Rich Foster's Blogs

I am not at all happy about the proposed design of the Union Jack, ok they left Wales off the flag when it was first created in 1801 but is slapping a huge dragon on the front effective? I understand that each of the 4 countries should have some kind of representation on the flag but this looks like it was designed using Microsoft Word, slapping a clip art dragon on the front and totally ruins the flag.

A few years ago I went to hear Peter Saville speak at one of the design conferences in New York, he felt that in the UK things were "over designed" with banks resembling amusement arcades with neon signs and bright colours, estate agents appearing like trendy lounges and constant visual bombardment of high street brands all fighting for attention. I am of the opinion that this in some part adds to the level of visual sophistication in the average UK consumer which in turn leads to agencies having to push the boundaries to create more challenging concepts and visual executions. Clearly this is not the case with this flag, which to me looks more like a guilty after thought than a well thought out and designed solution.

Sun Sachs, Director of Key Experiences demos the AIR applications AOL featured at Adobe Max in Chicago. Click here to Download Widget.

The Key Experiences team recently launched the My Favorite Artists widget on the Facebook platform, you can select your top 10 for the list of a 100 artists from AOL Music. This is our first outing on the Facebook platform, but this definitely takes a lot of the thinking and customization we put into all the widgets we produce and delivers a great experience including photo and videos in compact form factor.

We are now working on an AIR version that will be desktop based and will include all artists on AOL Music. These smaller vehicles are great ways for us share our content creating a more intimate relationships with our users with content that they choose to engage with.

These widgets are free and if you have a Facebook account add this to your profile page, it's free, customizable and fun. For more information and to see a full suite of the desktop and web based apps click here.

I have often spent hours scouring the web for good examples of information graphics and other experiments in data visualization with little success. The good people at smashing magazine have collected a superb cross section of work that is definitely food for thought.

The simplicity of this needs no explanation.

After many years of very well written purely typographic ad's (ok so they did use a light bulb a few times) the Economist has gone for an illustrated approach, I think AMV BBDO, London did an amazing job of keeping the integrity of the brand but offering a new spin on the execution.

"The World Revolves Around The Sun. The world revolves around the sun. Not the British isles. The Economist"

"100 000 Brain Cells". 100,000 of your brain cells die every day. Make sure it's not from boredom. The Economist"

"Know Everything. You can't know everything about everything. But you can give it a good go. The Economist"

"Six Years Old. Because it isn't only 6 year olds who don't want to be left in the dark. The Economist"

"Dissection. Good if you're a story. Bad if you're a frog. The Economist"

"Follow The Herd. Looking for the herd? It went thataway. The Economist"