Entries from March 2008

Girl Geek Dinners Sydney are holding their next dinner event on Thursday 17 April at Sydney's Cafe Jest. There are 2 amazing geek girls who are speaking on the night - UX guru Lindsay Ratcliffe from ThoughtWorks will speak about how designers and developers can collaborate to create the optimal user experience; and Google's Stephanie Hannon will discuss the development of Google's Geo products, ... Read full entry

Offices and The Creativity Zone Dan Benjamin on why open plan offices, or come to that, offices in general, are counter productive, and virtually useless, when it comes to entering the creative zone. Getting into The Zone is almost like getting lost a good book. You're sitting comfortably, you have your favorite beverage in hand. The house is quiet and you're without distraction. You're reading, the book is great, you're ... Read full entry

Earth Hour was a hit globally this year. Check the photos from Sydney, or explore the Flickr photos. Many people opted to light candles, have candle lit dinners, or barbecues, during the black out period, but it seems such activity, no matter how well intentioned, merely served to cancel out the benefits of switching off the ... Read full entry

Mini-Y2K fears over daylight saving change Daylight was extended by a week in parts of Australia, and now ends next week, the first weekend of April, rather than the traditional last weekend of March. The change has caught many software vendors off-guard however, with mobile phones and other applications reverting to standard time yesterday morning. Many electronic devices with internal clocks are set to adjust automatically for daylight saving but, as ... Read full entry

Despite occupying at least a quarter of Centennial Park (far more space than the recent Good Vibrations and Jack Johnson events), and having two stages, the V Festival, which took place in Sydney last Saturday still lost money, according to Virgin boss, Richard Branson. Responding to questions about the festival's financial losses last year Branson said: "We've now gotten bigger this year - we're gonna lose ... Read full entry

Space memorial firm will rocket cremated remains on the moon How's this for a way to spend eternity, interred on the Moon's surface, with an exclusive view of the Solar System and Galaxy to boot. A US firm specializing in sending people's cremated ashes into orbit is going to turn the Moon into a graveyard for earthlings beginning next year. Instead of caskets or urns, ashes of the dearly departed will ... Read full entry

Neanderthals wore make-up and liked to chat I wonder if they hung at night spots hoping to get lucky, and also had wingmen? Francesco d'Errico, an archaeologist from the University of Bordeaux, France, has found crafted lumps of pigment - essentially crayons - left behind by Neanderthals across Europe. He says that Neanderthals, who most likely had pale skin, used these dark pigments to mark their own as well ... Read full entry

Australian artists and designers Oz Dean and Dan Himbrechts are holding a joint exhibition, which explores graffiti and snowboard influenced art, at the MTV Gallery, East Sydney, from 8 to 23 May 2008. The opening night event kicks off at 6pm on Thursday 8 May. See the flyer for details.

How to make the ultimate mouse pad Lee Stephens and the ultimate mouse pad... but is this a D-I-Y home building project, or is he baking a cake? I'm working here with a floor tile that's about a foot square. What you want to do is grate about half the candle, evenly spread it over the floor tile, then ... Read full entry

Sydney Aboriginal Rock Engravings A collection of photos of Aboriginal Rock Engravings, some that are over 20,000 years old, from settlement sites in, and around, the Sydney basin. Amazing.