POKE

And the winner is...

Twenty-four hours of blood, sweat and tears, and it all came down to this: the verdict of our discerning celebrity judges.

And the winner is...

Sprïnkl. A simple, innovative way to immerse yourself in a new language while visiting the websites you use every day. Judges Aleks Krotoski, Dave Patten and John Mitchinson agreed that they saw it as having the most potential for development, real learning, and even monetization. They also admired how it came with a business that identified and solved a real problem (albeit with some statistics that they thought might be a little, ah, creative).

But it’s not over for the non-winners – this year, the five teams will continue to duke it out for the coveted Facebook prize, awarded to the project that receives the most likes in three months. So check out learn shit teach shit, How to Kill a Man, Now Know It and Live Lunch as well as Sprinkl…and watch this space.

Hack Day, halfway

We’re about halfway through this year’s Hack Day...

The brief: create a digital product that helps people learn. We split up into five teams and got cracking with our top secret plans. Tomorrow at 2 we pitch to our three supercalifragilistic judges: Dave Patten, head of new media at the Science Museum; author and publisher John Mitchinson; and tech journalist/academic Aleks Krotoski.

What will they make of our creations? You’ll have to tune in tomorrow…

Hack Day hype

This Wednesday, we’ll be downing tools at 2 pm sharp to get briefed for our third annual Hack Day. Everyone at Poke gets divided up into teams who are given 24 hours to tackle a top-secret creative brief, competing head-to-head. When the clock runs out, it’s time for the teams present to a panel of celebrity* judges. The best project will be awarded a valuable prize**.

What do we get out of Hack Day, besides a good time? Well, some pretty good projects – like last year’s winning The 100 Project, which won a Lovie Award, and runner-up Normal In Shoreditch, which nabbed a Lovie as well (and the moral victory, if you ask Eze). What kind of digital goodness will emerge from this year’s hard-fought competition? Watch this space…

*The identity of the judges is a secret. We assume that’s because they’re super-famous.

**The identity of the prize is also a secret. We assume that’s because it’s super-valuable.

Hasta la Vista, Emma Pueyo

If you follow Pokers on Twitter, you'll have noticed that our profile photos are sporting special Twibbons: today, we're commemorating creative director Emma Pueyo's last day at Poke. In her three years with us, Emma's led some of our best work, such as the Feed and French Connection. And she's also established herself as our very own Lady Gaga. But now Emma is moving back to Barcelona, and while we're excited for her next adventure, we're pretty gutted to see one of our favourite people go. So we're coping the only way we know how: wearing Spanish fancy dress, listening to Spanish pop music, doing the Macarena and drinking sangria to dull the pain. Hasta la vista, Emma -- we're going to miss you!

Si sigues a alguno de nuestros Pokers a través de Twitter, te habrás dado cuenta que nuestras fotos de perfil hoy llevan unos especiales Twibbons. Porque hoy estamos conmemorando el último día de Emma Pueyo, nuestra directora creativa. Durante sus tres años con nosotros, Emma ha liderado algunos de nuestros mejores trabajos. Como por ejemplo the Feed y French Connection. Emma se ha establecido como nuestra propia Lady Gaga. Pero ahora Emma vuelve a Barcelona. Estamos contentos por su nueva aventura, pero a la vez muy tristes de ver como una de nuestras personas favoritas se va. Así que lo vamos a sobrellevar de la mejor manera que sabemos: disfrazados como españoles, escuchando música española, bailando la Macarena y bebiendo sangria hasta reventar. Hasta la vista Emma ¡te vamos a echar de menos!

Happy Birthday Poke

It seems like only yesterday that Poke was but a wee thing; twinkle in our founders' eyes. But today, we've hit double digits. Look at how we've grown on our height chart.

http://www.pokelondon.com/10

Poke at Internet Week Europe

If you thought the Internet had an especially healthy glow recently, it might be something to do with Internet Week Europe - a seven-day celebration of the best of the web. As well as being partners of Internet Week Europe, we also put on a couple of events.

OpenShop ran for its second year, giving students an opportunity to drop by and meet the agencies where they could ultimately end up - basically the Guardian's Open House for the creative industries. A visit that would expose them to some great companies and people and inspire their future plans. The day proved to be a rare chance to meet the people behind the work and ask whatever they want to know. A huge thanks to the teams at POKE, Mother, LBi, Somethin' Else, Splendid, Anomaly, Work Club, Sapient, AKQA, Iris and Razorfish for making the time to host the 152 students that took part.

And on Wednesday night, the much-awaited (by us) sequel to Metaphwoar! took place. Six speakers took the stage at Concrete in Shoreditch to educate and amuse the crowd via the medium of metaphor. If that sounds strange, it probably is. You can read more about over here.

It was a huge success and a lot of fun. Someone in the audience described it as "stand up for nerds". Poke's Andy Whitlock hosted the event and was joined by Kate Miltner, Peter Gasston, David-Michel Davies, Margaret Robertson, Tim Malbon and Mr Bingo. If you're interested in speaking at a future Metaphwoar, you can get in touch via the website and let us know your idea.

In short, it was a bloody good week. Well done Internet. Well done everyone.

Have your say

We were chuffed to collaborate with The Huffington Post UK on The Gauge. It's a real-time tool for measuring public opinion about breaking news, in a distinctly social way.

The Gauge invites everyone to weight in with their opinions on The Huffington Post UK's biggest stories of the day. You can cast your vote on the controversy, share your opinion on Facebook and Twitter, and see how your view sizes up agains the perspectives of The Huffington Post UK's blogging community, other Gauge users, and your own network of friends. Go on: have your say.

What are you doing on Thursday night?

Orange Film to Go gives Orange customers a free film to download from iTunes, every Thursday. Which is nice. But we wanted to make the viewing experience extra brilliant.

So we recruited comedian (and leading tweeter) Peter Serafinowicz to present Film Night Live, alongside Empire Magazine’s Chris Hewitt. Live banter about the flick of the week, plus preview clips, special guests, and competitions.

We think it might just be the perfect movie night warm-up. And you can get involved — head to the Orange Film Club Facebook page every Thursday evening for 8pm.

The 100 Project Launch event

The 100 Project is something we came up with on our last Hack Day – just because. Our goal? To support 100 local kids to get a chance to study art at The Prince’s Drawing School here in Shoreditch. And we’re collaborating with some amazing artists to raise the cash. Each week for a year, we’ll be auctioning a piece of their work on eBay.

And on the 26th of July, the 100 Project will have its official launch, here at Poke HQ. There’ll be an exhibition of all 52 of the pieces that will be up for grabs. And we’ll also be auctioning off the first one.

Want to come? Brilliant. RSVP to

hello@the100project.co.uk

-----------------------

The 100 Project

On Facebook

On Twitter

Talk to me

We’re super excited about Talk to Me, a brilliant new exhibition at MOMA in New York. It’s all about exploring the communication between people and things.

The curators, Paola Antonelli and Kate Carmody, have pulled together a massive range of objects. Everything from interfaces and diagrams, to artworks, to ticket kiosks. A mobile phone box. And a hip-hop lyric database. There’s work by our mate David McCandless, the MIT SENSEable Cities Lab, and Frank Warren (the guy who runs PostSecret).

And we’re pretty delighted that two of Poke’s projects made the cut. Good Things Should Never End is on display in the ‘worlds’ category. And Baker Tweet is part of the ‘city’ category – it will be announcing what’s cooking in the MOMA restaurant. (Going to exhibitions is hungry work).

We’d cross the Atlantic to see Talk To Me. But if you can’t make it there in person, Antonelli and Carmody have recorded their process on an open source blog. Essential reading.

Talk to Me is at MOMA from 24 July – 7 November 2011