2012 was amazing. 2012 was terrible. It was beautiful and crushing and wasted and magical. Some of it I will always remember and some I will do everything I can to forget. I lived my own little story, full of little victories and little defeats, and everyone else lived theirs. We overlap, we are connected through each other. My story is your story and your story is mine.
We all ran without legs, we all vacated our cycling victories. We all laughed like doofuses during a Vice Presidential debate and we all talked to an empty chair. We all created storms so powerful they destroyed Arab governments in the spring, and then created storms so powerful they destroyed the east coast in the fall. We all Avenged and then returned to Middle Earth. We all took one small step and said goodbye to Mayberry. We all wrung our fists in hopeless disgust when we lost our child at Newtown, and we all raised our fists in triumph when we jumped from the stratosphere and lived to tell about it.
We were all there for the best, for the worst, and for the amazing lives we lead in between. We were all there when the world didn’t end. Goodbye 2012. =)
On October 21, 2011, Google doodled the life of Mary Blair on what would have been her 100th birthday. Blair worked as a Disney artist for much of her career, defining the look of many films and theme park attractions, most notably the style of the classic It’s a Small World.
Mary Blair had a unique way of telling a story through simple forms and odd color combinations, often bringing together a pallet that would have never worked for anyone but herself.
It is a testament to her unique talent that, out of all of the artists Walt Disney worked with, Mary Blair was his favorite.
I have been on a link clickin’ tear lately, and it’s all thanks to Jeri Ryan.
As I desperately tried to figure out what to do with google+ I decided to follow the Star Trek actress simply because on twitter she said people should do so (clearly I’m easily influenced). She has not disappointed. +Jeri Ryan (I think that’s what you call people on g+…I hope…) recently posted the above video of the most useless machine ever created and I’ve watched it about fifteen times and laughed just as hard each time.
I’m still trying to understand the g+ culture and what it does better than the more entrenched options (so far it feels like twitter only with more explanation and facebook only with less “me”), but my brain is a lot like that little box—every time I switch it on to focus on yet another network it clicks itself right back off.
Open g+ for the first time…”K, let’s add some people to a new circle.” Click. Nope.
2 days later…”Alright, maybe we can hangout.” Click. Don’t think so.
6 months later…“Wait, there’s a new social site I have to learn?!?” Click. BOOM!
Tuesday, September 6, 2011, Google went absolutely bananas with its doodle celebrating the birthday of Queen frontman Freddie Mercury.
Google has been hitting the doodles pretty hard lately, telling elaborate stories in a space other companies see as untouchable—the logo. This doodle was just the latest in seeing how far they could push this unique mode of storytelling. The worst part about Google’s doodles—that they are live only for a single day—is also what makes them so special.
You might say they went way over the top with this elaborate, flamboyant doodle, but considering the honoree, only something way over the top would do.
Spend a little time with the google doodle for July 22, 2011 in honor of Alexander Calder. It’s amusing that most of the videos on YouTube showing off this beautiful doodle focus solely on the spinning logo and entirely miss what is going on beneath it. The shadow implies space and provides context, and when telling a visual story, context is everything.
After that try your luck and relive the past (with a blank box, of course).
Google’s logo doodles are an amazing piece of storytelling, whether it’s a static bit of beauty, a rotating refresh montage, or an incredible animated piece like the one above, live on May 11, 2011 to celebrate the birthday of contemporary dancer Martha Graham.
In the past, Google has reserved their Google Doodle logo changes for specific holidays, but recently they have had something new almost every day (and on many occasions they have shown off a few new doodles per day for international users,as seen here). When searching, every day an interesting graphic appears in the top left corner of Google’s results page, often celebrating a life or an event that most people have devoted very little thought. Taking the time to click through and read a few snippets is a small way to learn just a little bit more about the world we live in.
No other company can make such positive headlines by playing with its logo so often. Google has spent a long time reinforcing its image as a very unique and unusual company, and has gained license to tinker. Other companies are terrified to mess with their brand identity in any way for fear of diluting it and confusing their customers into jumping ship for another product. Google realizes that it is not the logo that makes a company what it is, it’s what it is that makes a company what it is.
Google is search, content, information, communication, endless strings of semi-related information, things you had no idea existed (as well as things you wish didn’t), but it is more. Google is not a logo and it is not a building in California. Google is us. It is the new story of ourselves, a story that is told as we choose, when we choose, and it is ongoing, expanding our world farther than we could have imagined. This is what Google is, and once a company realizes what it truly offers–the story that it tells–and takes the time to carefully build its business around that then it doesn’t have to be afraid of something as silly as a logo.
In the doodle dedicated to Martha Graham, the dancer swirls and flows, suggesting story through movement, the particles trailing off behind her to visually remind us of where she has been. She leaps through the air and finally lands with a thunderous stomp, putting the final punctuation on her moment as if to say, “Done.” When she has finished all she has to say, you realize she has traveled backwards through the logo, but by clicking we move forwards into a new world of information, increasing our knowledge and adding another chapter to the story that Google itself has to tell.
