Kinference ’23 — Day 2
Thursday, April 20, 2023
Woke up at 05:30 — again — (thanks jetlag) but we took advantage of that by walking to the Brooklyn Bridge at sunrise. A great start of the day! Then we headed to the conference for a nice breakfast with bagels and coffee and relaxed talks with other attendees.
Woke up at 05:30 — again — (thanks jetlag) but we took advantage of that by walking to the Brooklyn Bridge at sunrise. A great start of the day! Then we headed to the conference for a nice breakfast with bagels and coffee and relaxed talks with other attendees.
This is the second part of my report on Kinference, a small conference with friendly people working on the web. (You can read the first part here)
Not long after that, the first speaker started:
Banu Guler
Banu Guler at Kinference ’23
Banu talked about her journey from bike messenger to self-taught designer to founder of Co-Star, a popular astrology app.
Co–Star offers personalised horoscopes, birth chart analysis, and daily updates on astrological events. 25% of all young people in the U.S. have Co–Star on their phones. 🤩
I found the app’s aesthetics (inspired by punk and photo-copied ’zines) very nice, but receiving advice and predictions based on the position of glowing balls of hot gas — is not for me. 😬
👉🏻 Read more about Co–Star here
Paula Scher
Paula Scher at Kinference ‘23
Paula Scher is a highly influential graphic designer and partner at Pentagram. With over four decades of experience, she has worked on branding and advertising campaigns for major corporations, cultural institutions, and non-profits.
The Westinghouse logo is designed by Paul Rand
She talked about the The Career Staircase but mainly showed a lot of nice projects she did with her team.
I really liked the work they did for Westinghouse in which they extended Paul Rand’s iconic logo into a contemporary identity system, complete with custom typeface.
Westinghouse mobile design by Pentagram
Check out the following case studies on the Pentagram site:
👉🏻 See more of Pentagram’s work here
This is the second part of my report on Kinference, a small conference with friendly people working on the web. (You can read the first part here)
Not long after that, the first speaker started:
Banu Guler
Banu Guler at Kinference ’23
Banu talked about her journey from bike messenger to self-taught designer to founder of Co-Star, a popular astrology app.
Co–Star offers personalised horoscopes, birth chart analysis, and daily updates on astrological events. 25% of all young people in the U.S. have Co–Star on their phones. 🤩
I found the app’s aesthetics (inspired by punk and photo-copied ’zines) very nice, but receiving advice and predictions based on the position of glowing balls of hot gas — is not for me. 😬
👉🏻 Read more about Co–Star here
Paula Scher
Paula Scher at Kinference ‘23
Paula Scher is a highly influential graphic designer and partner at Pentagram. With over four decades of experience, she has worked on branding and advertising campaigns for major corporations, cultural institutions, and non-profits.
The Westinghouse logo is designed by Paul Rand
She talked about the The Career Staircase but mainly showed a lot of nice projects she did with her team.
I really liked the work they did for Westinghouse in which they extended Paul Rand’s iconic logo into a contemporary identity system, complete with custom typeface.
Westinghouse mobile design by Pentagram
Check out the following case studies on the Pentagram site:
👉🏻 See more of Pentagram’s work here
Matt Hall
Matt Hall at Kinference ‘23
Matt Hall is a software developer from Canada who co-founded Larva Labs with John Watkinson. They worked on apps and games for the T-mobile Sidekick and the first Android phones. Together they made all kinds of weird apps like a drummachine, an avatar creator and a github for legal documents.
In 2017 they created Cryptopunks, a digital collectible on the Ethereum Blockchain. Inspired by pixel art of early video games they created a series of 10,000 unique characters, each with its own distinct look and personality. The characters were generated using an algorithm, which randomly assigned various attributes such as hairstyle, clothing, and accessories.
Three Cryptopunks
Sold for $0,10 at launch, they we’re quite happy to see them trade for $100 fairly quickly. And in 2021 their value began to rise quickly, as collectors and enthusiasts recognised their uniqueness and scarcity.
Today, CryptoPunks are considered to be some of the most valuable and sought-after digital collectibles, and the most expensive Crypto Punk ever sold for $23.7 million. 🤯
I don’t understand the art world and the NFT art world even less, and Matt’s talk didn’t change that, but it was interesting to watch.👉🏻 Read more about Larva Labs here
Next to the main talks there we’re also a few shorter ones in which:
Jessica Hische at Kinference ’23
Jessica Hische talked about her new book: Who will U Be, that follows an inquisitive little letter “u” as she goes on a class field trip to find out all the ways letters are seen and used in the world.
Russ Maschmeyer talked about his work with Shopify and how they are prototyping the future of commerce with AI and AR.
Pablo Stanley at Kinference ’23
Pablo Stanley talked about many things, including the art of doodling, his battle with depression and he reminded us to “stop killing the fun for the system”.
And Craig Mod talked about “Kissa by Kissa”, a beautiful book he created about walking 1,000 km along the ancient Nakasendō highway in Japan, the culture of pizza toast and Japanese cafés called kissaten.
Kissa by Kissa (4th edition) by Craig Mod
There were a few books available through a raffle and my friend Bram won a copy! 😀 And then he gave it to me. 🥹 Thanks so much Bram!
And that concluded the first edition of Kinference. I saw a lot of interesting talks and what I liked most were the topics I normally don’t think about or am aware of. And hearing creative people working in other fields than myself share their stories and insights is wonderful.
Next to that, getting a chance to speak to many people I’ve admired for a long time is great too. So thanks for the nice talks Bram, Tim, Chris, Dan, Maykel, Matt, Julia, Craig, Dave, Pablo and everyone I forgot.
And many thanks to Cameron, Jessi, Creighton, Jonny and everyone else that played a part in making Kinference so special. 😘
Matt Hall
Matt Hall at Kinference ‘23
Matt Hall is a software developer from Canada who co-founded Larva Labs with John Watkinson. They worked on apps and games for the T-mobile Sidekick and the first Android phones. Together they made all kinds of weird apps like a drummachine, an avatar creator and a github for legal documents.
In 2017 they created Cryptopunks, a digital collectible on the Ethereum Blockchain. Inspired by pixel art of early video games they created a series of 10,000 unique characters, each with its own distinct look and personality. The characters were generated using an algorithm, which randomly assigned various attributes such as hairstyle, clothing, and accessories.
Three Cryptopunks
Sold for $0,10 at launch, they we’re quite happy to see them trade for $100 fairly quickly. And in 2021 their value began to rise quickly, as collectors and enthusiasts recognised their uniqueness and scarcity.
Today, CryptoPunks are considered to be some of the most valuable and sought-after digital collectibles, and the most expensive Crypto Punk ever sold for $23.7 million. 🤯
I don’t understand the art world and the NFT art world even less, and Matt’s talk didn’t change that, but it was interesting to watch.👉🏻 Read more about Larva Labs here
Next to the main talks there we’re also a few shorter ones in which:
Jessica Hische at Kinference ’23
Jessica Hische talked about her new book: Who will U Be, that follows an inquisitive little letter “u” as she goes on a class field trip to find out all the ways letters are seen and used in the world.
Russ Maschmeyer talked about his work with Shopify and how they are prototyping the future of commerce with AI and AR.
Pablo Stanley at Kinference ’23
Pablo Stanley talked about many things, including the art of doodling, his battle with depression and he reminded us to “stop killing the fun for the system”.
And Craig Mod talked about “Kissa by Kissa”, a beautiful book he created about walking 1,000 km along the ancient Nakasendō highway in Japan, the culture of pizza toast and Japanese cafés called kissaten.
Kissa by Kissa (4th edition) by Craig Mod
There were a few books available through a raffle and my friend Bram won a copy! 😀 And then he gave it to me. 🥹 Thanks so much Bram!
And that concluded the first edition of Kinference. I saw a lot of interesting talks and what I liked most were the topics I normally don’t think about or am aware of. And hearing creative people working in other fields than myself share their stories and insights is wonderful.
Next to that, getting a chance to speak to many people I’ve admired for a long time is great too. So thanks for the nice talks Bram, Tim, Chris, Dan, Maykel, Matt, Julia, Craig, Dave, Pablo and everyone I forgot.
And many thanks to Cameron, Jessi, Creighton, Jonny and everyone else that played a part in making Kinference so special. 😘
