Andy Jacobson

Had Porterhouse at Lugar’s last night. Can’t. move. today.

Wed, 23 Dec 2009 12:02:19 -0500

Had Porterhouse at Lugar’s last night. Can’t. move. today.

RT @EverythingNYC: AMBER Alert Issued Over Missing Bronx Girl http://ow.ly/16cwEC

Wed, 23 Dec 2009 00:03:46 -0500

RT @EverythingNYC: AMBER Alert Issued Over Missing Bronx Girl http://ow.ly/16cwEC

Just released! Free Fandango Movies app for BlackBerry:...

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 17:37:59 -0500

Just released! Free Fandango Movies app for BlackBerry: http://www.getjar.com/mobile/25665/fandango-movies

Damn, I really liked Whole Foods until I read this…John Mackey: The Whole Foods Alternative to...

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 15:54:18 -0500

Damn, I really liked Whole Foods until I read this…John Mackey: The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare - WSJ.com http://bit.ly/8T4Mij

The Familiar (On-line) Place

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 15:40:00 -0400

Last week I read Verlyn Klinkenborg’s poignant editorial in the New York Times where he explores the “geography of familiarity”. It’s a quick read which you can link to [here].

Mr. Klinkenborg challenges his readers to think of home not as a world itself, but as a place we carry inside ourselves, a place where we welcome the unfamiliar because we know that as time passes it will become the very bedrock of our being.

As someone that spends a lot of time interacting with people on-line via Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed, etc., as well as helping my clients to design and build social networking platforms, I was caught by the notion of “home” being something we “carry within ourselves”. That’s sort of what having on-line relationships is like.

All of those people I interact with on-line carry with them my imagination’s interpretation of who they are.

As a Graphic Designer, a “visual communications professional”, that’s a really important concept to understand. For a social network to be successful it really does need to become, at least part of, the very bedrock of our being. Otherwise what is the value of all that time I spend developing relationships on-line?

Lately I’ve been “un-following” people on Twitter. I’ve been “filtering” friends on Facebook—same with FriendFeed. I tell myself that it’s because I only want to read about those people that I really care about, or be introduced to ideas from people I admire. That’s a huge disservice to the people that “friend me” or “follow me” — as well as a contradiction to Mr. Klinkenborg’s challenge to welcome the unfamiliar.

But it’s easy. After all, I don’t really “know” these people. I can delete them from my imagination as quickly as I created them.

And that’s the challenge for us “visual communications professionals”. How do we create a digital social platform that encourages each of us to have stronger connections? How do we create an online system that exposes more of who we are and reduces the ease at which we delete our “friends”.

A Logo Should Never Be Redesigned Unless

Mon, 01 Jun 2009 16:50:25 -0400

In this past weekend’s New York Times Ideas & Trends column there’s a story about “the new breed of corporate logos” [sic].

It got me thinking about when it’s appropriate to “refresh” a logo (a term the writer used).

First (my definition of) what a logo is: A Logo is a visual element of a organization’s Identity that helps the viewer immediately recognize that organization.

What a logo is not is an ad. And that’s exactly what I suspect many organization, including all of the companies represented in this story—except Blackwater*—thought they’d be getting when they had their logos redesigned.

I think a Logo should only be redesign when…

The company has changed its focus and has become a new business.
Two or more companies merge—each having equal weight in the new business’ focus.
The original design was so badly designed that some quick thinking CEO recognizes that it has to change immediately.
The company has a new name.
A city hires a design studio to give it a new look.

* The company provides no information on how it chose its new name, “Xe”. The attempt to rebrand itself comes as six former employees face manslaughter charges for a shooting that killed 17 civilians in Baghdad. The company has also faced intense scrutiny since four of its employees were massacred and two of them hung from a bridge in Fallujah in 2004.

What is Graphic Design?

Thu, 21 May 2009 00:13:00 -0400

Let’s look forward. After all, that’s something I was taught by my mentor, Tibor Kalman, back when I didn’t call myself a graphic designer—a title I still struggle with even after almost 20 years of having earned a living being one.

In fact, I suspect that many people would argue that in order to define what graphic design is, we have to look forward. Graphic designers are subjugated to the tools we’re given and the technology available. We were sign painters, book printers, newspaper typesetters, advertising layout artists, television keyboard operators, print designers, art directors, web designers…and now…interactive designers! User experience designers! Social network experiential designers (okay, I might have made that one up)!

Wtf??? Can you think of any other professional, white-collar jobs, which have had that many different titles?

So what’s the glue that holds all these different titles together as “graphic design”?

I think the glue is “us”—yup, us graphic designers. We need a way to answer the question, “so, what do you do?” and we’re a bit of an insecure group that likes—okay, needs—a support network. It used to be the “AIGA”. Now, have you seen how many graphic designers there are on Twitter?

Our clients don’t care what we call ourselves; they care about what we can do. Can we design and produce a brochure? A poster? A TV spot? A website? A widget? (Please don’t make me produce a widget—I’ll start having econ 101 nightmares all over again.)

And that’s what makes being a “graphic designer” so incredibly wonderful. We’re getting paid to think, to create, to develop solutions! It’s not about the negative “what ifs”, it about the positive “what ifs”. It’s about using all of our life experiences, stapling them to our mental Rolodex, and then spinning the dial to help someone communicate an idea—using whatever tool or technology is best.

What is graphic design? It’s the title on a business card—the rest is up to you.

[Special thanks to Joey Pfeifer for starting this conversation, which I think he’ll be continuing on http://definegraphicdesign.com/contribute]

What Tip O'Neill Taught Me About Graphic Design

Tue, 19 May 2009 10:00:00 -0400

I started blogging at the beginning of 2006. I created my “Facebook” page in September ‘07; the same month I created my “LinkedIn” page. I now belong to several social networking sites including, “Twitter”, “FriendFeed”, and “Last.fm”.

Why? Well I think it was a combination of “web 2.0” curiosity, a feeling of being somewhat isolated (there are four of us in the studio), and a need to have an active and stimulating social environment. What I hadn’t expected was that by being a member of these sites it would also give me a sense of stability—no matter where my friends and associates are, I can always find them “on-line”.

In the “real” world, my world—my New York City world—finding social stability is pretty hard to do. Friends and associates move, split-up, get divorced, get married, change jobs…phone numbers…favorite restaurants…

That didn’t happen in my hometown. And if it did, most of the people we knew stayed nearby. My parents and I would still see them at the grocery store, the hardware store, at temple during high holidays, at school functions, or at the town dump on Saturdays. (Yes, the town dump—a source of innumerable go-cart parts.)

So why am I blogging about this today? Well, it occurred to me that while the Internet may be addressing society’s need for social stability—allowing each of us to create our own on-line community, our own hometown—it’s also changing the context in which I do my design work.

More and more, the medium I use to communicate my client’s message effectively and economically is restricted by the limitation of a computer screen. My client’s audience is becoming more heterogeneous. And the design tools I have at my fingertips are limited due to my lack of technological knowledge.

While this might seem to diminish my impact as a graphic designer, it doesn’t. In fact, it only serve to remind me that what a Graphic Designer does best isn’t found on a piece of paper, it’s what they do before they’ve even taken out their pencil.

To be successful, maybe I need to move back home (metaphorically of course!) and get to know my clients and their “customers” better. Spend more time listening. More time hanging out with them.

As Tip O’Neill said, “All politics is local”. Maybe now, the same should be said for graphic design.