Bio
Oli Shaw created his first homepage in 1995 on GeoCities, he has gone on to work in a range of industries from media to telecoms, finance to electronics and consumer goods, for clients which include: Nokia, BSkyB, Orange, UBS, Panasonic and Adidas to name but a few. In his 12 years in the industry, he's gained extensive experience spanning; online, interactive TV, mobile, interactive narratives and installations. Moving between the worlds of advertising to products & services, he works to concept and maintain the quality of the idea. Ensuring that from the initial vision to the final output, it's not only of a high standard but is also right for both the brand and the audience.
Speaking / Workshops
Better inspiration through serendipity and the unexpected
Belfast, March 2012, CreativeCamp
A talk about how to improve your creativity and inspiration by opening yourself up to some serendipity and adding randomness into your life.
London, November 2011, LondonIA
Prague, October 2011, IA Europe
Serendipity is a catchy term, there is a lot of hope placed in how we can better show relevance in an abundance of information, there's also a lot of myths about what a serendipitous system can do and should do.
This talk explores the different areas serendipity can be applied from; search results, what is around me (location based suggestions) and suggesting things which aren't being looked for. Looking at the positive aspects of creating relevance in a world of information overload but also the pitfalls and problems that come with recommendations and serendipity.
London, July 2011, Interesting '11
A workshop to cater for 200 creative to make a creature and cuitfy it using plasticine and their imaginations, once the creature had be sculpted and decorated there was a photobooth area to document it.
Lisbon, May 2011, UXLX
We live in modern times, witchcraft has been replaced by technologically magical products and service whose appearance is as alluring as our expectations of how we can use them. The more utopian the products and service we use become the less we need to understand how they work, which is fine, until something goes wrong and you need to get it working again.
This talk will be examine the pitfalls of simplified 'seamless' designs, how something which was perceived as magical one day can be the source of great frustration then next, when things are no longer working as expected or worse completely broken. In a world of immaculately created artefacts be it on-screen or in-hand, the role of perception is intrinsically linked to emotion as an effective design approach, yet often overlooked.
Brighton Science week, March 2011, Pecha Kucha
A talk on 'Future foods' which explores the glimpses of food from the future in sci-fi films, contrasted with the reality of what is around and available to use today.
Febuary 2010
A (lite) study into commuters playing (iPhone) games and some of the design principals that can be extracted from the research, looking at the behaviors and traits that are associated with mobile game players in a commuting scenario.
Sheffield, November 2010, InterestingNorth
The art & game of 'catching sleepers' - Those public transport passengers who fall asleep whilst journeying on buses, trains, tubes and alike. What started off as a passing amusement during my daily commute to and from work, quickly became a more serious fascination, trying to understand why these people would sleep in such a public place?
Before long my fascination had developed into a year long lite-anthropological study on the behaviour of 'sleepers'. Through this study I have been looking at identifying the traits, behaviours and patterns of sleepers, what similarities could be found in the type of person that makes a 'sleeper'? The pros & cons of different sleeping methods and tactics.
Through the documentation of this study I've developed a simple game for continued entertainment in which others can competitively play the game of 'Catching sleepers' too.
