An Internet startup called Fashion Stake launching in coming weeks aims to shake up the fashion industry, just as peer-to-peer file sharing changed the music industry.

Fashion Stake will allow customers to directly fund fashion designers by browsing on-line collections and buying a stake in a collection in return for credits to buy clothes. Patrons can also share ideas with designers and vote on collections.

The model, inspired by Internet-based social media networks like Twitter and Facebook, taps into a growing business model called crowd sourcing where entrepreneurs go directly to customers for content, funding, and distribution.

Full story at Reuters

Louis Vuitton is developing a series of emotion monitoring bags – technologically designed to ‘feel what you feel’. Well, sort of.

Although currently in concept stage, art director Fernando Lahoz includes information about the new product development on his website, “Louis Vuitton bags and wallets are now able to detect owners’ emotions thanks to these new LV jewelry accessories. The bag incorporates a new HERM (heart and emotion rate monitor) in the form of a beautiful piece of jewelry which can be purchased with a bag or separately at Louis Vuitton stores. When attached to a bag the HERM automatically transmits your location and heartbeat via Bluetooth/WiFi to the owner’s smartphone. This heart and emotion rate monitor is automatically tracking the heartbeat and transmitting the information via Bluetooth/Wi-Fi to a smartphone, creating a heartbeat path and storing all the data. The bag is connected to the owner more than ever, saving a trustworthy reminder of the feelings and emotions of the owner during each journey.”

The owner is then able to map journeys that have been taken with the bag, via a downloadable iPhone app. All of which is not only very cool, but is a powerful way to reinforce the ‘journey’ equity that has become an increasingly visible piece of the brand communication over recent years. It also lifts the brand to a new level of technological and social media relevance.

The concept has been developed by Louis Vuitton in conjunction with Ogilvy Paris and Ogilvy New York… No further information available yet on whether / when the product will be made, but it’s a fascinating glimpse into a technological future for traditional luxury.

(from Agenda Inc)

By their own admission, it is still very much early stages for Augmented Reality and as such the current crop of executions are quite limited. None of the examples we reviewed could be said to offer readers much additional value. But it’s good to see them exploring the potential of AR and introducing readers to what might lie ahead.

Wallpaper are not the only fashion magazine to test their hand at AR. Both Esquire and Colors have dedicated issues to AR in recent months. Colors went a step further than Wallpaper and used AR to extend the story-lines within their Teenagers edition. By using graphics alongside articles throughout the magazine, readers could view animation and extended interviews via a dedicated section on the Colors website. Their efforts certainly went some way to enhance the experience for readers.

But whilst many see this use of AR as an innovative way of improving editorial and user experience, most digital purists will argue that it makes little sense to marry print and AR together. After all, what’s the point of holding a magazine to your web-cam when you can simply visit the website to check out audio-visual content without the need of AR.

This argument may be true for the long term, but for now it is our view that any effort by publishers of print titles to add value to their readers and differentiate from their competitors can only have positive affect on their business, and ultimately the industry as a whole. We think it is really promising to see traditional publishers testing digital technologies. The future of the industry depends on it. Their efforts should be encouraged and supported, not thwarted.