New Site For Elia Law

We completed on a new website for Elia Law LLC, a lawfirm based in Nicosia, Cyprus. The site includes a full CMS system as well as a custom client area, where Elia Law can provide specific, private documents in a secure environment, saving time and money.

You can take a look at the site here: www.elialaw.com.cy

Refreshment Time!

FITC Toronto 2011 Titles from FITC on Vimeo.

New Site For Bond Street Holdings

We enjoyed working on this project. We built a customised content managed site for Bond Street Holdings. The site was designed to be easy to use, attractive and sophisticated. We integrated a neat client area where the site administrators could share information and files securely with their clients. We like the way the site turned out, you can visit the site here

Firefly, The Brightest Way To Shop Online

We were recently asked to create the identity and website for Firefly.com.cy. Firefly is a facilitator between the consumer and the product. Whether you’re looking for the next product in consumer electronics, office supplies or home appliances, Firefly can facilitate your order online through a process of requesting & customising your order. Once happy with your request, Firefly will deliver your product. We really enjoyed working closely with a fantastic client & developing a customised solution for a process which is far too often complicated. Visit the site here, we hope you like it.

Focused Sunshine

Danny MacAskill - One Skilled Cat

Good Things Come To Those Who Wait

We've Rebranded

We've finally launched our new website after a while of the same old same old. Not only have we launched a brand new site, we've also rebranded. Please visit our site to view selected projects, latest news and a little more. Check it out here...

Children's Cancer & Blood Foundation Goes Live

We were approached by the truly fantastic folks at the Children's Cancer & Blood Foundation to develop a custom content managed site based on the requirements that they have. We enjoyed working very closely with the CCBF on this project and the result is a crisp, friendly website where users can browse resources, read news, browse the events section, watch videos, view galleries and participate in forums. We're very pleased with the site and are glad that we were able to be involved in such a great project. You can view the site here.

Balloon Bass Quartet.

A couple of weeks ago I posted video of a guy playing a balloon and his buddy playing a box. I really loved it. So I managed to find more on this balloon-playing guy and came across this video. Looks like hes in band!

The video above is them performing "Carmen/Green Eyes" at the Museum of Contemporary Art in San Diego

Addi Somekh - Balloon Bass
Henry Bermudez - Guitar
Tylana Regna - Violin
Matt Margucci - Recorder

Cool track!

Skevi Farazi Is An Awesome Architect

Don't take our word for it, see for yourself on the cool new website we built for her. Visit the site here.

Mallouppas & Papacostas Has A New Site

We're very pleased to announce the launch of the new Mallouppas & Papacostas website. Mallouppas & Papacostas is a major player in Cyprus. Responsible for representing a number of global fashion brands like Mango, Playlife, Intimissimi and much more, We created a site which allows users to see all the brands they are associated with, their business activities, we even included a nifty store locator using Google Maps.
Visit the live site here.

Google Chrome Speed Tests

So many awesome shots, great concept and brilliantly executed ad for Google's browser, Chrome. If all ads looked like this, were produced with the same amount of detail then who would need the cinema?

Workforce gets a makeover

It is with great pleasure that we launch the brand new WorkForce website. We added some nifty features into this fully content managed site, all designed to make your job search more pleasant. We're really happy with the site, and would be even happier if you paid them a visit. You can do that here.

Sigma Live gets a Facelift

We were lucky to get the chance to give Sigma Live, Cyprus' leading portal, a fresh new look. Working closely with our good friends Bytecrafts, who are responsible for the awesome development of this new site, we handled the design and aesthetics. The site features great new content, lots of videos and great reporting.

Visit the site, click here.

The Balloon and the Box

Ballon Bass And Box Jam - Watch more Funny Videos

Fantastic CGI

The Third & The Seventh from Alex Roman on Vimeo.

Thanks Alex

Newspapers To Start Using Video

This is great. This September the first-ever video advertisement will be published in a traditional paper magazine. Times they are a changing.

The screens will be pretty small, about the same as a mobile phone's. The chip technology will be similar to the ones found in singing (annoying) greeting cards. The idea seems to be when a page is turned, the video is activated and will begin to play.

Pretty cool article, read the whole thing here...

We're On Twitter

We sure took our time, but we're finally on Twitter.

Follow us, you know you want to.

Brand New Website For Demstar

We're so very pleased to announce the launch of the new website for the Demstar Group. It was an absolute pleasure working with them on this project and we're very pleased with the result.

Demstar now has a sparkly new content managed website with a few extra features underneath the hood such as a neat intranet.

The site turned out rather well we think, you can see it here.

Is There Anything He Can't Do?

Apostolou & Co Goes Live

It is with great pleasure and pride that we announce the launch of a brand new website for a great company, Apostolou & Co. We thoroughly enjoyed working on this project.

It is rare to work with companies that pay as much attention to detail as they do and who are as passionate about the look, feel and usability of their website as we are. I think that because of this, a really beautiful website was created.

Apostolou & Co is a market leader in its focus fields of Banking and Finance Laws, Corporate Law, Mergers and Acquisitions, Financial Services, Commercial Law, Contracts, Property, Tax, Tax Planning, Trusts and Company Formation and Administration.

Find out more about this fine company here.

Violent Muppets Commercials

Some funny, strangely violent commercials back from the fifties endorsing Wilkins Coffee by Muppets creator Jim Henson. Worth a view.

Thanks Alex

Cytanet is The Devil

So the battle with Cytanet rages on. The speed at which Cytanet is letting me browse the net is 180kbps. Yes, 180 kbps. That is pathetic. especially since I am paying for a 4mbps connection.

The worst part is that a technician came over this morning, said he fixed the line and that everything was working correctly. I wonder what it is these guys do just before they make these statements, puff on the crack pipe? Too much time in the sun? Electro shock therapy or perhaps a labotomy? How else does one explain getting much slower speeds AFTER the technician arrives claiming to have sorted the problem out?

So I've decided. I'm giving them until Thrusday to sort the problem out, then its time to switch providers. I can't take it anymore, they're killing me.

Did I mention I called three times today? The first two times I was put on hold and then hung up on, the third time, thankfully a very helpful person answered, the only thing is he was helpless as he needs one of those amazing technicians to do something.

So, heres how it stands: Its taken Cytanet a week and a day to make the original problem worse. Much worse. I have made countless calls that all ended in nothing being accomplised and about two hours of my life gone that I will never get back. I have "upgraded" to double my original speed in my head it seems (that I will no doubt be billed for) but in reality have been downgraded to half my original speed.

Man Cyta must be getting a real kick out of this, how else would you explain it? I can see it now, a bunch of people wearing green shirts sitting around a speaker phone cackling at the moon.

Now thats service.

New Sites Launching Soon

We here at Cornerstore Digital have been very busy of late, when EVIL CYTANET lets us use the internet. Sometimes it seems there just aren't enough days in a week. Luckily for us, we have great projects for some fantastic clients to work on.

We're planning on launching a few nifty client sites soon, all very different and we're very pleased with the way they're looking at the moment. More news on that soon...

Cytanet Strikes Again

I use Cytanet as my internet provider. This is something I regret, heres why:

Last week, I had no internet connection from Monday to Wednesday. I called them up and the woman at the help-desk, or wherever they sit, told me with what sounded like a straight face that the whole of Nicosia had no internet.

I figured there was no point in carrying on, I left my workplace to work from a coffeeshop all day. Finally, Wednesday evening rolls in and I finally got the internet back.

There was a new problem though, my speed was about as fast as a dial-up connection. When I reported this, I got the old "We were doing repairs in your area last week" to which I replied: That was last week, surely the repairs were to fix a problem, not create more.

Anyway, this has been going on since last monday and I still dont have a solid connection, and when I do get the luxury of being online, its as if Im an internet user from the nineties. So I figured I may as well upgrade to a better package, which I did, and is the same as before, only less reliable. On and off, here and there, just not in my house!

I just got off the phone with another unhelpful person at Cytanet right now where she informed me that there is a problem with my phone line. Now, this wouldnt be so bad if they told me this from the beginning. Definitely would have been better than the "whole city is down" story but they didnt, they couldn't be bothered to find out what the real problem was until phonecall forty seven.

So my next question to the people working at Cytanet was "When can this be fixed?" to which she replied, we will send a technician in the coming days. I asked when the soonest I could expect a visit from a line-checking, line-fixing Cytanet guy and she said I won't be waiting for more than three days, repeat, THREE DAYS!

Now come on Cytanet, does your grip on the local telecoms industry really give you the right to treat your paying customers like shit? To supply such a substandard service where if it works at all, works badly? Lies and deceipt (Refer to the paragraph about the entire Nicosia being down), being put on hold for countless minutes, unhelpful call centre staff and all the while being charged the full rate of a working service. Is this how you choose to operate?

Oh, but one area Cytanet really excels at is sending bills. My bills always seem to arrive early. some even overlap. If only the service on "offer" were as steady and reliable as that steady stream of Cytanet bills.

So Cytanet, Thanks for all the good times Ive had to endure this past week, I'm sure they wont be the last.

The Smartest Search Engine

Okay so it's not really a search engine. Computational engine? Whatever it is, it's awesome. If only this was up when I was studying engineering...

Check out the introduction video, I challenge you not to be impressed!

Spacetime Changes....

Remember that 3D browser I was lauding? Well, obviously right after I did that they go and change it into a 3D search engine...

It's actually pretty good, but most people just want speed when they are searching for something, and since it renders every page before it shows you, it's not the fastest thing ever. Not quite as polished visually as Cooliris either.

New Anna Vissi Music Video

Anna Vissi's brand new music video has been added to the site. You can also check out some cool "behind The Scenes" footage of the making of the video. There is also a pretty cool contest to enter where you get to mix and sample some Anna Vissi tracks.

Check it all out here.

2019 According to Microsoft

This is Microsoft's "Future Vision Montage" video shown at the Wharton Business Technology Conference. Pretty cool stuff, and some of it is already out there in some form at least.

Having a vision and making it a reality are very different though. Will any of it make it past the concept phase?

Cool Website

Quickly excusing the horridly generic name, BeFunky is pretty neat. What it does isn't terribly interesting or... useful, but I like the interface.

Everything in the process works and works quickly. Take note, Internet!

The Coolest Thing Ever

This guy is insane. How do you even stop?!

Obligatory Windows 7 Post

Windows Vista had a hard time. Constant delays, dropped features, ridiculous amount of editions and high price weren't a good starting point, compounded by poor early driver support (looking at you NVIDIA, Creative) and sluggish performance on older systems. A lot of the media jumped on it, which gave people who naturally hate Microsoft and Apple ammunition to spread half-truths about it. I recently dual-boot installed Vista on my brother's shiny new MacBook Pro (I found it amusing that he paid all of that for, an admittedly nice machine, but then wanted Vista on it) and one of the first things he said was; "What do I need to do to not get a load of viruses and stuff?"

But that was then, Vista actually matured into a pretty solid OS. Honest.

Now a new challenger appears, Windows 7. It's arrival only 3 years after Vista seen as admission by some from Microsoft that Vista was a failure. In actuality, XP had a an unusually long life-span for a Microsoft OS for various reasons and they are now simply getting back to their usual 2-4 year cycle. Windows 7 beta is here, and now the dust has settled after the overwhelming response to the public beta release (their servers melted), everyone seems pretty pleased.

It's more lightweight than Vista at around 2GB, has a funky new(-ish) GUI, some cool new features and runs surprisingly well on older systems. Most importantly though, Microsoft are really on hardware partner's asses to get their drivers sorted. The best OS beta I can remember, I now go back to Vista and wait for late 2009-early 2010 for it to drop.

Happy New Year

Thanks to all who've been reading our blog and have supported us over the great years known as 2007 and 2008. We're looking forward to 2009 and already, its proving to be quite a good one.

This year we welcome Michael Charilaou, bringing to Cornerstore Digital something different, some much needed CSS and HTML know how and some interesting blog posts.

Some seriously cool projects coming up in the next couple of months, we're every excited about some of the stuff we're working on. So excited in fact, my grammar has gone right out the window!

We'll be letting you know of all the new stuff coming out of our little studio right here and on our website, so please keep reading.

3D Browsers Are Getting Better

Stumbled across SpaceTime a little while ago. Has reached 1.0 and is pretty cool, especially when compared to the awful ones out there. Renders well and you can even enable MSAA. Unfortunately, like Compiz Fusion and other such GUI enchancers it looks nice but doesn't really improve workflow. Fun for about 10 minutes until you realise it's not really doing anything for you that you can't do faster already.

Until they do, I'll take 2D tabs. But they're getting there....

More Wingsuit Excellence

wingsuit base jumping from Ali on Vimeo.

A while ago I posted some crazy guys flying through the air in wingsuits. What they did, and you can scroll down the page to watch the older video, is jump off huge cliffs, then glide through the air with their wingsuits and then release their parachutes.

These guys have taken it a step further by skiing off a cliff, releasing their skis, gliding through the air in their wingsuits, and then, well, just watch the video. looks fun.

Thanks Alex.

Its Happening

Happy New year, hope 2009 is as good for you as its going to be for us.

Now that thats out of the way, the type of interface we've all been waiting for is finally coming together. Remember the Spielberg film Minority Report? The one with Tom Cruise fooling about with pretty much the coolest user interface we had seen on the big screen. Well, some smart cats over at Oblong have taken it further than anyone in the real world so far, that I know of anyway.

Check out the video below, its nice.


g-speak overview 1828121108 from john underkoffler on Vimeo.

Anna Vissi Goes Live

We couldn't be happier for having the opportunity to develop Anna Vissi's brand new website. Find out more about her new album, watch videos, sample the latest tracks and much more.

It was an absolute pleasure working on this site, and we're very happy with the way it turned out. We hope you like it.

Visit the new Anna Vissi site here.

Another Excellent IKEA site

Ikea's NEW SITE is awesome.

So much fun playing around with the different tracks, which happen to be great, and going between the different room for a completely immersive experience. I think they hit it on the nail on this one, I didnt even realising i was browsing through their products, I was having so much doing it.

Well done IKEA, your site rules.

Need An Identity?

Ioannou+Souglides are graphic design maestros.

They are very precise when designing corporate identities and their graphic design portfolio speaks for itself really. With branches in Cyprus and the UK, they're easy to get hold of.

We're pleased to announce we have been selected to create their online presence. At the moment the site is under development, but why not stop over and get in touch with them?

You can do that here.

Twitter is cool

Twitter, I know its not so new and exciting for most people now, what can I say, im a late bloomer. I think its fantastic that people all over the world can know that I'm making making a cup of tea just by me texting a website far far away. Might come handy some time.

Thats pretty much it. Happy halloween and expect some nifty projects launching soon.

WEFAIL Does It Again!

I love WEFAIL and again they have created something brilliant. Their new site for Julian Velard which is completely out there, as usual, promoting his new album, Planeteer, very well.

Explore the site by going in and out of different rooms, interacting with strange and unusual creatures like caterpillars & twisted 80's performers. Unlock rooms with missing fuses, get in a fight with a creepy, neo-hippied-out fan, little people in trash cans and plenty more great weirdness from none other than WEFAIL.

Kyriakides Piano Gallery Goes Live

We are so very happy to announce the launch of our latest offering, Kyriakides Piano Gallery.

Located at Makedonitissa, Engomi, They provide many different options of piano brands, models, sizes, and finishes, a large number of pianos to play and listen to. Offering a complete line of services in the piano field, from sales, technical support and rentals.

It doesn't end there. Kyriakides Piano Gallery also runs the AvantGarde Group, which is a non-profit organization founded in an attempt to enrich and strengthen the cultural life of the island. Main target of the Foundation is to assist young people in their musical careers and development of their talent. Avantgarde is activated through recitals, concerts, competitions, international festivals.

So go on then, pay them a visit, click here.

ArchTube Goes Live

We're pleased to announce the launch of ArchTube.com.

Archtube Ltd is an architectural lighting and design consultancy based in Nicosia, Cyprus, providing a high standard of professional services from conceptual design to execution.

We thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity of working with these creatives, who never stopped the positive and creative ideas coming. If thats what they gave us to work with, imagine what they can do for you.

Click here to visit their brand new website and find out more about them.

Been Busy

We've been pretty swamped lately, hence the long delay in posting anything new on our dear old blog. But all that is about to change. No, the workload hasn't decreased, but we'll be launching two new flash sites in the coming days, so please be sure to watch this space.

We won't say much right now, but we're excited.

More great projects in the pipeline, some interesting projects are coming up and we can't wait to tell you more about them.

Fantastic Guiness Commercial

This is an old Guinness commercial, but one of the coolest ads I can remember seeing in a very long time.

Interactive Playnet Goes Live

We're exceptionally pleased to announce that Interactive Playnet's new site is now online.

Interactive Playnet provides a complete service of online gaming solutions. The company is a close mixture of pioneering marketing experience and forward thinking software solutions. Together the company is unified in its aims and goals of being the leader in the online gaming industry.

TIF Goes Live

We're pleased to announce that we launched the Thalassaemia International Federation's brand spanking new website.

Thalassaemia International Federation (TIF) is a non-profit, non-governmental patient-driven organisation founded in 1986 and working in official relations with the World Health Organization (WHO) since 1996. TIF is an umbrella organisation involving 98 national thalassaemia associations and other members from over 60 countries across the world.

View the new site here.

Affiliate Arena goes online

We just completed the design work for the new Affiliate Arena site which is now online.

If you look at many websites, you will probably notice that there are banner advertisements displayed on most pages. If you are a newcomer to the scene, you might think that you must either be a company or that your site must be famous before you can get advertisers, just as it is the case in hardcopy publications.

In reality, anyone with a website can get advertisers. While it is true that if your site is well-known, you may get companies contacting you to offer to advertise on your site, you can get advertising revenue even if you are just starting out and your site is relatively unknown.

The way to do this is to join as an "affiliate" of various sites, either directly, or through an affiliate network.

Click here to visit Affiliate Arena now.

Now Showing: Paravan Proactions

Paravan Proactions puts on shows, not your regular, run-of-the-mill shows, but more unusual, very visual, lets say alternative shows where the audience becomes really involved in the act itself. Their mission: To challenge the relationship between the audience, the space and the show.

We're thrilled to announce that Paravan.org has a new shiny website by Cornerstore Digital. It was a great project to be involved in, and the people behind Paravan itself were fantastic to work with. Very creative people makes for some interesting brainstorming sessions!

More will be added to the site very soon, namely video. So make sure you keep checking in. Big thanks to Paravan for letting us create your site for you.

Who Cares?

Another fantastic video and track from the almost at the top of my list now, Gnarls Barkley. Great concept for a music video, ties in well with the lyrics. A winner.

Kickstart Your Future, Bru.

Our close friends all the way down at the tip of Africa needed a new site. We were only too happy to help out.

Kickstart is a company that offers internships for students about to finish up their studies. They offer social and wildlife volunteer work placements and gap year adventures for that break away from home as well as language travel travelers a chance to learn while discovering South Africa.

Take a look at their site, who knows, it may be something you'd like to do, I know I would have liked to.

Visit www.kickstart.co.za now.

Joziewood Goes Live

The hottest new production company in South Africa has a brand new website. Visit www.joziewood.com. We are proud to have been chosen to create their site.

They rock.

New Offices and Site Launches. Soon.

We've been on the lookout for a new spot to call home for a little while and we may have found the right place. Its still a little early on to say where or what, but we'll say this... It seems perfect right now. More on that next week.

In other news, we'll be launching a new site for a very cool, creative company that lives far, far away. In the woods somewhere we believe. Thats all we're saying.

Gone Daddy Gone

I love these guys, and here is a fantastic video of their version of Gone Daddy Gone for your enjoyment.

The Robotic Restaurant

You just have to love German efficiency. One restaurant in Nuremberg, Germany, has taken the term to a whole new level. The place is called 's Baggers.

Touch-screen TVs are used to browse the menu and choose your meals. There are no waiters and once your order is placed, kitchen upstairs receives your order than sends it down on a system similar to a rollercoaster.

While waiting for your order you can use the screens to send e-mails and text messages. The owner, Michael Mack, said he wanted to come up with a complete new restaurant system, one that would be more efficient and more comfortable.

Read the full article on BBC

Coffee

Coffee, it seems to me, has got an awfully bad reputation lately. Most people I speak to about the amounts of caffeine a person can consume and still maintain a healthy body and mind tell me that coffee is bad. "Don't drink that much", "Stop drinking it at all" and so forth.

So here is my attempt, biased it may be, to get to the bottom of it.

Turns out our tasty morning beverage is quite high in antioxidants. These little guys are generally helpful substances, found in foods, which scavenge unstable molecules in your body known as free radicals (great name). Free radicals contribute to oxidative stress, which, over time, can cause inflammation and other unhealthy changes in your cells. So I guess according to that little tidbit, sixteen cups a day is bad. One or two is good.

Further along I found that caffeine reduces the risk of inflammation and cardiovascular disease in women.

Routine coffee consumption substantially lowers your risk of type 2 diabetes. Nice. Furthermore, coffee protects your brain. Caffeine helps preserve cognitive skills a study on elderly women who, throughout their lives were rugular coffee consumers.

Its not all good news though. Too much caffeine can cause restlessness, anxiety, irritability, tremors, sleeplessness, headaches, gastrointestinal symptoms and abnormal heart rhythms. In some people, caffeine can increase blood pressure too.

So thats that then, coffee is good for you.

Do You Do Children's Parties?

We're Hiring

Yes, our small studio is growing and we're looking for talented designers to add to the team.

If you are passionate about the web, have strong communication skills, are profficient in Photoshop, Flash, HTML and CSS, then why not drop us an email. We would love to hear from you.

Something Different

Its always nice to get to work on interesting projects for interesting clients. Thats why We're enjoying working on a brand spanking new site for a very cool company.

The name is Paravan Productions. They make shows. A young, vibrant production company which specializes in out-the-box theatre productions. They're run by a very creative bunch, who all have extensive experience in the world of art.

The site is coming soon, in the meantime, visit their page to get in touch with them. You can do that here.

The UFO Guy

Kofteros Goes Live

Kofteros, a company in Cyprus which specializes in Parquet flooring went live today. We're quite happy the way this site turned out. We found working on this site to be quite enjoyable. Stay tuned for multiple languages as well as updated content.

Love These Guys

A Good Start To The Week

As per usual we got off to a brutal start this week. Much work lies in our To Do lists and with many more projects on the way, it looks to be a bumper month. We will be completing a new site in the coming days, stay posted for the launch dates as well as some other interesting stuff on the way.

Hello Everybody

Its been a long time and we've finally found a minute to create our blog. Here you, our dear readers, will find out the latest news coming out of Cornerstore Digital, things on the web we find interesting and probably a large amount of incoherent ramblings coming out of our small studio here in Nicosia, Cyprus.

Things at Cornerstore Digital have been going swimmingly and we have a few projects in the pipeline.

Watch this space.