It seems that the big boys have overlooked one of the most important parts of the design process, research.

"The fast-food chain, Burger King, is withdrawing its ice-cream cones after the lid of the dessert offended a Muslim. The man claimed the design resembled the Arabic inscription for Allah, and branded it sacrilegious, threatening a "jihad".

The chain is being forced to spend thousands of pounds redesigning the lid with backing from The Muslim Council of Britain. It apologised and said: "The design simply represents a spinning ice-cream cone." The offending lid was spotted in a branch in Park Royal last week by business development manager Rashad Akhtar, 27, of High Wycombe."

He was not satisfied by the decision to withdraw the cones and has called on Muslims to boycott Burger King. He said: "This is my jihad. How can you say it is a spinning swirl? If you spin it one way to the right you are offending Muslims."

The system formerly known as Vestigo, is now in beta testing as Delineate. Rather interesting because this tracking service not only tells you who your visitors are, but what they want too. It also uses Google Maps API so you can see their exact location. Pretty swift stuff.

On the social networking end, Flock has landed–so sign up to be first in the know.

Polka recently took home the 'Best of Show, New Product Award' at Maison et Objet, Paris 2005 and 'Best Lighting' at Autumn Fair Birmingham 2005 for this beauty. The CUTlight can be grabbed at innermost, along with some other nice aesthetics for the home.

The team of Monica Singer and Marie Rahm, have been creating innovative designs since 2004, and are pushing the boundaries of what people think is possible (see tattoofurniture). Their new light will be presented September 23 at the 100% Design Show, complete with a live cutting.

Guess Gen Y isn't as mobile as we first thought, based on results from a study conducted by scenarioDNA.

"Consider this, although iPod defines music for 56% of Gen Yers polled in the survey, more than half (50.7%) of Gen Yers listen to their music mainly at home. Meanwhile, 40% of respondents claim that the handheld device Game Boy defines gaming for them. Yet 71.1% say they mainly play their video games (guess where?) -- at home."

Part of this is due to the bans on portable electronics in school and the workplace, so teens are not as mobile as they can be. It won't be until the bans lift over time that mobile campaigns will start to effectively reach this demographic.

"British design consultancy Arup has announced that it has been tapped by the Chinese government to lead the construction of an "eco-city" expansion to Shanghai. Dongtan, the expanded development near Shanghai's airport, will eventually cover about 8,800 hectares -- roughly the size of Manhattan island. Shanghai claims that the Dongtan project will be "the world's first genuinely eco-friendly city," using recycled water, cogeneration and biomass for energy, and striving to be as carbon-neutral as possible.

The first phase, a 630 hectare development including a mix of transport facilities, schools, housing and high-tech industrial spaces, will begin construction late next year, and is expected to be completed by 2010."