AN INTERNATIONAL CONTEST IS LOOKING FOR CREATIVE GENIUS’ FOR THE “CARNIVAL OF PHYSICS” LOGO

Thanks to crowdsourcing and to the cooperative power of Web 2.0, designers and creative people from all over the world can take part.

Turin, 8th November 2010. The editorial staff of the “Gravità Zero” and “Gravedad Cero” blogs are launching a contest for ideas relating to the creation of the institutional logo for the “Carnival of Physics”, a scientific popularization event at an international level. And they are doing so by turning to crowdsourcing, a Web 2.0 technology based on the cooperative intelligence.

The aim is to spot a graphic element which is able to transmit in a direct way the identity and message of the “Carnival of Physics”, born a year a go precisely thanks to the initiative of the two blogs, and relying on the use of the cooperative opportunities offered by the web.

Coinciding with the first “Carnival of Physics” anniversary, its creators have introduced the crowdsourcing (from crowd and outsourcing) innovation, a neologism that shows how the use of the web can multiply and amplify the opportunities for innovation, also within the scientific popularization sphere.

How to take part?

The contest in addressed to graphics, designers, design bureaus and communication agencies, which will be able to compete individually or in partnership.

To take part one has to subscribe at the site www.logotournament.com and follow the rules described within, they which will also be available in the blogs www.gravita-zero.org and www.carnevadellafisica.ning.com, and in the c o r r e s p o n d i n g S p a n i s h s i t e s w w w . g r a v e d a d - c e r o . o r g a n d www.carnavadelafisica.ning.com

The contest for ideas’ deadline is set for midnight of the 27th November 2010. From then on a board formed by the editorial staff of “Gravità Zero” and “Gravedad Cero” will judge the works which have been presented. The 29th November 2010, the day of the eve of the first anniversary of the “Carnival of Physics” the name of the winner will be announced. The best logo will be used as the symbol of this great international scientific popularization initiative and will receive a 300 euros prize!

“We have extensively thought on how to innovate and keep the interest for the “Carnival of Physics” high. I believe that the introduction of crowdsourcing represents the best way to give added value to this event, which was born exactly on the Web 2.0 technologies”, Carlo Ferri from Gravedad Cero asserts.

According to Claudio Pasqua from “Gravità Zero”, also a co-founder of the Carnival, "this is a very wide spread online meeting among the English speaking countries where the teachers from schools of any level can interact and come to know about international matters thanks to the social networks, building associative contact networks with thousands of followers in Italy and in the world. The young people can find in Internet the motivations required to study in depth the subjects which will be useful for their cultural and professional training.

What is the “Carnival of Physics”?

The “Carnival of Physics” is an initiative devised by the editorial staff of the Gravedad Cero (Spain) and Gravità Zero (Italy) blogs. Inspired by the model of the Carnivals of Mathematics, it was created to promote the understanding of physics and addresses the larger public.

The 30th of each month hundreds of bloggers and scientific authors from over 10 countries of the world meet in the web reporting articles and posts which have physic as a thread. The blog in charge of hosting the event collects the pieces with a brief presentation.

The subjects can concern all the disciplines linked to physics (theoretical physics, meteorology, nanotechnologies, biophysics, astrophysics, etc.), but also literature and art (history poetry, theatre, music), reviews from other blogs, books, films which have physic as a thread.

The “Carnival of Physics” was officially born the 30th of the month of November 2009, and this date is not fortuitous. Four-hundred years earlier from such date, in fact, Galileo Galilei raised his spyglass to the sky, observing for the first time the brightest celestial body in the firmament: the Moon. This year, the “Carnival of Physics” celebrates its first year of existence!

It celebrates this scientific communicational event on:www.gravita-zero.org & www.gravedad-cero.org Social network: http://carnevaledellafisica.ning.com

Contact: ITALY: redazione@gravita-zero.org - SPAIN: info@gravedad-cero.org

The “Carnival of Physics” is organised with the sponsorship of:

Associazione Levi-Montalcini (www.levimontalcini.org e www.allascopertadeipreminobel.it)

Unione Astrofili Italiani(www.uai.it)