Stylish Pocket Art
Canadian artist Gary Taxali has teamed up with fashion retailer Harry Rosen to create pocket squares focused on Canadian. This is good because it seems so rare that Canadians celebrate…
Adam Clare
Carbon-Negative Energy Generation
All Power Labs sells a device that converts biomass into electric energy. Their machine, which is based on technology over 60 years old, can produce insanely cheap energy while making…
Think Dirty on Your Mobile to Shop Clean
Think Dirty is an app for your mobile phone (iOS only) designed to help people understand the ingredients in products. It’s focused on cosmetics products as a starting point for…
How Racing Cars Helps Babies
For the most part, Formula 1 is just entertainment, but every now and then something really nifty comes out of it. Using models and algorithms developed to monitor an F1…
A Turkish Hotel Wins Hospitality Innovation Award for Accommodating Protestors
During the Taksim Square protests in Turkey earlier this year, Divan Hotels’ flagship property in Istanbul opened their doors to the protestors. Not a bad place to get support after…
Literary Fiction Enhances Empathy in Readers
Literary fiction, not popular fiction, can make people better understand one another according to a new study. Because literary fiction (i.e. books not for sale at airports) focuses on the…
SXSW ECO in Austin Texas
I’m in Austin right now attending (and presenting) at the Captivate Conference and this city has come to impress me. While I’m at that conference about digital design there is…
The Types of Cyclist Change Thanks to Bike Sharing
Bixi is a bike sharing program that started in Montreal but the concept exists in cities around the world. In Montreal where there are more bicycle commuters every year,researchers at…
Soil Benefits from Organic Farming
The benefits of organic farming keep revealing themselves – it turns out that the soil itself benefits from farmers growing organic crops. “Farmers interested in transitioning to organic production will…
Open Hand: Low Cost Robotic Hand
A funding campaign on IndieGoGo is focused on making an open-sourced robotic prosthetic hand. This is wonderful because the end product will be shared with everyone and the hand can…
France Bans Child “Beauty” Pageants
The bizarre practice of over-sexualizing prepubescent girls on stages in front of people has now been banned in France. I’ve never understood the reasoning behind these pageants and it’s nice…
India Bans Shark Finning
Chinese demand for the fins of sharks (I have no idea what they are good for) has gone up over the past couple years. India is one of the largest…
Scotland Starts Europe’s Largest Tidal Wave Energy Installation
Tidal wave energy installations are nothing new, but installing it on a scale that can power 42,000 homes is. The other day, the Scottish government gave the go ahead for…
Toronto Condo Developers Want More Bike Sharing, Less Focus on Cars
Despite repeated efforts by Toronto’s mayor to make transportation in the city worse, things are improving. Local condo developers are finding ways to build condo towers that don’t require more…
A Good New Podcast
Talking GOOD is “PR for people making a difference” and each episode focuses on one person who is improving the world. It’s a Q&A about the work they do and…
Canadians: Stand Up for Science on Sept. 16
Previously on Things Are Good we’ve seen Canadians concerned about democracy mobilize to ensure that our political leaders make informed decisions. After a streak of attacks on knowledge, scientists and…
The Age of Exploration Isn’t Over
Humans haven’t been on the Moon for over 30 years and as a result it’s easy to think that the “space age” is over and our exploration of the universe…
Policy Changes Bring Cleaner Solvents to Market
Industrial cleaning solvents aren’t something most people think about on a daily basis, at least I hardly do. Interestingly enough some policy changes have forced companies to change how they…
Regrowing a Coral Reef
Coral reefs are under threat. Recreational boating and increased shipping have increased the risk to coral reefs from humanity, and increased temperatures have caused coral acidification. There are scientists and…