Flower-lined streets had fewer burglaries

Flower Power Thwarts Burglars in Japan : TreeHugger
Studies have shown that hospital patients make a speedier recovery when they have a exposure to living vegetation, like trees and flowers. And certainly great metropoli are made even more liveable by their extensive parks and gardens. Now it seems that plants can also deter burglars. Sort of.
Suginami, [...]

Curriculum Design

Just some eye candy on this subject – Papanek’s sketch.

I made the draft for three curricula – courses in Social Design, Service Design and Social Innovation. I am imagining that at this point the object trajectory of design is one path. The dematerialized is another way entirley.
The difference in the two paths is the focus [...]

The opportunities in an Economic Downturn for Designers

I keep hearing of people being laid off – Designers are losing their jobs in the current downturn. So what do they do. I have a few ideas for things you can do as you wait for the economy to turn around:
1. Go back to uni and do a Masters degree. So you get to [...]

Social Design it is

I have just come back from India. And from Presenting the School of Design vision. For now its all go – and that is really exciting. In short the vision argues for three new kinds of courses:
1. Social Innovation: Where the key focus is upon a people orientated project that uses methodologies more attuned to [...]

Sustainable Innovation: The Organizational, Human, and Knowledge Dimensions

Sustainable Innovation: The Organizational, Human, and Knowledge Dimensions | Discovery Fuel
Problematically, most contemporary patterns of innovation in human social systems and organisations are not sustainable. This prevents people from learning effectively, from recognising and solving their problems, and from operating in sustainable ways. It is arguably why societies, businesses and industries around the world are [...]

Design School Vision

I finally started writing – the tool kit for a new School of Design. A tool kit because a vision is so self aggarandising. Tool kit is so much more participative. For now the tool kit has three parts – a way to do a take on design.

1. The Agenda – which in this case [...]

D-Light

d.light – About Us
The use of kerosene lamps has caused countless disabilities and loss of lives. Kerosene lamps are a poor and unreliable source of light that emit smoke and create unhealthy home environments. They depend on kerosene fuel, which is expensive for the rural family. There are 1.6 billion people worldwide who still [...]

KICKING GOALS – CHANGING LIVES: Discussions about homelessness, poverty, social entrepreneurship and making a change

Series Venue:  BMW Edge at Federation Square, Melbourne
Series Moderator:  Ms Tracee Hutchison, a writer, broadcaster, reporter for
ABC TV’s 7.30 Report and Saturday Age Opinion columnist.
FREE ENTRY
CONVERSATION ONE
Wednesday 3 December – Kicking Goals – Changing Lives
A discussion with young people about street soccer, crime, homelessness,
poverty, achievement against the odds and how young people can make a
difference [...]

More Social Innovation

“The world needs more social innovation—and so all who aspire to solve the world’s most vexing problems—entrepreneurs, leaders, managers, activists, and change agents—regardless of whether they come from the world of business, government, or nonprofits, must shed old patterns of isolation, paternalism, and antagonism and strive to understand, embrace, and leverage cross-sector dynamics to find [...]

Obama White House Wishlist: ‘Office of Social Entrepreneurship’

Social Entrepreneurship – Change.org: Obama White House Wishlist: ‘Office of Social Entrepreneurship’
The Chronicle of Philanthropy reported yesterday that influential progressive think tanks New Democracy Fund and the Center for American Progress are advocating for the creation of a White House Office for Social Entrepreneurship.
While Obama had advocated for a Social Entrepreneurship Agency on the campaign [...]

Measuring the economic impact of social innovation

MaRS Blog – Innovation and Commercialization in Canada » Blog Archive » Measuring the economic impact of social innovation
A few weeks ago, someone asked me how social innovation has affected the economy and, more specifically, how that compares to technology innovation. Nothing obvious came to mind. After some serious thought and a thorough search of [...]

Understand social innovation

Understand your social innovation topic (a step in Design Thinking) « Contagious Creativity
To understand a huge topic such as social innovation, the very first step would be our sincere interest and passion to know more about both elements: the social, and the innovation. The first time I learned about this was last year, as part [...]

Enabled by Design now a ‘dot org’ social start up

enabled by design
As of today, we are officially a ‘dot org’ social start up!
Marking an important new chapter in the Enabled by Design story, today sees the launch of the Innovation Exchange’s Next Practice programme. EbD and 13 other third sector innovation projects have been chosen to work with the Innovation Exchange and develop our [...]

The necessity of Socially Engaged Design

Still at the level of ‘meaning’ construction in design – but I am inserting the notion of ‘manifesto’ – and archaic term much loved by students.
Moon Base, Victor Papanek and the necessity of Socially Engaged Design « Design Research Group
Naturally there’s much to disagree with Papanek, if not in his overall argument, then in the [...]

Is Design Elitist?

I have maintained for some time that Design ( and Architecture) and all these practices are in the main elitist! I say in the main as there exist more inclusive projects and perspectives such as – Design for the other 90 percent and Architects without frontiers. Though I have got into arguments defending these projects/ [...]

Philanthrocapitalism

Word Spy – philanthrocapitalism
philanthrocapitalism n. Philanthropy that uses the principles, models, and techniques of capitalism. Also: philanthro-capitalism. [Blend of philanthropy and capitalism.]—philanthrocapitalist n.
Example Citations:Much of the strength of the philanthrocapitalism movement lies in the effort to remodel the philanthropic paradigm, and to offer a new vocabulary, a new mind-set, and new mechanisms for approaching traditional [...]

Volans

VOLANS: The Business of Social Innovation » About Volans
Volans is a for-profit company, dedicated to the business of social and environmental innovation. Founded in March 2008, Volans is based in London and Singapore with partnerships developing across the world. We work with corporations and social enterprises to create opportunities for talent share, to spark the [...]

Social Entrepreneurship Defined

Social Entrepreneurship Defined | Social Velocity
Because social innovation is such a new field, terms are still being defined. At times terms are used interchangeably when in reality they have very different meanings. Academics and thought leaders are still hammering out final definitions, but in the interim a common language is beginning to emerge. In an [...]

Taking on Australian Industrial design education: current practice and future directions

Draft abstract.

Mr. Stephen Trathen, University of Canberra Australia and Dr. Soumitri Varadarajan, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia
There is much international discussion regarding the role of Industrial Design in a rapidly changing world, from the view to focus solely on the need for relevant design skills and knowledge as fundamental for employment; to a recognition that industrial [...]

Service Design studio at RISD

I stumbled upon a service design studio at RISD. This is the first – for me to find service design in the US. From my exposure to studio teaching in the US – both from returning students who went there on exchange and from my visits to design studios – I had a picture of [...]

Obama’s energy plan and social innovation opportunities

Continuing the conversation that we’ve started, check out the Obama Administration’s energy plan video posted below. Today on TriplePundit, the founder of ConstructiveBuilding.com added a layer of specificity to the specific new economic opportunities that the energy plan would create, for the economy in general and entrepreneurs in particular. A couple salient points for socially-minded [...]

The Coming Fourth Sector

The Coming Fourth Sector | Social Velocity
In the last couple of years there have been discussions about the convergence of the public, private and nonprofit sectors, some call this The Fourth Sector. Up until now, there have been, for the most part, 3 separate sectors. The government sector was separate and distinct from [...]

Change dot Org

Social Entrepreneurship – Change.org: About
What if you could train disabled persons, formerly-trafficked women, and other underserved groups in Cambodia to take on one of the most important and intellectually intensive roles in modern global business?
That was the question Jeremy Hockenstein asked himself when he founded Digital Divide Data, a nonprofit social venture that teaches computer [...]

Reflective Practitioner

On Reflective PhDs: I have at this point four PhD candidates who are all doing their PhDs with reflective practice as their methodology. While lack of certainty and clarity is their constant companion they are all on the verge of and continually come up with some startling insights. The trick is to take these insights [...]

SI Conversations

Social Innovation Conversations
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