HP

Hewlett-Packard is a Silicon valley legend. No, it invented the legend, or at least the stereotype of two guys founding a technology company in their garage, which is what Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard actually did in 1939 in Palo Alto, CA. It was a very successful company through the 1980s focusing primarily on scientific equipment, which made it turn down employee Steve Wozniak's original design for the Apple I, and then branching out to desktop devices like calculators, computers, and printers (but all arising from its focus on scientific uses).

Despite there are a lot of efforts on recycling, very little of our stuff is recyclable and being recycled. I don’t think we are doing enough, designers and consumers have a dilemma, and we love nicely designed packaging but hate to see the kind of waste we’re producing. Food containers are one good example.

Well before the social media age, we all learned that trust and reputation are important currencies in this thing called life.  That's why our parents, professors and parish priests have taught us to be honest and honour our promises.  And most of us try and do just that.  It doesn't always work like we want, but largely we get by.  Or if things go wrong, we apologise and try to make amends.

This is the garage where David Packard and William Hewlett started their new company in 1938 as fresh Stanford University engineering graduates. This is probably one of the key places in California that can be called the birthplace of Silicon Valley. If you visit this tiny garage, you will find In front of the house a plaque officially declaring the location the "birthplace of Silicon Valley” some 70 years ago. The Valley not only transform businesses, it also transform societies and politics.

by: Idris Mootee

Continuing on the subject of empathy, Empathy is key in customer service and it’s not something you can embed in a script or redesign process flow to make it happen. Especially in call centers, medical services, technical support, hospitality — places where expectations are high and people feel vulnerable … those are the place we need applied empathy to convey to the customer that they understand them and truly care to help resolve their issues. Not reading from a script.

by: John Winsor

What happens when two companies advertise their respective products in the same 30 second spot? It’s intrusive and disjointed. Still, does doubling up on ads boost both brands? What if one brand has poor memory recall or is associated with poor quality? Does it bring down the other brand? It will be interesting to see the effects of “double-branding,” and in particular, on this spot for HP computers and the newly released action-film, “Jumper.”

by: Jonathan Salem Baskin

I know many communicators will claim that there's no such thing as bad publicity, but check out the logo on the medic's sweatshirt. 

Context matters, doesn't it?