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Maria Popova
Creator and Author, “Brain Pickings”
Maria Popova is a reader and a writer, and writes about what she reads on Brain Pickings (brainpickings.org), which is included in the Library of Congress archive of culturally valuable materials. She has also written for The New York Times, Wired UK, and The Atlantic, among others, and is an MIT Fellow. She is on Twitter @brainpicker.
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Designer Kaylene Kau has produced a highly functional, sleek prosthetic arm inspired by the tentacle of an octopus.
There is increasing concern about pollution levels in the world’s most ubiquitous and essential substance – air – and a new pilot project from Intel is aiming to address it […]
Last month, we looked at Meltware – an ingenious line of DIY tableware made out of palm tree wax. Now, a similar and even more playful project is applying the same […]
Homelessness is perhaps the most disconcerting reminder of the staggering gap between the rich and the poor in some of the world’s wealthiest nations. In Detroit alone, more than 18,000 […]
Playing into the established “reuse is better than recycle” eco-sensibility, TerraCycle takes trash and transforms it into useful eco-products. TerraCycle runs a series of free national brigades, inviting people to […]
For the past year, security researcher Dan Kaminsky has had an interesting secret side project that has nothing to do with his day job: He’s been working on correcting color […]
Real-time translation and augmented reality have been among 2010’s hottest topics. Now, one app is marrying the two. Word Lens is a real-time translation app that turns your iPhone into […]
The open-source movement’s capacity for collaborative innovation on the content and productivity side is a well-established reality, with success stories like Wikipedia, WordPress and Firefox to show for. But open-source […]
War-torn Afghanistan has a long path to healing ahead, but one nonprofit, Business Council for Peace, is quietly pushing things along with a smart social enterprise that trains Afghan women […]
We’ve previously looked at severalexamples of Braille-centric design for the blind. Haptic Braille is an ingenious concept by Korean designer Baek Kil Hyun – a portable Braille translator and scanner. […]
Visual literacy is an essential necessity of modern life. But some of the most widely recognized symbols of visual language are wrapped in a surprising amount of historical and contextual […]
We’ve previously looked at educational tools that help consumers make better choices when it comes to sustainability. Now, a new joint project between the Not For Sale Campaign and International […]
The pipe dream of the paperless office has been around for a while, hoping to mitigate the massive paper waste generated by the corporate world – 1,410 unnecessary pages printed […]
3D printing is easily the biggest design futurism meme of 2010. We’ve previously looked at other approaches to on-demand, DIY, factory-free design objects. Now, NYC-based designer Alissia Melka-Teichroew is applying […]
While online tools for personal finance management like Mint and Outright make it increasingly easier to keep track of our “digital money,” there’s something to be said for the dwindling […]
Democracy is a great concept, but its micro-implementations in matters as petty and mundane as agreeing with coworkers on what music to stream at the office can be a messy […]
Texas-based designer and builder Dan Phillips builds extraordinary low-cost homes out of reclaimed materials. In his witty and insightful talk from TEDxHouston, he showcases a dozen of his remarkable creations […]
Energy efficiency in the home, particularly the notion of the smart grid, has been a concept of increasing interest both by ordinary citizens and large-scale corporations in the energy sector. […]
Are your kitchen cabinets overflowing with tableware you rarely use, only to find yourself in need of an essential missing piece for that dinner party? Eindhoven Design Academy graduate Maaike […]
When the TSA dramatically upped the level of intimacy for airport security scans this month, public outrage ensued, ranging from tongue-in-cheek mashups to grassroots activism. Now, designers are taking their stab […]