June 2002
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Webby Award Winner
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1 min read
Tolerance.org, for which I did the original IA and led the experience team, won a Webby for best Activism site. And Guggenheim.com, produced by some friends of mine, won for best broadband site. That’s nice. I still think awards are stupid, somewhat opposed to the aims of user-centered design. But I slaved over that site,…
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Powerpoint
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2 min read
Speaking of Powerpoint, I think the common format sucks, but not in the usual way people say it sucks (too concise to be meaningful, or boring). I think communicating in presentation format is fine when the occasion calls for it. The problems I see are During a presentation people are either listening to me speak…
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n_gen Interview
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2 min read
Remember n_gen (site’s down, or else I’d link there)? There’s an interview with its makers. Smart, sensible folks. My favorite bits: By analyzing what we believe to be successful designs, is it possible to determine formulae for what is pleasing to the eye? What are the rules and principles that talented designers instinctively employ in…
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MacOS X Email Client?
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2 min read
So I recently upgraded to MacOS X and for the most part I’m loving it. But I haven’t found an email client that sings. So far I hear the MacOS X Mail program is kinda lameI’ve used Eudora in the past, and I’m willing to again. The interface is embarrasingly bad at times, but I’ve…
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Small Pieces
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1 min read
Seems like all the cool kids are reading Small Pieces Loosely Joined. I’m already in the middle of three or four books so I won’t get to this anytime soon, but there’s a couple of chapters available online.
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No!
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1 min read
No! is a new album ‘for the whole family’ from They Might Be Giants. It’s a kid’s album. It’s fun. Robot Parade (~500k mp3) And sometimes it’s romantic, in that Narrow Your Eyes sort of way. Four Of Two And sometimes it’s scary, ’cause sometimes it’s fun to be scared. The Edison Museum In the…
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Macromedia and Nielson
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1 min read
My two cents. In short, I agree with Adam, ‘it’s a big step in the right direction, for both parties.‘
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Cashless ATM
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1 min read
Look there, in between the Oreos and the Pringles, it’s…an automatic teller machine! The basic idea here is great: there are a million bodegas in New York that would like to have ATMs inside their tiny spaces. But why build all the cash-dispensing mechanics into the ATM when it’s sitting right near a machine that…
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Get Me Some dot com
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1 min read
Over lunch L. and I invented a new web service, soon to become part of the LazyWeb. You insert a metatag into your page that indicates whether you have a partner or not. Our service aggregates this info, along with similar info of people, say, on your subway line, in your social network, your blogspace,…
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What’s Better
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1 min read
Hmmmm, I wonder if Christopher Alexander would like What’s Better? Isn’t this the sort of thing he was talking about to test something’s ‘wholeness’, simply comparing two things to see which people liked more? I’m not kidding.
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Information per Screen
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1 min read
I’d like to develop a finite, coherent set of attributes that determine how much information to put on a page (a virtual, scrolling page that is) and that size of that page. It seems like a small enough scope to get scientific about it. The bookseller site analysis I did was informative (long pages seem…
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Design By Numbers
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1 min read
I had heard of DBN a while ago, but didn’t realize you could download it. What’s this, the MIT Media Lab actually releasing something that will benefit the real world? Link via Andrew.
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Great Product Name
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1 min read
I wish I could come up with product names like the Eureka 4885AT Whirlwind Omega Upright True Hepa Bagless Cyclonic Vacuum Cleaner.
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Testing Second-Order Effects of Branding
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1 min read
Jared Spool offers some interesting advice when it comes to testing an institution’s branding: Under the direction of Walt, Disney built the brand quality that they are ‘magical’. Adults interacting going to a Disney resort see the ‘magic’ in the design of their products, both in the direct interaction with the elements of the resort…
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Monday
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1 min read
Introducing Monday. I can hear it now: ‘Monday we’ll meet with Monday…’ That PWC could pull a MarchFirst says to me either the management has as much taste in names as Accenture or that they’re really embracing new economy ways. Suddenly Razorfish doesn’t sound so ground-breaking anymore. We’ll have to push further out. Maybe Emmanuel,…