Noise Between Stations

Author: Victor

  • Symbiosis

    Symbiosis is a dependent relationship between two organisms. There are three basic kinds: parasitism, in which one partner (the parasite) benefits and the other (the host) is harmed; commensalism, in which one partner (the commensal) benefits and the other partner (the host) is indifferent, and mutualism, in which both partners benefit. These three states are evolutionarily related to each other: parasitic relationships tend to evolve into commensalistic relationships, and commensalistic relationships tend to evolve into mutualistic relationships. This makes perfect sense. Any accidental genetic change in the host which reduces the harm (or causes benefit) from the parasite would certainly be favored by selection; any accidental genetic change in the parasite which keeps its host, upon which it depends, healthy and alive longer would also be favored. So the selective pressure on both sides is toward less and less damage to the host.

    From Life Together: The Origin of Mitochondria and Chloroplasts

  • Interaction design talk in NYC

    David Heller will be giving a free talk at the Parsons Design Lab this Thursday:

    What is Interaction Design (IxD)? Placing IxD in the context of Product Design and User Experience (UX) Design
    7pm
    Parsons Design Lab
    55 W. 13th St., 9th Floor
    NYC

  • The Campaign for Real Beauty

    Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty battles the definition of beauty offered by mass media and seeks to raise women’s self-asteem. I’ve come to regard similar campaigns skeptically, after having been sucked in by a powerful ad only to reveal commerical intentions sprinkled with a touch of social activism. What I think makes Dove’s effort more geniune is the focus on customer interaction: a study, a forum, a poll… the whole thing is about generating dialog, not a company monolog.

    Woman with a whole lotta freckles

  • The Future of IA retreat

    The Future of Information Architecture retreat was simply amazing, one of the top three professional events I’ve ever attended. Wonderful people, setting, format, discussion… everything. There’s already plans for more.

  • A New Zeldman

    Congratulations to the parents of Ava Marie, one child who will never hunger for lack of website knowledge.

  • VoIP and personal SLAs

    Last night my wife and I realized we both had conference calls from home at the same time. My group wanted to use Skype, so she was free to use our landline, a Vonage (VoIP) connection. This means we were using two different devices to push and pull audio down the same cable modem connection. Theoretically it’s pretty neat. In practice the poor Motorola VoIP adapter supplied by Vonage couldn’t keep up and dropped both of the connections, twice.

    So far the home broadband suppliers haven’t had to provide rigorous minimum bandwidth, but when more of us start using the connection for synchronous communication we’ll want bandwidth like water: as much pressure as we need, whenever we need it, cheaply. Service level agreements for the home user could be in our future.

  • The Postal Service, explained

    A lot of bloggers are getting hip to The Postal Service (iTunes), the band behind the infectious electronic The District Sleeps Alone and others from the album “Give Up”. Most don’t seem to know the mind behind the songs is Ben Gibbard, front man of Death Cab for Cutie. To explore Death Cab, I’d recommend starting with We Have the Facts and We’re Voting Yes, although all of their albums are very good. If you like lo-fi, sweet adolescent songs you might also like his early solo album “All-Time Quarterback”, like the track Rules Broken.

  • Inter-cultural communication

    Brian Van der Horst’s essay on Edward T. Hall, a “Great-Grandfather of Neuro Linguistic Programming,” helps clear up some of the confusion I’ve experienced abroad. The below example of inter-cultural communication resembles how I met my wife in Germany, who must have thought I was over-sexed:

    In both the British and American cultures, there are, let’s say 20 distinct steps in the ritual of courtship — between the first hello and going to bed. One step that occurs in both cultures is “the kiss on the lips.”

    In America, this is about step number three. It’s something you do to establish intimacy. But in England, this is around step 18. It’s about the last thing you do before engaging in sexual intercourse.

    So imagine a U.S. soldier on a date with an English girl. To get the relationship going in the right direction, to warm it up a little, the guy gives the gal a kiss on the lips. Just like in the (Hollywood) movies.

    The lady in question now has a difficult choice to make. First, she thinks the guy is definitly over-sexed. After all, she hardly knows the fellow, and she’s just been cheated out of 15 steps. So either she walks off the scene immediately — in which case the Yankee says, “She is obviously over-sexed and hysterical — all I did was give her a kiss on the lips.”

    Her other choice is to start preparing to go to bed. After, all the guy just yanked her action chain, and she is only a step or two away from the main event. If she follows this course, the American says, “Boy, is she over-sexed! She’s taking off her clothes, and all I did was give her a kiss on the lips.”

  • E-Myth

    I just read The E-Myth Revisited after it having been recommended to me several times. In it Michael Gerber addresses the most prevalent problems of small businesses (e stands for entrepreneur) along with his solutions. It’s a breezy read, and, although a little too preachy at times, it’s a worthwhile read.

    A few notes worth remembering:

    • The Fatal Assumption: if you understand the technical work of a business, you understand a business that does the technical work
    • Whereas before starting the business you were The Technician, now you must also be The Entrepreneur and The Manager
    • The technician will manage by abdication whereas the manager will manage by delegation
    • Tom Watson of IBM had a very clear vision of what the company would look like when it was done. “I then realized that, unless we began to act that way from the very beginning, we would never get there… At the end of each day, we asked ourselves how well we did, discovered the disparity between where we were and where we had committed ourselves to be, and, at the start of the following day, set out to make up for the difference.“
    • Your business is not your life

  • All the news that fits on the head of a pin

    I like that an online journal of nanotechnology has named itself Small Times.

  • First Fridays, now in NYC

    You’re invited to the first monthly social meeting of First Fridays in NYC for the User Experience Design community.

    It should be a good evening of simply meeting with peers to talk, network, relax, and engage.

    Fri, Oct 1st, 6:30p till 8:30 at
    Hell
    59 Gansevoort St at Washington St (Meatpacking District)
    (Between 12th & 13th Streets, West of 9th Avenue/Hudson Street)
    212-727-1666
    Subway: A,C,E and 1239 to 14th Street or L to 8th Ave

    For more information send e-mail to: info (at) nyc.htmhell.com
    For a list of other UX events in the NYC area you can also go to http://nyc.htmhell.com/

    This is a UXnet event and was organized through the coordinated efforts and resources of AIfIA, AIGA, IxDG, NYC CHI, STC and UPA. If you represent an organization that you feel should also be part of future event coordination, please contact info (at) nyc.htmhell.com.

  • An egg laying, wool-milk-pig

    That’s the literal translation of this great German phrase, die eierlegende Wollmilchsau which literally translates to a pig that lays eggs, grows wool, and gives milk. As when a company is looking for someone with Java, IA, graphic design, project management, and creative writing skills.

  • IA innies becoming outies?

    Lou Rosenfeld requests your participation in a short survey to “detect past and future trends regarding where information architects work, and how much of their work is dedicated to IA.” I’m going to guess that after the crash when a lot of consultants went in-house they have yet to go back to consulting, considering myself an exception.

  • The Flamenco store

    Juan Sebastian gives me a heads up to es flamenco, a storefront crafted with care and content. Once spare time returns to my life I plan to study some Flamenco guitar, instead of the pigeon technique I have now.

  • Terminal 5

    Oh yes, we youngins finally get to see the inside of Terminal 5, Eero Saarinen’s gorgeous sculpture of a building at JFK airport in New York. And if that wasn’t enough, there will be — inside the terminal — an exhibition featuring “major artists responding to the site with works reflecting on the transitory nature of travel, architecture and contemporary art.” October 1 through January 31, 2005 (Tues-Sat, 12-6, voluntary donation).

    Link courtesy of MUG.