Vibram Five Fingers are a way different type of athletic shoe than the average consumer is used to. Just one look at it’s design with the five toes and shape mimicking the human foot and anyone can tell the difference. Some studies in recent years have shown normal running shoes can cause stresses on knees and ankles, leading to an upswing in bare footing, the natural way to run. The new promotional microsite You Are The Technology illustrates the benefits of Vibram’s unique shoes and supports natural running. Explore the extremely toned, naked bodies tattooed with questions and statements to learn more, and you may even be able to find a video that shows the shoe in action over various terrain. Pretty cool execution and great minimalist design.

Source: creativity-online.com

With more than a hundred million users on Twitter, there are sure to be at least dozens of accounts out there that will reflect your interests. The trouble is finding all of them. As of July 30th, Twitter is beginning to roll out a simple, but powerful new feature to help address that — “Suggestions for You”.

The algorithms in this feature, built by their user relevance team, suggest people you don’t currently follow that you may find interesting. The suggestions are based on several factors, including people you follow and the people they follow. You’ll see these suggestions on Twitter.com and the Find People section. If you like a suggestion, click “follow”; if you don’t, click “hide,” and they’ll try not to suggest that user again.

In addition, you will begin to see recommendations for similar users when you view another account’s profile. If you’re interested in a particular user, you might be interested in these other accounts as well.

Kind of sounds like Facebook’s “suggestions” on the right hand side of your homepage, no?

Source: Twitter Blog

I love Kraft Macaroni and Cheese! It was one of my favorites when I was a kid, and I still consider it a comfort food. Kraft has now launched their noodle smile cam. According to adfreak.com, “Kraft is running a banner unit on Yahoo!’s homepage that lets users activate their webcams and control a Mac & Cheese noodle based on their smiles.” It uses CP+B facial recognition technology through webcams to animate the noodle corresponding to your smile. This technology has already been used for Burger King and Coke Zero.

I think that this is a great and fun idea to promote the classic Mac and Cheese! And because this is my last blog post I would just like to say thank you to everyone here at Source Marketing! I have had an amazing time and have learned so much! Have a good summer

According to Sony its time for all of us to get a new 3D TV! Or at least thats the message they are trying to portray with their new 3D commercials. Now that the World Cup is only 2 days away, Sony has launched a 3D commercial featuring soccer superstar Kaka playing in a match. But because the commercial is meant to be watched with 3D glasses the images all appear blurry and unrecognizable. At the end of the spot the message “Please do not adjust your set… This is 3D TV… Maybe it’s time to get a 3D TV” appears. They make a pretty convincing argument.  

This commercial is set to air before 3D movies across Europe so that audiences may enjoy it in clarity. The fact that 3D televisions even exist is amazing to me! I cant imagine being able to fully appreciate “Avatar” from my living room!

Source: The Inspiration Room

Lady Gaga announced that she would be partnering up with Apple to produce a limited edition line of iPod Shuffles. Gaga is already knee-deep in tech ventures — from Polaroid cameras to her Heartbeat Headphones — so adding a specialty Shuffle to her resumé should be no problem. The 4GB chrome-plated shuffles (which are exclusive from the Apple Store already) will be branded with Gaga’s logo and come stocked with bothThe Fame, The Fame Monster, as well as a playlist of her favorite tunes from other artists. Bonus — she’ll also be lending a hand to design an accompanying pair of earbuds to match.

She seems be to quite the tech and marketing savvy individual these days!

Source: GeekSugar.com

For the month of March Kansas has a new capital; Google. Under a formal proclamation issued by Mayor Bill Bunten on Monday, March 1, the capital of the Sunflower State will be known as Google, Kan. — “the capital city of fiber optics.”

It’s perhaps the most brazen and offbeat publicity stunt among several U.S. cities with big broadband dreams that are vying for a spot in Google’s new “Fiber for Communities” program. Announced in February, the Web search giant plans to pick one or more cities for its pilot project, offering an ultra-high speed network at a “competitive price.” The experiment has citizens salivating at the thought of Internet that’s100 times faster than what’s available in average American households. Cities have until March 26 to express their interest in Google’s fiber-optic broadband test, and Bunten believes his proclamation speaks for itself.

Source & more details at: govtech.com

A company in Japan has developed headphones that sense eye movement. Look right to left to pause your music, roll them clockwise to increase the volume. NTT DoCoMo, the company who created the new technology, doesn’t have plans yet to market or sell them, but if this catches on we could soon see some pretty crazy eye moving in public.

They work by sensing tiny changes in electric charge; apparently the cornea in our eyes has a positive charge, and changes in charge can be detected as far away as your ears. Who knew? Let’s just hope no one misinterprets a turn-up-the-music eye roll with a you’re-being-ridiculous eye roll.

CodeOrgan.com is a great site for totally geeky musical entertainment. Type any URL into CodeOrgan, and the site will use an algorithm to compose music based on the website’s code. It first scans the text on the page and removes all of the letters that aren’t musical notes (so, letters that aren’t A-G). It then scans for the most popular “note,” turning the song into either major or minor key. Then, it uses the total number of letters on the page to determine which synthesizer tone to use, and finally creates a drum beat based on the ratio of “note” letters to non-note letters.

In other words, it’s a very complicated way of saying: CodeOrgan shows off an extremely geeky way to make music. Check it out at codeorgan.com

Source: GeekSugar

Apple held a press conference and media event to announce the launch of it’s much-hyped new tablet, the iPad. Prices range from $499 to $829 (depending on hard drive size and WiFi/3G connectivity).

Notable features include capabilities to use all iPhone/iPod Touch apps, USB syncing, enhanced music browsing, PDF-viewing, and an iPhone-like “Home” screen rather than desktop/dock.

Notable MISSING features include a camera (front-facing or otherwise), Flash capabilities, and any CD/DVD drives.

Initial consumer feedback isn’t overwhelmingly positive; many (myself included) were expecting something a lot closer to the MacBook in functionality. Perhaps there will be a desire for developers to create apps exclusively for the iPad, but as of now it is mostly an oversized iPhone… without the phone.

Source: MacRumors

Using OLED technology, the flower plastered stuff called wallpaper could be lighting homes across the world, cutting carbon emissions, and eliminate the need for light bulbs as early as 2012.

The government-backed carbon trust has awarded a £454,000 ($720,000) grant to a company by the name of Lomox, to develop the special wallpaper. Inspired by OLED TVs which use low voltage, Lomox hopes to use some of the same technology for wallpaper that lights up rooms and outdoor areas.

Source: Gizmodo