Chris, a designer and sports fan, has been talking about the book When the Game was Ours for what seems like the last year and a half. Needless to say, he has a specific interest in the Larry Bird-Magic Johnson rivalry. One time I introduced Chris to a friend as an expert in "Bird-Magic" which was actually confused as avian mysticism. We found this to be a pretty hilarious concept and worthy of further exploration. So Chris and I took the final hour of the day on Tuesday and assigned ourselves a design challenge: Redesign the cover of the book "When the Game was Ours" as a fantasy/science fiction novel titled "Bird Magic."

To provide a better user experience, we often use content delivery solutions like Limelight or Akamai to host bigger files and reduce load time. (Although this cuts into the user's time spent watching pretty loaders.)

During a recent project, we ran into a couple of security errors loading external module.swf files from a different domain than main.swf. The idea was to have a basic framework in main that controls IN and OUT animations of the modules and have all additional functionality in the module.swf itself. All loaded swf files extended Big Spaceships StandardInOut Class to be controllable from the main file, so we could easily cast the loaded modules.

As Whrrl launched the third version of their iPhone app yesterday, how exactly should we view it?  Is it simply another service in the rapidly crowding Location Based Service (LBS) marketplace or does it offer enough unique services that it is significantly differentiated?  While Whrrl does have some unique features to distinguish it from the likes of Foursquare and Gowalla, is it enough to slow the momentum of these dominant services?

We know, we know.  Things have been a little bit slow here at Think as we've moved into 2010, but one of our resolutions for the year is to change that.  Things have been busier than ever, but we're eager to commit more time to sharing our thoughts, ideas and observations -- and, selfishly, even more eager to learn from the wide range of experts, innovators and generally thoughtful, opinionated and diverse readers who take the time to join us and share their comments.

Since we're more interested in conversation than monologue, we wanted to take a moment to introduce -- or re-introduce -- the diverse group of people behind the blog.  Below, a quick self-introduction from each of our contributors... and if you follow this blog, we'd love for you to introduce yourself in the comments.

This post was originally shared on Adobe XD's INSPIRE, who were kind enough to ask me to blog for them last week. You can find many a great post from those in the user experience and design fields there. Please check it out.
We at Big Spaceship are always looking to incorporate new perspectives that will inform our thinking in projects, helping us shape insights that ultimately lead to ideas and execution. As we roll into 2010, there are a few disciplines we’ve been dipping our collective toes into that I think will have a big impact on the way we approach the experiences we design.

This post was originally shared on Adobe XD's INSPIRE, who were kind enough to ask me to blog for them this week. You can find many a great post from those in the user experience and design fields there. Please check it out.

On top of looking for ways to grab attention, brands should be thinking about how they can engage their audiences in conversation. Discussing the needs and values of your audience with your audience can help you find better ways to solve for their problems. Carrying on a conversation also shows that you care about what your audience wants. And if you as a brand can demonstrate that you care, well, maybe they’ll care about you too. Brands that don’t engage in a discussion end up doing a lot of talking before earning the permission needed to speak in any meaningful way.