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Design Economics Information Technology Innovation

Watch Jane McGonigal’s “Gaming can make a better world” talk at TED

Games like World of Warcraft give players the means to save worlds, and incentive to learn the habits of heroes. What if we could harness this gamer power to solve real-world problems? Jane McGonigal says we can, and explains how […]

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Economics Information Technology Innovation Software Trend Watching

Information Technology in Brazil: IT services push GDP numbers up

Segment was the fastest growing in 2011, according to GDP data. market jumped from U.S. $ 59 billion in 2008 to US$ 95 billion in 2011 […]

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Economics Innovation Trend Watching

Watch Justin Hall-Tipping’s “Freeing energy from the grid” talk at TED

What would happen if we could generate power from our windowpanes? In this moving talk, entrepreneur Justin Hall-Tipping shows the materials that could make that possible, and how questioning our notion of ‘normal’ can lead to extraordinary breakthroughs […]

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China Economics Trend Watching

Living in China: Foreign expert numbers on the rise in Shanghai

Some 81,000 foreign experts were working in Shanghai at the end of 2011 – a third more than in 2005, the local labor authority said recently […]

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Design Innovation Readings Software

Autodesk software behind ‘Best Visual Effects’ Academy Award Nominees

The five movies nominated for the “Best Visual Effects” Oscar havea something fairly obvious in common: They all relied on special software to create the effects. Check out the various 3D tools from Autodesk that were used for each film […]

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Design Innovation

Watch Joe Sabia’s “The technology of storytelling” talk at TED

iPad storyteller Joe Sabia introduces us to Lothar Meggendorfer, who created a bold technology for storytelling: the pop-up book. Sabia shows how new technology has always helped us tell our own stories, from the walls of caves to his own onstage iPad […]

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China Economics Trend Watching

Living in China: Shanghai holds the highest population of foreigners

Shanghai has the largest population of foreign nationals among all domestic cities and provinces in China, with about 143,200 expat residents living in the city, the Shanghai Statistics Bureau announced recently. Nearly one in every four foreign residents in the country lives in Shanghai, according to the sixth national census conducted in November 2010. […]

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Personal

Ladies and Gentleman: welcome Caleb Peng Medeiros

As you’ve probably noticed, there hasn’t been much updates to this blog in the last two weeks, since I’ve been pre-occupied with having a baby: his name is Caleb Peng Medeiros, was born on October 20th, 2011, weighting 2.5 Kilos (approximately 5.5 pounds) […]

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China Consumer Behavior Economics Information Technology Trend Watching

China, Socialism & Consumer Behavior: Chinese consumers choosier, web-savvy

Chinese consumers are becoming increasingly sophisticated in their tastes and expect a wider range of better products, according to a report released Monday that says local companies lead foreign ones in using e-commerce to expand sales […]

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Design Innovation Software

Watch Aaron Koblin’s “Crowds and Clouds: Data, Sheep, and Collaboration” talk at MIT’s Office of the Arts

Where others see just data points and fodder for bar graphs, Aaron Koblin visualizes dynamic systems where information assumes forms both abstract and familiar. In this talk, Koblin shares recent projects that meld statistical science and art to convey a really big picture, while often inviting the viewer to partake in a more personal experience […]