Designers, engineers, students and professors, architects, and social entrepreneurs from all over the globe are devising cost-effective ways to increase access to food and water, energy, education, healthcare, revenue-generating activities, and affordable transportation for those who most need them. And an increasing number of initiatives are providing solutions for underserved populations in developed countries such...

Aptly described by one blogger as “Home Depot from the future,” Inventables is a store unlike any other. The materials vendor sells unusual and unreal-sounding stuff, from rubber glass to translucent concrete. Their website is intended to help designers, artists and inventors “streamline the process of innovation and explore what’s possible.” Shape memory polymer that...

One of 31 video segments featured in 'Designing Media', the new book, DVD and website by Bill Moggridge. More info on 'Designing Medi'a available at http://www.designing-media.com Chad Hurley, the founder of YouTube, describes how he designed the Web site and developed his company. Chad had noticed the success that Flickr was having in connecting people...

The Royal College of Art and Innovation has posted a new video as part of their “Innovation Night” event. This year, guest speaker Chad Hurley, founder and CEO of YouTube.com talks about building one of the top ten web services in less than a year.   YouTube co-founder and CEO Chad Hurley at Royal College...

Last night at Cooper-Hewitt, Washington Post Style Editor Robin Givhan lead a conversation with past National Design Award Winners Francisco Costa (Women’s Creative Director of Calvin Klein Collection), Yeohlee Teng, and Maria Cornejo about their work and the role of fashion in contemporary culture. Their designs are all featured in Design USA: Contemporary Innovation, which...

World Bank’s Development Marketplace has started a blog to exchange and expand knowledge about innovation and social entrepreneurship for early stage development around the world. Practitioners from different backgrounds and previous winners will discuss projects, share lesson learned, tools and resources. Expanding beyond the yearly themed global competitions (such as sustainable development, water, sanitation, energy,...

The Buckminster Fuller Institute has announced an annual award named in honor of the innovator has been described as a “philosopher of shelter”. The institute will award $100,000 to support the development and implementation of a solution which addresses a pressing world problem. A solution that demonstrates Fuller’s principles of using limited energy and resources...