Now for some beefy content, here are some highlights:

New facebook interface / profiles: Very clean. More canvas space for developers. The extra space is also in anticipation of aging baby-boomers who poor eye site joining facebook – giving fbook designers more space to work with larger fonts and buttons. There is a also a heavy focus on the news feed which combines the wall, and will also publish from external sites using Facebook Connect. I have been using the new interface for a few days and now I prefer it a lot to the original - overall feels a lot less cramped.

Application Improvement: This is huge. You will no longer need to ‘Opt-in’ for applications to view them or information that your friends on storing on them (ie. You can see what’s on your friend’s bookshelf without installing the app.) Also facebook will be embracing Applications that they believe are good based on their 10 principles (below). Rewards are given to good apps in the form of a “Verified” seal, and for even better apps they get a “Great Applications” seal. Similar to a service eBay has been offering to its API developers for a while now.

Facebook’s ‘Ten Guiding Principles” for developers

Meaningful:
Social
Useful
Expressive
Engaging

Trustworthy:
Secure
Respectful
Transparent

Well Designed:
Clean
Fast
Robust

Facebook connect: Now this is really going to change the way people interact inside and outside of facebook. It is very similar to Google’s ‘Friend Connect’ but has a lot of promise because of everyone is on facebook (the count is about 90 Million active users!) With facebook connect, developers will be able to add a simple piece of script that allows them to pull any facebook information from a user you agrees to ‘Connect’ – allowing users to bring their profile with them. Additionally it allows people to connect with other facebook friends of theirs using the same site. The coolest part is authenticated registration. Imagine signing up for a new beta site, with the registration taking only one-click. This gives websites more accurate and current profile, and gives the user simple and quick registration. A large part of Facebook connect is seamless flow to news feed. Completely at the discretion of the user people can publish from the external site to their newsfeed. Users can choose the size of the post to the news feed, from one line to a large image, or to nothing at all – lots of user control and well executed. Developers can begin working with it now, should be in a site near you in a few months.

The fun part!

After the all the networking and speakers the fun started! After eating great food and drinks all day, the open bar was opened in the evening. There was also an Octamasher set up…this thing was awesome! Eight keyboards set up each with different sounds/kits from drums to vocals, allowing people to collaborate and create music. I couldn’t get enough of this machine! The guest concert performer was ‘Thievery Corporation’. Amazing concert. The group rocked: music was on point, and the performance was busting with energy. Throughout the evening facebook provided snacks: chili cheese fries, mini tacos, and dumplings…what more could I ask for

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Ideally this would make a great iPhone application.  For those without smartphones the contact information could come in the form of a text message.

A while back we wrote about a similar concept: Mobile Proximity Networking. An idea that seems to have become a reality with the GPS enabled iPhones!

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Thianh: To begin, do you mind giving us a bit of background? Tell us a little about yourself.

Priscilla: I’m Priscilla Barton. I am an industrial and/or product designer. I started out in materials engineering because I was strong in math and science throughout school, but when I realized that it took more than that to enjoy engineering, I directed myself on the design path.

Sounds like you knew what you wanted and went for it! Was it the same for the MagTack idea? How did you come up with the idea, was it an accident?

When I was in my first year of design school, we had to do hundreds of pages of drawings. And we had to post them on the walls of the school for critiques. Art students come up with all sorts of convoluted ways to mount their work on the walls, but most of those ways are pretty destructive. Once you poke a hole in a drawing, if you try to repost it, the hole will get bigger or you will just make another hole. We tried tape and magnets….it was all a hassle. And it was a faux pas if while you were in critique, your drawing fell off the wall. So, as I was pinning up my drawings one day into drywall that had been patched and repatched, my fingers were getting all red and indented and I thought out loud “why hasn’t someone designed a better tack?”

At that point, since I was new to design, I didn’t do anything about it for 3 years. Around the time I was graduating, a school instructor asked me to enter a design competition. I had limited time and resources at that point because I was working already and I was trying to finish up my thesis. So, I remembered the tack I had thought of redesigning and I just decided that this would be my design entry.

At first, I thought I was just going to make it more ergonomic, but after thinking about the problem of holes in corners and the ones I make when I pin up post cards or pictures, I realized that I could bring more to the table than that. I also wanted something that looked more permanent and presentable than these little clear or silver commodity pins. When I started thinking of ways that this pin could ‘hold’ the paper in place, a short design exploration led to the idea of using magnets.

Very neat! Its amazing how an idea from three years prior came to mind. After coming up with the idea, what steps were needed to get it into production? How long did that process take?

I drew them up, modeled them in 3D, had someone make them for me, and submitted it to the design contest. I didn’t win it, but I had a chance to speak with one of the judges, who prodded me to try to license them to someone. I had a handful of samples, so I started emailing companies that I thought might be interested. I probably spoke with or contacted 10 companies or more and some of them told me they were interested so I waited and waited and called them every month to get in touch but they never did anything with it. So, I wasted probably a year or more waiting for different companies that expressed interest.

Wow, sounds like a trying time and a difficult process. In the end how did OXO find your invention?

When I designed it, I was thinking of the aesthetic that they have with their magnetic clips and their other colorful products that use black santoprene rubber. I had thought of contacting them, but an old boss discouraged me from it, telling me that they were a kitchen products company, not an office products company. In spite of that, I went on their website, emailed their general email, and was put in touch with someone who could evaluate the idea. They took about a month to get back to me to say they were interested, but the project was set back because their lawyers had found a registered patent that included an embodiment of a product that mechanically was doing the same thing as the Magtack. So, it basically was over until I decided I could make it even better by having the two pieces mate together when you are storing it - the pin gets inserted into the other half and it becomes a protective cap for the pin. This has the added bonus of being a lot safer to carry around than a normal tack. I often carried loose tacks in my bag so that I could post drawings up, and I often ended up hurting myself reaching into the black abyss of my backpack in search of tacks. When I presented it to OXO, they were delighted and they decided to take on the product.

Success! As we know the rest is MagTack history from there What other inventions are you most proud of?

Well, I am working on a few more and we will see what they lead to. I have lots of ideas so the challenge with me is taking on the right amount of work.

My senior thesis project which was a messaging drinking glass was a pretty fun project. I got a lot of emails from people trying to buy them. Unfortunately, it is a very complicated product, so although a few people here and there said that they were interested, it never panned out. What with the iPhone, my Connection Glass is less of a dream than it was back then. It is very attainable, but it would take quite a lot of investment to undertake that project.

I’m on your site right now…those are very slick glasses! From the looks of your website, you have experimented with everything from shoes, glasses to backpacks. Do you tend to focus on certain things or do you find a problem then want to solve it?

I tend to find a problem and then want to solve it. I currently work fulltime designing bags, so I do have an affinity for the soft goods/sewn products world, BUT bags can only do so much for you. They carry things. I sometimes want to design the things that they carry.

At incubaker we are inspired by each other and observations that we share with each other on our tumble log, “Let the Juices Flow” Where do find you get most of your inspiration?

Mostly, the problems that I find are just things that come up in daily life. Ways to do things easier and more efficient, ways to make things look nicer. Lately I have been having ideas for services rather than products. Here’s a free idea - a company that sells insurance for sunglasses. How many pairs of expensive sunglasses have you lost? Would you pay 5 bucks a month or pay a $30 premium to get your Prada shades that you dropped in the lake back? If it has been done for cellphones, it makes sense to do it for sunglasses. But I think friends are finding holes in my argument. They say that renters insurance can cover your sunglasses. But how many people out there have renters’ insurance?

Haha thanks for the free idea! Does commercial success with MagTack allow you the leeway to experiment and take more risks?

Uh, hopefully. It’s too early to tell, but to be honest, I’ll only do well if Magtacks sell like Coca-Cola. It’s just a bonus if it does well and having that mindset helps me to not get anxious. What with your investing and watching stocks, you’re probably better off than I am or will be.

Your too humble! At Incubaker we came up with an idea for a luggage seat - What’s your first reaction!?

Well, have you seen Zuca bags?

Having the picture of the luggage and the picture of the seat helps me to understand the two objects that you would like to combine. That other luggage product that attempts to do this is interesting - it seems that their approach is just to make the luggage strong enough to bear the weight of an average person. It doesn’t look that stable or comfortable. I have often sat on those old molded Samsonite luggages when they are laid on the ground horizontally - i.e. when you are cramming old clothes into it and you have to sit on it to get it to close? And then you are so tired out that you sit there for a while and rest. I would probably either want to sit in a normal lounge chair at the airport OR I would sit on my luggage in the way I just described. There are a lot of constraints with luggage because the ultimate requirement is that it needs to fit in the overhead bin and within the carryon dimensions set forth. The carryon dimensions are narrow in the depth such that it would probably not be a comfortable seat. I guess if you sat on it like you were riding a horse, i.e. at McDonalds or KMart, that might be more stable.

But, a brief exploration with drawings may help you to assess whether or not is a good idea. I have designed luggage before and it is not cheap. This may be one barrier to entry - maybe others have tried it and it ended up being so expensive and not that alluring that consumers weren’t willing to pay extra for it.

Nice feedback, thanks! How did you find out about Incubaker anyway? Do you have a favorite posting?

Googling and finding your posting on Magtacks. I liked the brush and rinse toothbrush. I just hope it wouldn’t squirt water on my clothes or face if I didn’t have the perfect angle.

Yea we are still trying to get our hands on a prototype toothbrush…Any last words of advice for other innovators?

I think that if you have ideas, it behooves you to know how to build things or draw them - paper or computer, it doesn’t matter.

Not everyone will like your idea, but it is important to recognize when an idea doesn’t jibe well with your target consumer. This doesn’t mean quit while you’re ahead, but maybe rethinking things will get you to an even better idea.

Thanks for the words of wisdom and inspiring interview Priscilla! Looking forward to seeing more of your designs

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The problem: A few weeks ago my phone went off in class because I had forgotten to silence it. I had gotten into the habit of silencing my phone during the week, and leaving the ring tone on over the weekend, but for some reason I had forgotten to silence it that Monday morning. This got me to thinking…

The Idea: Why can’t we schedule when our phones go on silent? I was thinking it could be an option on the calendar; for each appointment you could choose “silent” or “not silent”. I thought that this was so simple that it must be on some phone somewhere and looked it up online…to no avail. Hopefully this turns up within a couple of years.

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This vending machine located in the East Village is hitting the top of the list for vending machine innovations.

[via Boing Boing]

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With fuel costs soaring and airlines raising their prices higher and higher, Airline tickets services such as Kayak.com and Farecast.com become ever so important in our lives. I have been an avid user of both sites as I have weaned myself off of traditional search sites like Orbitz and Travelocity. The new web 2.0 services allow more robust features as fare prediction, customizable flight trackers, time of year suggestions, and the list goes on and on.

Recently, I have been searching for one way tickets to save money on my round trip flight. So basically it’s a cumbersome process to find one leg of the flight and then re-enter new parameters for the return flight. Orbitz sometimes pairs flights on multiple airlines but in no way comes close to the cheapest flights.

Idea: I would like Kayak or Farecast to develop a “Create your own flight” option. User would enter in the dates and select round trip flight using one way tickets. You could ultimately add multiple legs and really customize a trip while being as cost efficient as possible. It’s also nice to view all the times and suggestions in one screen versus jotting it down and figuring it out yourself. Farecast has great user tools that would allow for alerts, suggestions and hotels as well…..

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The idea: A website the allows people to upload or find fotos of their clothes and post them online to their online closet. Then they can invite other users to help them find an outfit for a certain occasion. Example: “Jenny has a blind date with Joe, at a casual sushi place downtown, what should she wear?!” then other users can recommend and vote on the best outfit based on the clothes jenny already has….a sort of community fashion policing.

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The idea: Frequent customers create a sandwich and it gives it a name. The sandwich is displayed on a screen, with about a dozen other sandwiches; every time a customer orders it it moves up on the list (a digg style, voice of the masses voting system). If a sandwich moves to the top of a list and stays there for a week or month, the customer gets a free sub. At the end of the year, the most ordered customer sandwich can be added to the stores menu for the next year.

I had this idea for a case study I did a while back, but was recently reminded of it while reading “Life after the 30-Second Spot” by Jaffe, a book that discusses changes in the advertising industry, and new approaches to marketing and advertising. In the book Jaffe, introduces three key roles to the new advertising environment:

1. To Demonstrate
2. To Empower
3. To Involve

(These new roles are the evolution of the classic roles: To inform, persuade, remind. ) This approach to sandwich marketing nails each of the new roles in advertising. As a consumer I am able to demonstrate the sandwich creating opportunities available at my local sandwich shop, I am empowered as I create and promote my (own) product, and I am involved in the sandwich and menu making process.

As mentioned all stakeholders benefit: Sandwich shops get better sandwiches, loyal customers and promoters. Sandwich enthusiasts get the opportunity to promote their sandwich, and the chance to win free subs or a place on the menu (or other prizes), and new customers get a new chance to try new and community proven subs. Win - win - win

Bon Appétit!

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Here is a bit about Sandbox from their blog:

Sandbox is a yearly conference for talents under 30. We’re bringing together young achievers from all over the world for three inspiring days full of great ideas, innovation and extraordinary people.

We are pumped about the growth of their concept and are looking forward to the conference - should be a nice weekend full of incubaking Check out their blog to learn more about the concept and updates about the conference.

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I did some research and there is a sudo solution called Seatkase that has built something that could work. They have created a strong frame with a padded top that is supposed to double as a seat.

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