Happy birthday to you,
happy birthday to you,
happy birthday Boxes and Arrows,
happy birthday to you.
Author: Victor
glasshaus shutting down
Car Free
Finally sold my Beetle. Sniff. I didn’t realize how much I’d miss her until a week before the sale. Still, it’s good to be a carfree city dweller.
Tom tracked me down using the Internet. He flew in from Wyoming to get the car. He works as a coal miner, and his wife teaches. They have four daughters. We had a drink at the hotel bar, signed some papers, and talked about how cold it’s been this winter and his drive home. Then I walked across the street to the airport and rode the monorail (which has a voice like Data’s from Star Trek) to the Airtrain (which has a logo designed by Pentagram) to the subway (wherein a man chewed potato chips in such a way that many fell out of his mouth) which brought me to 3/4 of a block from my apartment. I walked up the steps to street level and peered straight through the clear sky to the brilliant moon and stars.
About Face 2.0
I’m now glad I never had the chance to read Cooper’s About Face as the second edition is coming soon. But while we all want the details on their process, the description is rather vague: ‘A detailed overview of Cooper’s Goal-Directed design methodology.‘ Hmmmm, a detailed overview, I wonder which it is, detailed or an overview? I hope it’s the former, as the profession could benefit from it. Link courtesy of Jess.
Report from SXSW
If you’re looking, Molly has some reports from SXSW. I’ve never been, and she confirms a fear of mine: ‘the thing is, i wish we were talking about these things at a higher level. so many people who attend this conference are in the blog community….it’s safe to assume that everyone’s got some understanding of the more basic issues around these micromedia. could we instead talk about the deeper whys, the implications, the social issues? could we look outward a few years and try to envision the world we’re going to be in, as it pertains to us and the aims of this conference?‘
Wi-Fi Hardrive
Smart: The Martian NetDrive Wireless will replace your PC server that does nothing but serve files. Now if we could only figure out how to do wireless power cords.
Little hydrogen fuel cells perhaps?
Stuck With Old Browsers Until 2003
Hey, do you realize what year it is? Yippee!
Lamp
ONLamp.com: Linux, Apache, and either Perl, Python, or PHP. ‘We have felt that the market has ignored the tools that make Linux a great applications development platform, especially for robust web applications that run on Linux servers.‘
Book Love
Mike Lee was nice enough to blog the many books our little group of IAs excitedly ran our fingers through the other night.
Already at War?
There are military personel in the subways wearing fatigues and brandishing automatic weapons. It reminds me of what someone said of Isreal, that the civilians are always in a state of war.
Design for Older Adults
Went to a great half-day seminar run by AARP the other day, thanks to Mike Lee and his wife Amy. They have a great initiative to spread research to designers about how to design for older adults. Of particular note is the AgeLine database of ‘books and articles about like at 50+.’
Risk and Uncertainty
‘The economist Frank Knight drew a distinction between risk and uncertainty. Risk, he argued, is something you can calculate – the probability of someone losing at roulette. Uncertainty, though, arises when the odds of success or failure are incalculable – the probability of someone deciding to play roulette in the first place, and being pickpocketed on the way out of the casino.’ – James Surowiecki, THE FINANCIAL PAGE
Lycoris
Lycoris is an attractively designed Linux distribution for only $30. Installed on PCs with an AMD processor for $270. The effect on Microsoft? I wouldn’t be surprised if Microsoft ends up making more money from servers and services than desktops in the future.
Anita O’Day
Tea for Two (560K mp3)