The Art of the Exchange

TOKYO, JAPAN - NOVEMBER 21: A man gives his business card to a robot at Japanese employee supply company Ubiquitous Exchange during a press review on November 21, 2006 in Tokyo, Japan. Ubiquitous Exchange has bought the Japanese robot from maker tmsuk to dispatch for YEN105,000 (roughly US$890) a day. The robot is able to automatically walk, guide, understand words, talk and project images and movies. Photo: Junko Kimura/Getty Images

One last chapter in this business card craziness. If I were doing business in Japan, the ritual of the business card exchange is very serious indeed. Via the Daily Heller & ehow.com

The practice of exchanging business cards in Japan is incredibly important. In Japan, business actually cannot take place until these cards have been exchanged with the utmost respect. A business card establishes a person's station and status in Japan's intensely hierarchal culture. Not having a business card means, in a very fundamental way, that you simply do not exist.

Step 1
Use both hands when presenting your business card. Your card should be printed on both sides - Japanese on one, English on the other. When presenting your card, the Japanese side should be facing up.

Step 2
Bow as long and as low as befits your station - being foreign, young, female, and/or unaffiliated with a corporation means you must bow very, very low.

Step 3
You receive a business card in the same way, but you should bow even longer and lower than you did before. Say thank you, or 'Hajimemashite,' as you accept it with both hands.

Step 4
Study the business card intently, even if you can't read a single line. At the very least, remember the giver's name. They will remember yours.

Step 5
If you are receiving multiple cards at once, you may leave them in a neat stack in front of you until the end of your meeting. If not, retrieve your custom-made business card holder, and slide your new aquisition inside - carefully, like it were a piece of art.

New Work: Personal Business Cards

I have a bunch of new work that i'll be updating here over the next few weeks as I re-design my website. I've really been needing a set of business cards for a while now, and as i'm meeting more people and getting more freelance work i've been feeling like a total doofus for not having any business cards to give out.

I tackled this as a branding exercise and I set out to make my cards feel like a natural extension of my website. First off, matching RGB web colors to CMYK (offset) print is pretty hard. Even if you convert the numbers they just look visually different (duh!). Overall i'm pretty happy with how they came out. Oh and BTW I made enough to give one out to just about anyone and everyone, so don't be shy if you want one!

Your Business Card Is Crap!

This youtube video that i found on swissmiss is the perfect conclusion to the business card design/printing craziness of the last few weeks.

The Dark Side is Sustainable

I've never been one for white space. Negative space sure, but white space...meh. Its always nice to see that a personal design aestheic can actually be good for the environment.

The guys over at BLACKLE, a black themed google believe that web pages such as theirs which use dark colored backgrounds used less energy than a site like google which is predomidantly white. If you remember your basic color theory that dicates that black and white are not really colors morever black being the abscense of color/light and white being the complete prescence of color/light, this idea seems to make sense.

Simply put white screens need more energy so precious whitespace that so many of us designers love is actually bad for the environment.

Thai "Spiderman" saves the day.

This is a great little story and proves that superheroes are real!!! ok maybe not, but that was some brilliant thinking by that fireman to save the day.


Thai fireman in 'spider-man' costume rescue of autistic boy

BANGKOK (AFP) – A Thai fireman turned superhero when he dressed up as comic-book character Spider-Man to coax a frightened eight-year-old from a balcony, police said Tuesday.
Teachers at a special needs school in Bangkok alerted authorities on Monday when an autistic pupil, scared of attending his first day at school, sat out on the third-floor ledge and refused to come inside, a police sergeant told AFP.
Despite teachers' efforts to beckon the boy inside, he refused to budge until his mother mentioned her son's love of superheroes, prompting fireman Sonchai Yoosabai to take a novel approach to the problem.
The rescuer dashed back to his fire station and made a quick change into a Spider-Man costume before returning to the boy, he said.
"I told him Spider-Man is here to rescue you, no monsters are going to attack you and I told him to walk slowly towards me as running could be dangerous," Somchai told local television.
The young boy immediately stood up and walked into his rescuer's arms, police said.
Somchai said he keeps the Spider-Man costume and an outfit of Japanese television character Ultraman at the station in order to liven up school fire drills.