SamKnows

SamKnows

I ‘ve been busy rebranding, redesigning and Cookie-ifying all of SamKnows digital products this year. First to get relaunched is the website – www.samknows.com.

If you don’t know anything about SamKnows and it’s highly likely that you don’t, they can measure your internet, they measure lots of peoples internet, they are considered the best measurers of the internet in the world! Governments, regulators and ISPs all over the world use them to conduct national studies on internet performance. They have big plans, plans to help you get better internet, understand your internet performance more, make the complexity and mystery about why your internet is sometimes good, sometimes bad and thing of the past, they want to build a self healing internet so you don’t ever have to worry about bad internet again. We’re not there yet… but you can sign up for a free Whitebox and start monitoring your internet right now, new features will be hot off the production line.

Big up to Callum for building it, all the .svg animations on the homepage required some mad maths skills. Oh there’s a couple of hidden Easter eggs on the homepage, see if you can find them :)

The little boy / girl who lost their name

lostmyname2

Some friends of mine have been busy making a Kids book, The Little Boy / Girl Who Lost Their Name is personalised print on demand storybook based on your child’s name. I gave them a little bit of help on the recent site update, now you can preview your custom book before you buy. Just head over, add a name, select whether it’s for a boy or girl and flick through your book!

Square

Square

Wow, this thing looks set to be massive – Square is this tiny little dongle that fits into any device with an audio input jack, and turns your iPod (for example) into a credit card money taking machine. They are giving out the dongles for free, there’s no transaction charges, only a $1 fee to install the application on your device! It’s the brainchild of Twitter inventor Jack Dorsey, currently in beta and will roll out to everyone next year.

Where’s the Catch? Well I’m not sure if you can use you Visa or Mastercard on it, you might need to get a some sort of Square credit, debit or pre-paid card, suppose they’ve got to make there money somewhere? Sorry got the wrong end of the stick, just noticed the image above has a Mastercard logo in it… These days when everyone hates bankers and loves Twitter, I think there could be a lot of people happy to make the switch.

What I like about it, well as a freelancer who once a year has to try and find some receipts to offset against my tax, this is a dream come true, everything stored digitally online where I can’t lose it and I can access easily from anywhere. Also this is going to be a massive help to small independent businesses which is always going to be a good thing.

Via: Matthew Buchanan.

kickstarter

Kickstarter. A new way to fund ideas & endeavors.

While I’m on the subject of adventure film making, I’ve been meaning to blog about this site Kickstarter for a while now. It’s not about film making, but it is about raising money to do stuff.

I’ve seen this sort thing before, but the interesting angle about Kickstarter is you have to supply tiered ‘rewards’ for the people giving you cash. People get quite creative not only with their ideas they want to get off the ground, but also with these rewards that they give back. Brilliantly it’s working, check out and see how many projects have already been funded and how much money they’ve raised.

Problem is you need an invite to post a project and I don’t have one :( So if you have a spare invite to Kickstarter please sent it my way, Cheers for the invite Lisa Yao, you are a legend :) Ok so here’s my pitch:

Te Araroa Route map

I’m planning to walk 1900 miles across New Zealand from the Northern most point to the southern tip next year, the trail is called Te Araroa and it officially opens next year. Problem is I’m spending too much time these days planning/mapping, rather than earning money for it.. So the concept of Kickstarter instantly appealed to me :) But I think my work could be worth while rewards for would be pledgers.

Pledge $5 or more and you’ll be able to download all the route maps I’ve been making and use them for your own hike.

Pledge $25 or more and I’ll mail you the finished DVD once we return and edit it. Here’s an example of last years video of my hike across America. Plus all the maps on a separate disc, and hey shit I’ll stick your name in the credits!

Pledge $50 or more you’ll get all the above plus beautifully screen printed A2 poster of the route, maybe some sort of date planner thing like this.

Pledge $100 or more and I’ll leave your name (obviously nothing permanent) along the route somewhere, write it out in rocks, draw it in sand on a beach, piss into snow, chips on my plate, whatever! Promise to do something interesting and send you the hi-res photo.

Pledge $1000 or more Ha ha, this is the big one and it was Nicky’s idea so unsurprisingly involves me making an arse of myself.. but It could be pretty funny so – donate $1000 or more then at the end of each month you decide what I have to do with my facial hair.. It’s a bit of a tradition that you grow your beard on a long walk, but I’m giving you the chance to style it for me – Big Lamb chop side burns, down to the moustache, shave half off vertically… (Only six available, 1 each month).