The Finnish company of Tampere (and now Espoo) produced at one time or another paper products, car and bicycle tires, communications cables, televisions  and other consumer electronics, personal computers, electricity generation machinery, robotics, capacitors, military communications and equipment (such as the SANLA M/90 device and the M61 gas mask for the Finnish Army), plastics, aluminium, chemicals and footwear. Yes, you read correctly, footwear!

To make the (boot) story short, the Nokian Footwear story began in 1898, when a group of Finnish business men decided to establish the company Suomen Gummitehdas Oy (Finnish Rubber Works Ltd) in Helsinki. After operating for a few years, the factory began to produce high quality rubber galoshes, which competed successfully against Russian imports.

As production grew, the factory was moved from Helsinki to Nokia. Soon the rubber company began to highlight the name Nokia, communicating Finnishness, in its marketing. Demand for the company’s products grew strongly and the rubber boot became a utility item for the whole nation! And this has been lasting until today!

If you’re a reaaal dyed in the whool Nokia fan, then you won’t resist the temptation of buying your very own pair of Nokia(n) boots and carry your beloved brand wherever you go!

“Nokia, shoe fitting people”

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Source: Nokian boot wear and Wikipedia

My Paper Heroes is a blog which offers for download (and for free…) a variety of very detailed DIY paper heroes models already printed on plain A4 paper. All you need is a color printer, a pair of scissors, a little bit of glue and some patience to create your very own collection of paper heroes/pop culture figures.

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So far, more than 30 models are available! Well enough to keep kids (or yourself) busy during Easter holidays…

This is a sample of how a model looks like once printed in A4 format (the IronMan model fits on seven A4 paper pages)

And if you feel like “scissoring” a rabbit instead, you might have some fun with Cutnejo!

Hartmut Esslinger, one early superstar of high-tech design, was responsible for the design of Apple devices in the 80s. He then developed together with Steve Jobs a prototype of a touchscreen phone whose main function was to make possible sending digital bank checks though a phone wire. This quite revolutionnary gizmo – remember that we’re then in 1983 – was part of the Snow White design language applied to the IIc and the original Mac.

Was Apple already trying to raise the buzz?

I can say with certainty that this is the best roller bag ever made. Why this particular bit of genius hasn’t caught on, I can’t imagine. Possibly because, like those who ride the accursed Segway, riders of this contraption would give off a certain “punch me” vibe. And yet, one can’t entirely suppress the feeling of wanting to switch places with them, if only for a moment. Shameful, but understandable.

The Trolley Scooter from Samsonite und Micro Mobility is the perfect tool for bloggers like myself who cumulates hundred of miles (and that’s no lie…) wandering and running in Airports and at trade shows all year long with packs full of gear.
To be perfectly honest, I’d rather scoot than spend the day sweating my shirt running between airport gates. All the more so as I’ll probably look like the coolest traveller Airport security guys will have ever seen!

No price is given and I can’t find it on Micro Mobility’s site, but I would ballpark its cost at around 100€ — $120 or thereabouts.

I was precisely wondering which use could big cities make of those hugly and half-useful manholes in their streets…

Designer: Jiae Kwon

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(via ignant)

Then, cell phone manufacturers who were all struggling on this highly competitive industry, started to brainstorm on this issue and came-up with a great idea: they’d equip their new generation mobile devices with cool features such as digital camera, built-in radio, video games, etc. to make them more attractive to consumers! and it worked quite well (I can still remember the competitions of Nokia’s “snake game”) ! But that was not enough, and we experienced a new trend. Some crazy engineers and marketers, probably high or at least euphoric, started to transform objects of our everyday’s life into mobile phones…

yesterday: Mobile phone as a gaming platgorm[singlepic id=35 w=320 h=240 float=center]

Nokia was he first to launch the N-Gage, in a quixotic attempt to fuse phone and handheld gaming platform. That was in October 2003.

today: Mobile phone as a camera[singlepic id=22 w=320 h=240 float=center] The Samsung Memoir T929 just looks like any regular mid-level digital camera you can find at RadioShack or Best Buy. Its 8-megapixel delivers top-notch photo quality, but that’s almost all.

today: Mobile phone as a navigation system[singlepic id=24 w=320 h=240 float=center] Garmin is already famous for its navigation systems. And there was only one step to do, to move from a meer GPS to a GPS with embedded communication features. This Nuviphone G60 is the offspring of a partnership between Garmin and Asus. “Pretty slow when reorienting itself or entering certain applications, and, as feared, there seems a general lack of depth to the functionality of the actual “smartphone” features like calendar or contacts, but the location-based services — in the car and out — really do bring a lot to the table” according to Engadget.

tomorrow: Mobile phone as a weather forecast device. Introducing the “Window Phone” concept [singlepic id=26 w=320 h=240 float=center] Weather often rules the day. Most modern mobile phones offer built in weather forecasts widgets which can also be downloaded from the Internet. But the information they deliver frustrates me most of the time: lack of accuracy, lack of information, but most of all, lack of design in the delivery of information! So why wouldn’t there be a mobile phone dedicated to weather forecasts? [nggallery id=5] The Window Phone is a concept mobile phone by designer Seunghan Song, that is able to transform its appearance like a window as per the weather. The phone is designed as a thin, clear and transparent plastic sheet, which remains clear during a sunny day, displays virtual rain drops on a rainy day and takes a dump outlook during a snowy day. The user can write text messages or draw pictures on the phone in different weather conditions which will later transform and show as SMS characters. The screen features sensitive interaction with the user and comprises the state of a window in different weather conditions.

And since our world of tomorrow will slightly be different (worse?) than our of today, the “Window Phone” will turn into the must-have device which will be able to warn us against acid rains, air pollution, storms and much more.

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* A frog is, generally, well known for its ability to forecast weather…

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Even Will Smith’s car in iRobot wished it had this ID plate…

Unfurled into a 252° semicircle, the Mobile Mini reveals five modular rooms that cover your needs for a bed, bath, living room, kitchen and even an office. Cutouts in all of the walls allow for the various bits to interlock when it’s folded up, and, unfolded, there’s a transparent screen that pulls out to act as the roof and walls.

Even if some parts of this trailer are at an early age of development and raise some questions (“where does the huge floor comes from? Does it overlaps with the rest of the structure or is it towed in a separate trailer? What hapens with theplumbing, water or waste tanks on movable walls? How is the whole structure cooled down in summer/heated in winter? Will it be possible to have an opaque sliding screen instead of the see-trough one?”), the idea per se is really interesting and deserves funding for further development and eventually a mass production for the consumer market (nomads and nature lovers, raise your hand!).

* “moving in a moving thing”

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Sources: Yanko Design

Here is a prototype of food container specifically designed for office workers (or urban nomads always on the go…) who do not even have time to heat their lunch in the microwave oven during their lunch break.

Equipped with a built-in heating and insulation system, the device plugs into the USB port of the computer and warms up your meal you have prepared the day before or the morning before you left to the office.

For the other co-workers who have their meal delivered at the office, they can keep their food warm in MO:BEN while they finish editing their weekly timesheets…

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Source:  Gearfuse