February 2012
21 posts
Clear: 350k downloads in nine days
“Obviously, there are hundreds of them already on the App Store, so we had to take a really different approach. We set ourselves on the path to a really simple design, then started iterating and iterating, taking more stuff away as we go.”
The aim: to make an app that was as simple to use as a pen and a piece of paper, removing the interface clutter of rival apps. Clear is so...
The myth of the eight-hour sleep
Much like the experience of Wehr’s subjects, these references describe a first sleep which began about two hours after dusk, followed by waking period of one or two hours and then a second sleep.
“It’s not just the number of references - it is the way they refer to it, as if it was common knowledge,” Ekirch says.
During this waking period people were quite active. They...
The Oatmeal: Trying to watch Game of Thrones
Nailed it.
via The Oatmeal
Samsungs new err .. Ph-ablet?
Sometimes bigger is just … bigger …
via The Tech Block
The anatomy of an Apple product shot
The most challenging aspect of shooting store panels for Apple is the balance between the size of the file and the depth of field. Often the products small enough that our depth of field is very narrow. In order for the product to appear entirely in focus, we have to shoot a number of focus zones, which are stitched together in post. This video is a stop motion video made from all of the focus...
Inventing on Principal
Bret Victor, who has designed experimental UI concepts at Apple, talks about inventing on principal beliefs, with his being that a creator needs to have direct and instantaneous feedback on the objects they’re creating.
He talks about how traditional coding doesn’t allow this to happen, and how he uses his principal of instantaneous feedback to invent solutions to make this a...
iOS '86
via @flyosity via repponen
How to remove Finder from the Application Switcher...
This has always been a pet peeve of mine, though I never thought about looking for a way to disable it.
via @destroytoday via Josh Dzielak
Amit Gupta - Interview with CBS Boston
superamit:
CBS Boston came by my hospital room yesterday to do an interview about my story so far + the urgent need for more donors to register. Here’s the video!
(It’s about 2 and a half minutes.)
Even though I don’t know Amit personally, I’ve been following his search for a donor ever since I heard he got cancer. I’m glad his hard work paid off to save his...
Robot readable world
via jwz via Timo
The Teehan+Lax's offices
via Teehan+Lax blog
A Brief History of the To-Do List and the...
Tierney and Baumeister recount a revealing experiment: When a psychologist was invited to give a talk at the Pentagon on managing time and resources, he decided to warm up the elite group of generals with a short writing exercise. He asked them all to write a summary of their strategic approach limited to 25 words.
The exercise stumped most of them. None of the distinguished men in uniform...
Retro iPhone cases
via What the Cool via Schreer Design
Sorties paradox
From wikipedia
The sorites paradox (from Ancient Greek: σωρείτης sōreitēs, meaning “heaped up”) is a paradox that arises from vague predicates. The paradox of the heap is an example of this paradox which arises when one considers a heap of sand, from which grains are individually removed. Is it still a heap when only one grain remains? If not, when did it change from a heap to a...
Phantom keys on the iPad keyboard
via Little Big Details via Finer Things in iOS
Social media explained (with doughnuts)
via @rands via douglaswray
Skala Preview
via Bjango
The Tesla Valve: One Way Flow With No Moving Parts
via Make
Speed and direction
via @secretGeek
Product development and Maslow's hierarchy
But wait, you say, look at eBay, Amazon, and Craiglist – they look like crap. Implement an MVP with product/market fit, and it doesn’t matter what it looks like. That’s true sometimes, but it also depends on where you are on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. The lower on the pyramid your product is, the crappier it can look. If your product is core to helping people make money, pirate movies, or sell...
Facebook Files For $5 Billion IPO
Picture via Mark Zuckerberg’s wall
Details via TechCrunch
Zuckerberg’s letter to shareholders
January 2012
13 posts
Why are software development task estimations...
Let’s take a hike on the coast from San Francisco to Los Angeles to visit our friends in Newport Beach. I’ll whip out my map and draw our route down the coast
The line is about 400 miles long, we can walk 4 miles per hour for 10 hours per day, so we’ll be there in 10 days. We call our friends and book dinner for next Sunday night, when we roll in triumphantly at 6pm. They...
Pentax Q: The world's smallest interchangeable...
via Imaging Resource
iPad
Apple's proposed new Cupertino campus
via 0neinfinitel00p
When people don't understand the Internet is made...
Original post on Google+
There is a comedian, Tom Green, who every now and then muses about the fact I have the Twitter handle @TomGreen while his is @tomgreenlive and he “wonders” why I won’t give it to him.
This morning, on the Opie and Anthony show, he raised it again and sort of told people to ask me for it because I would get mad.
At about 10:00 am, noticing a ton...
Why we have 24hr Internet access
via SMBC
David Ogilvy's creative process
7. At this point I can no longer postpone the actual copy. So I go home and sit down at my desk. I find myself entirely without ideas. I get bad-tempered. If my wife comes into the room I growl at her. (This has gotten worse since I gave up smoking.) 8. I am terrified of producing a lousy advertisement. This causes me to throw away the first 20 attempts. 9. If all else fails, I drink half a...
The scariest thing about China's industrial...
Another critical advantage for Apple was that China provided engineers at a scale the United States could not match. Apple’s executives had estimated that about 8,700 industrial engineers were needed to oversee and guide the 200,000 assembly-line workers eventually involved in manufacturing iPhones. The company’s analysts had forecast it would take as long as nine months to find that many...
How the Japanese multiply
via kottke.org
Steve on poking life
RIP Kodak
Clay Shirky on PIPA / SOPA
Bill Joy's greatest gift to man – the vi editor
Linux Mag then asked: “So you didn’t really write vi in one weekend like everybody says?”
No. It took a long time. It was really hard to do because you’ve got to remember that I was trying to make it usable over a 300 baud modem. That’s also the reason you have all these funny commands. It just barely worked to use a screen editor over a modem. It was just barely...
December 2011
2 posts
Apple Store Grand Central
Below are pictures from Apple’s new store in New York’s Grand Central Terminal.
While hauntingly beautiful, sometimes when I see pictures of new Apple stores I get the feeling they could be crossing the line. In that the beautiful architectural structure they’re located in have been reduced to do nothing more than sell electronic devices to the masses.
Then I remember...
The secret history of "about:jwz", "about:mozilla"...
Jamie Zawinsky (jwz), Mozilla hacker extraordinaire, has finally written about the secret history behind the hidden about:jwz URL, which use to show in all Mozilla browsers (Netscape, Phoenix, FireBird, FireFox, etc).
I realized recently that while I have written about the history of the about:authors URL, I have never explained the history of the about:jwz easter egg. Well, I guess it’s...
October 2011
4 posts
Thanks for everything
It always seem that comedians know how to say it best
There’s always the hope that if you sit and watch for long enough, the beachball will vanish and the thing it interrupted will return.
via xkcd
via TechCrunch
Forbidden Fruit
via Abtruse Goose
Stay hungry, stay foolish
A new flavour ... still Delicious
For a long time, one of my most used sites on the Internet has easily been delicious. It’s not sexy and glamorous like Facebook or twitter, though it has always sat in the background, saving my links, and (with surprising frequency) been there when I’ve needed a quick lookup for programming references, business ideas, inspiring talks, and anything else I’ve saved with the...
September 2011
2 posts
3 tags
Ways of Thinking
I’m a big fan of Richard Feynman (probably the worlds foremost theoretical physicist / part time bongo player of the 21st century), though in saying that I’ve only ever read books, and only just recently stumbled upon his videos.
The following 2 are from a set of 12 which I stumbled upon, and which I thought were not only very insightful, but also gave another dimension and a voice...
That's easy, the market has already spoken ...
via Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
August 2011
5 posts
4 tags
There's more than one way to build a tablet
With all the brouhaha today about Samsung using Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odessey as prior art against Apple’s design patent, a lot of people seem to have forgotten they’re multiple ways to build a tablet. And if Samsung are saying that there’s only one obvious way to do it, why were all tablets before the iPad so different to what they are now?
Some examples:
...
2 tags
The slow hunch
Steven Johnson gives a lecture at TED on where ideas come from.
I love this quote - “chance favours the connected mind”
3 tags
Playable Archaeology: An Interview with Telehack's...
I’ve been playing this game since the weekend and am completely addicted. I’m not sure if it’s the open endedness or the nostalgia I get from seeing the green on black screen but it’s definitely worth checking out.
Telehack is the most interesting game I’ve played in the last year… a game that most users won’t realise is a game at all.
It’s a...
5 tags
Travelling
If you want to go quickly go alone, if you want to go far go together.
via quotevadis via African proverb (via brumieruss)
1 tag
Good defensive patents are bad patents
The very existence of such massive trade in “defensive patents” is, in itself, pretty strong evidence that there’s something systematically quite wrong with the American patent system—because a patent that’s useful for “defensive” purposes is very likely to be a bad patent.
via Tightwind via Julian Sanchez
July 2011
4 posts
1 tag
Arrived
1 tag
It's coming ...
2 tags
Fleet Commander
Kids have it way too good now a days …
via Tek Goblin