In the vastness of space and immensity of time, the chance of you happening as you, is one in 400 billion. And, that is no joke. Think about it. Ask any scientist and he/she will validate it. “The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.”  And that is the reason why you always carry this feeling of emptiness, a sense of always being a part of something; not very sure what that is. I believe that is because, the whole cosmos comes together to make you, you in your contemporaneous glory and the ratio of that happening is 1:400,000,000,000

“The Cosmos is all that is or was or ever will be. Our feeblest contemplations of the Cosmos stir us -- there is a tingling in the spine, a catch in the voice, a faint sensation, as if a distant memory, of falling from a height. We know we are approaching the greatest of mysteries.” 
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos

Design, architecture and technology merged to bring this mysterious sensation within the grasp of our immediate touch. It takes fearless humility to accept the vastness of this universe. The most effective way, I believe, even to comprehend it, is using the scientific and technological tools that are available at our disposal. Though science is in a state of unfading revolution, always subject to revision and never envisioning the complete reality, it does give you "successive approximations of reality."
Skip Traffic, Traverse Space and Time in a Roadside Mini-Universe

Artists and Designers use direction, dramatic contrasts, and placement relationships to  draw our attention to areas of emphasis and focal points.
Emphasis is the principle by which an artist draws attention to particular content. A focal point is a specific place of visual emphasis in a work of art or design. Most works of art have at least one area of emphasis and multiple focal points.
An artist can emphasize focal points through the use of line, implied line, value, color or as it so happens in this case,  more than 14,000 LED lights. " Like the bull’s-eye on a target, focal points concentrate our attention. Even though our field of vision is fairly wide, at any given moment we can only focus our vision on a small area. The physiology of vision underlies the principle of focal point. _"

The emphasis is here on the 12 meter high wall that cascades through the space giving way to ‘graffiti fetish’, trademark of a British artist INSA. When an environment exists beyond its primary purpose of  dining and and explores the dominion of drama and participation the resulting phenomenon is  G9 Shanghai. The diners are invited to engage with the art work through the "3D depth sensing capabilities of an xbox kinect camera that empowers them to control its speed and brightness with simple hand gestures."
Image Source: Designboom

An independent filmmaker Claude Mossessian, uploaded this video for those of us who missed this spectacular pixellated beauty in its glory.


"The three-minute clip shows how the white-washed church exterior opens up into a kaleidoscope of color, design and shape-shifting splendor that references everything from microorganisms to embroidery."
Built in a  Neo-Gothic style but inflenced by the  Moroccan Muslim, the huge Cathédrale Sacré-Coeur is a surprising delight in the heart o Casablanca. French transmedia installation designer Miguel Chevalier created magic on the floor by projecting animation that turned the institution's massive floor into a multicolored, reactive art experience.

In the artist's very own words.
Magic Carpets revisit the tradition of the Islamic art, in particular the mosaic and the carpets.
A huge light carpet covers the floor of Sacré Coeur church. When the viewer moves, the trajectory of the curves is disrupted under their feet. This world of colors and forms in movement, invites us into the magic universe of the "Arabian Nights" and the flying carpets with the music of Michel Redolfi.
This installation has been made possible thanks to the French Institut et de Voxels Productions.

Having a proven track track record of capturing the workings of life, BBC in conjunction with SEGA Corporation presents us with Orbi. It is a feast for your sesnses and a drama that you want to participate to give those neurons of yours a good conditioning. “By partnering with SEGA and fusing our nature expertise with their innovative technology we are able to bring people closer to natures wonders than would ever be possible in real life using the magic of technology to create a truly extraordinary entertainment experience with our amazing planet at its heart.”
Amanda Hill, BBC Worldwide’s Chief Brands Officer

A fascination with nature is shared by us all. Through our Partnership with the global brand ‘BBC Earth’ we've created an attraction that is unique and different from other entertainment facilities and it is our intention that Orbi Yokohama will be a showcase for partners across the world. We aim to roll out this first entertainment experience of its kind globally. I, as a representative of this project, am truly looking forward to sharing Orbi’s unforgettable nature experience with people all over the globe." Mr Tsurumi, President and COO, SEGA Corporation

Orbi is a mul-tisensory  “supercharged nature experience”  that challenges you to indulge in all the 5 sense participation and explore our planet as a giant interactive. Journey through the deep sea, the artics, the jungles and the skies above all "awakened to life using physical sensations, astonishing imagery, high-tech sound installations and scent technology."

Explore Orbi: The Supercharged Nature Experience

Want to indulge in the 5 senses on brand marketing?
You might want to check out this Visual Look Book and learn how to engage all five senses in brand communication.

"Content marketing is no longer a nice-to-have. It’s a must-have. It’s imperative that businesses create content on an ongoing basis. They can’t create just any old content, of course. It must be relevant and high quality. It also must be valuable and drive profitable customer interactions. And it must be about customer needs and customer interests, not ad-speak, which is all about the “me"."
Rebecca Lieb

For you content marketers, as you drown in the massive content creation craze here are some tools that you might want to explore for creation, curation and ideation!
       
Quora is good at getting people to open up. It discerns your interests before deciding which questions, topics and people to show you. Without overt prodding, Quora teaches users to put their experience into their answers in the form of short biographies related to the question.

Topsy "specializes in analyzing the global conversation on Its tools can decipher how often a term is tweeted, find an influential person on a specific subject, or measure the exposure of an event or campaign."

SocialMention seeks out content according to your search parameters across the social web and analyzes sentiment.

Zemanta is a semantic content discovery personal assistant, listening to your needs and bringing back the information you need in real time. It’s a great tool for inspiration and research as well as engaging your audience with more relevant content, especially if you aren’t a high-volume publisher.

Evernote is my brain dump. It lets you save voice recordings, text, pictures, and entire web pages to a cloud account you can access from any computer or mobile device.

Ubersuggest takes your word or phrase and instantly generates thousands of keyword ideas from real user queries! Use the keywords to get inspiration for your next blog post, or to optimize your PPC campaigns.

SocialMention  helps you keep track of your brand and keeps you on the cutting edge of your industry. Drop a keyword in their search tool and you’ll pull up results like the latest mentions across the search world.

Twitter List helps you keep track of industry influencers, customers, journalists… any group of people whose real-time conversations might inform your content creation decisions.

“With Bottlenose Nerve Center, it is now possible to know what the world thinks and feels at precisely this moment. Nerve Center helps brands, agencies, and enterprises understand the trends that are impacting them in real-time, so they can amplify the positives and tamp the negatives.”

Jing records everything you see and do. From simple mouse movements to a fully narrated tutorial. Jing videos are limited to five minutes for instant, focused communication.

Here are two articles that I found very helpful!
http://www.toprankblog.com/2013/04/11-content-creation-tools/#ptlink.fid=8947&isc=1&did=bookmark.3a64e6e1aed2e1ab0fb5f3b6d89a593b90065257&ctp=article

http://blog.kissmetrics.com/17-social-media-tools/

Image credit: http://adsoftheworld.com/

Apple’s announcement of the iBeacon functionality as part of its iOS7 technology is a game-changer for how businesses will conduct location-based marketing in the future. Think of iBeacon as a form of micro-location geofencing that makes it much easier for retailers to use a person’s exact location within a store to deliver targeted, relevant content, says Dave Walters, Product Strategist, Silverpop.

Here’s how it works: A customer with an iPhone 4S or later model who’s downloaded your app walks into your store. The iBeacon in the customer’s phone exchanges data with beacons in your store. Your system has been configured to send push notifications to customers who meet certain criteria, so at the moment the customer strolls into Aisle 12, they receive a push notification on their phone with offers or content related to where they’re standing.

The possibilities are endless. You could use iBeacon to serve up customized coupons, says Dave, send sales alerts based on real-time external data (such as weather changes), display personalized product information and videos, curate shopping lists based on past purchases, and drive email opt-ins. Moving beyond mobile, you could use iBeacon activity to trigger communications in other channels.  Learn More on iBeacon and the next generation of location based marketing.

With more than 46% of the web searchers using mobile extensively, the release of Google Hummingbird demands mobile responsive website design. Without it, your website ranking will be seriously compromised.

Find Ways to Create Mobile-First Content
Mobile-first also impacts your content creation process and cycle. Here are some key things to consider when you’re developing topics, writing content, and thinking about dissemination:

Short content tends to play better on mobile. Yet long posts are necessary for great SEO. The work around: use introductions to your blog posts as the hook to target your mobile readers.
Visual and Audio Content: Are you using visual content such as images, infographics, video, and micro-video to support your content efforts? Mobile users devours visual content much easier and faster than text-based content
Socially Friendly: Are you crafting socially sharable content? Mobile users tend to have a high degree of social shares and this can be a great way to build your shares with minimal effort.
Target Specific: Why not use Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools to determine what people are doing on your site. Are they shopping? If so, product guides would be a great way to focus your content development. Are they looking for industry trends, then you need to furnish them with materials that talks about your industry. When you have a better understanding of how your mobile audience is spending their time, you’ll be in an excellent position to develop topics of interest. Read more.

Make Google Hummingbird work for you. Come up with a list of the 5-10 most frequently asked questions—either about your products or how to use them and create one or more blog posts that answer each of those questions. Now your website transforms from being all about you to how it can benefit your prospects and clients.

I for one, talk a lot about the perils of digital distraction. For, we live in an awkward age where 90% of people move between devices to accomplish one single goal. Yet, never before in the written history of mankind have we enjoyed such immense privileges.  Here is a snap shot of the 6 apps that will stramline your digital life.

Your Password in the Technology Safe Deposit Box
Forget remembering dozens of passwords.  The word is that LastPass stores your data online in an encryption so complicated that even the company (and the NSA, for that matter) can’t read. The two-factor authentication ensure you’re actually who you say you are. Personally, I will be hesitant to use it. Read more...

The Comprehensive Calendar for Your ILife
Tiny details sets Sunrise apart from other free competitors. Send Artwork: @elineart                                                          and respond to event invites from within the app itself. A tap brings up a handy map to help you get to your next appointment. It pulls in weather for your location and shows a little icon next to events throughout the day, so you always know when to bring the umbrella. And ofcourse, Facebook events, friends’ birthdays, Foursquare check-ins, and more on one supremely synchronized calendar.
The ultimate enabler Hootlet.  Read more...

Jazz Up Your Digital Self On One Website
Stand apart from existing personal site builders with its eye-catching, customized infographics. To set up the site, you just need to connect existing social profiles, including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram. Relevant data is then pulled in and automagically arranged into not just a homepage but an entire website. This is the wonder of Vizify.
Read more...

You Control Your Personal Brand
Over 1 billion names are Googled every day - more than the entire population of the U.S. and Europe combined. You get to choose how you showcase yourself in the eyes of Google and that is pretty nifty. Brandyourself simplifies the complicated online reputation management process so you can do it yourself.

Organize Your Online Research
Evernote’s Web Clipper, a browser extension that lets you “snip” out those little gems you encounter online and store them all in the cloud--neatly catalogued and accessible on any device. For web serfers living life on the edge, this is for you. You can select a piece of text or an image or choose to save the entire article or page. Read more...

Armed with these amazing apps, now you are left with some quiet time to ponder on the wonder of the glory that is you!
Have fun and let me know of other wonders that I have missed!