommend all of his books, which you can find on Amazon.

Zeus Jones and Puny are doing something really cool. They’ve recognized the students at the Minneapolis based Richard R Green Central Park School need some help as 97% of students at Green Central live below the poverty line. As this kind of poverty has an impact on learning, Zeus and Puny teamed up to raise $7,000 to send all 550 kids from Green Central on a field trip.

There are three easy ways to help the cause:

1. Donate Money
2. Shop Online
3. Collect Box Tops

Give today

Google finds a intriguingly different way to showcase Chromes new features:

Speed: A faster browser means faster browsing.
Security: Shelters your computer from malicious websites.
Themes: You choose what your browser looks like.
Stability: Crashed tabs won’t crash your whole browser.
Omnibox: Type in a web address or search the web, all in one box.
Ingognito: Nobody can see what you saw online with incognito browsing.
New tabs: Shows the websites you visit most often every time you open a new tab.

I like this commercial, but the end left me questioning, “Was that really for an Amazon Kindle? How does it relate-to or portray the product?” If you miss the four-second product  placement at the beginning – it doesn’t. It took me a few views to recognize the fact that the adventure scenes the lady is going through may be apart of the story she reading on her Kindle. Without knowing that, the commercial appeared so generic that it could sub in many brand or products. Intentional or not, the commercial’s vague nature inspires a need-to-know curiosity for what the commercial is about, which is precisely what captured my attention long enough to  recognize the brand. Risky business. (In the sense that many people may not have this curiosity.)

Coca-Cola announced the new packaging designs for Minute Maid juices will be available in aisles across America during the 4th quarter of 2009 and will roll out around the world after that. The re-brand was done by Minneapolis Duffy & Partners. I predict it will be much more successful than Tropicana’s rebranding debacle that happened earlier this year.

I recently received the following email from Aldo Shoes and the subject line intrigued me enough to open the email. The subject was, “ALDO DiY Design Contest Finalists announced! Vote for your favorite today,” which most likely stood out due to its deviation from their typical lines that focus on ’shop today’ or ‘huge sale.’ Honestly, I loved the contest idea. It was simple, yet inspiring – as reflected in the design of the site as well. Every girl loves a good pair of shoes, and who wouldn’t have fun crafting up a design that represents their own individual style? Below is the email. Here is the link to the DiY contest collection, which is worth checking out: www.aldo-diy.com.

The problem with Facebook events is that they don’t make it onto real calendars, presenting two issues:

1. Events can be easily forgotten.
2. People don’t feel committed to an event, even after digitally replying, “attending.”

By volunteering in the non-profit world, I quickly discovered that people don’t actually feel invited to an event (or obliged to attend) until they have been personally invited. Facebook doesn’t create that personal connection, especially when it appears that the invitee has send the event announcement to every single person on their friend list.

Another issue with digital events in general is that it gives people the opportunity to wait before responding, in order to see who else will confirm attendance. I believe it’s very true that using a crowd to attract a bigger crowd to any event – works. If you get a low response to your event on Facebook, people may start to believe the event won’t be worth attending.

While I don’t have an answer as to how Facebook events can solve all its problems, I suggest they start by adding an ‘export to calendar’ feature.