Frugal solutions – Our brief new pamphlet

At the Universe Foundation we've just published a short, easy to read pamphlet which describes why we see a need for companies to develop more "frugal solutions".

It also features  a toolbox of methods that companies may consider if they want to try lowering prices without comprising the utility for end-users. 

You can download it here.

Obviously, there’s an extensive website as well.

In English - and in Danish

Counterfeit paradises - amazing photo book from China

 

Matthew Niederhauser is a photographer living in China with a keen eye for the absurdity of the ways Chinese developers create completely artificial town as replicas of German villages, French chateaus or Venetian canals. You can see a large collection in his online book, Counterfeit paradises. Very funny, very weird - a bit hard to comprehend, actually.The pdf is rather large, so it takes a while to load. It's worth the wait. 

Foxconn's robots are late

Interesting update on the situation around Foxconn’s plans to deploy massive numbers of robots in their immense factories in China – the ones that, among other, produce phones and computers for Apple.

Several details I wasn’t aware of:

- Foxconn is losing money, $US 316 mio. last year

- Foxcon build their own robots – they call them Foxbots. They started constructing the robots with the help of MIT back in 2009. So far they have only made 20.000, but the plans are to build a million.

- Unusually, there is currently a freeze in hiring at Foxconn, or at least thay was the situation back in february, after the new year holiday.

Basic tricks for computer use that you ought to know

New Times tech columnist David Pogue delivers real value for your time in this 6 minute TED presentation of 10 basic trick for easier everyday use of you computer, phone and camera.
Like: don't use your mouse to scoll on a webpage, use the spacebar to go down a screen - or shift space bar to go back up again.
Or: Press ctrl + to magnify the size of text on a webpage. ctrl - to back in size again. (it's the cmd-key on Macs)
useful stuff.

The core of e-learning

E-learning, flipping the classroom, blended learning... it's been exploding recently.
Here are links to three podcast with some central actors in the field:

A presentation by Salman Khan at the London School of Economics

A presentation by Sebastian Thrun from Udacity for the Commonwealth club of California on april 17. 2013

And finally, some interesting critical observations from Nicholas Negroponte, ex-head of MIT Medialab, speaking for the Long Now Foundation. He argues that videoinstructions and online tests are disastrous for learning. He calls it instructionalism. Instead he reminds of the virtues of constructivism; learning by doing and making, and the combination and the combination of theory and practice.
His remarks are concentrated 44 minutes into the programme.

Saving all open word documents at once

Ah, I finally found this function: If you have a bunch of word documents open on your screen and want to make sure they are all saved, you can save them all in one go by pressing "shift", and then choosing the "save all" function which will now appear in your "file" menu. Works for both windows and Mac. Wonderful!
It's explained in detail here.

Chinese phrases for key cultural concepts

Here are some Chinese phrases that anyone dealing with China might find useful to know: 

Fendou - 奋斗 

Struggle, hard work. There’s a strong belief that hard work and plain living is the way to build up a person – and a country, as well. Fendou is the drive that allows China to catch up

Renao - 热闹

Lively, hot, noisy. Whereas Danes typically prefer a quiet, orderly setting, Chinese often like to go where everyone else is mingling, talking, eating.

Mianzi - 面对

Face. Showing a big face, protecting face is very important. Nice clothes, a big car, an impressive façade on the house, paying the bills at restaurants – even if you can’t really afford it.

Shanzhai - 山寨

Literally: The bandit’s nest. Refers to pirated copies and low quality semi-legal products. Shanzhai companies are used to working fast, delivering what customers want, really cheap and with whatever means it takes.

Hexie, 和谐

Harmony. A very important concept in later years. Chinese leaders have emphasized the wish to develop a harmonius society, with comfortable, stable and fair relationships. Family and teams in companies should also be in harmony.

Shuang - 爽

If something is just great, feels wonderful, clear, bright and satisfying, the Chinese will call it Shuang, in an affectionate voice.

Jia You-  加油

Literally means: Add gas. Usually a shout to encourage someone to work harder: Go! Commonly used at sporting events, or to ask employees to speed up.

When the copy comes before the original

Here's a great little story about copying in China:
Zahia Hadid, one of the world's leading architects, has drawn the very distinct Wangjing SOHO complex, which is currently under construction in Beijing. However, it seems that someone has gotten hold of the drawings and used them as a very direct inspiration for a similar complex, which is under construction in Chongqing. Apart from illustrating that anything is subject to copying in China, there's a delicious twist to the story, because apparently the building in Chongqing will be completed before the one in Beijing. So the copy will precede the original.
You can read the full story in this article from Der Spiegel.