From: Gleanings
To: Monday Robots
Subject: Gleanings: you will think what I tell you to think
OPENING THANG
Welcome to Monday. Republic.com is the book everyone is talking about. Supposedly in it (I’ll cheerfully admit I haven’t read it and feel no urgency to do so), the author speculates that new technologies will allow us to become ignorant about the world around us and more intolerant, because we’ll be able to filter out the news we don’t want. Has he ever seen a family read the newspaper? In the most archetypical scenario, mom takes the food section, dad takes sports, brother takes classified, sis take fashion and little one reads comics. In a real scenario a similar but perhaps less gender driven scenario takes place: people read the sections that interest them. Ever watch someone couch surf across the TV channels? Filters happen.
Instead the author should be grateful that email allows people to forward news articles to each other, suddenly allows a human filter to push through current events the way a newsbreak interrupts a rerun of friends.
Of course gleanings is very much a “daily me:” a human filter for your news.
Law Professor Sees Hazard in Personalized News
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/13/technology/13CYBERLAW.html
BLOG OF THE DAY
I’ve been really enjoying Nadav’s “antenna” lately. from April 15th:
“My first reaction on seeing this navigation map of computer ethics was “feh! Why do people insist on mapping ideas onto a physical geography,” but then I spent a minute with it and realized that, unlike antarctica, where there’s no meaning to the geographical distribution of the data, the organization was meaningful. While both Encryption and Spamming are within the borders of Privacy, the former is near Intellectual Property, while the latter is at the juncture of Computer Abuse and Commerce. ”
http://www.giantant.com/antenna/
DESIGN & IA MATTERS
The Myth of 800×600
“Developing fixed-size Web pages is a fundamentally flawed practice. Not only does it result in Web pages that remain at a constant size regardless of the user’s browser size, but it fails to take advantage of the medium’s flexibility. ” Amen brother.
http://webreview.com/2001/03_16/webauthors/index01.shtml
Visual Architecture: The Rule of Three
“Visual architecture is applied to the new media design context and defined as the use of a particular method of building visual information and balancing communication between images and words.” Funny, where I grew up this was called design. In any case, this is an excellent article– especially for nondesingers– on effective layout.
http://www.digital-web.com/features/feature_2001-4.shtml
also in digtalweb
Designing for Search Engines and Stars
“Great search engine placement doesn’t require you to sacrifice appealing design. While “content is king” for high search engine rankings as well as overall site popularity, your imagination and creativity with designs can still reach for the stars.”
http://www.digital-web.com/tutorials/
Web typography: the rookie mistakes
“Novice designers, writers, editors, and publishers who come to the medium with no background in web publishing tend to make simple mistakes that can turn an otherwise utilitarian website into a visual junk store. Their websites, consequently, are hard to look at, hard to read, and hard to navigate. ”
http://www.nua.com/nkb/index.cgi?f=VA&art_type=STYLE&art_id=618
Another decadent eyecandy design studio site. and why not.
http://www.malex.it/
USABILITY MATTERS
Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox for April 15
“According to a recent critical incident analysis, users’ most important
Web tasks involve collecting and comparing multiple pieces of information,
usually so they can make a choice.”
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20010415.html
Audience interviews from the final leg of the User Experience World Tour:
Is the Slowing Economy Helping or Hurting Usability?
http://www.nngroup.com/worldtour/cit_se.html
Users Aren’t Happy in Captivity
“Marketing columnist Blake Rohrbacher debunks the myth of stickiness. ”
http://www.business2.com/content/channels/marketing/2001/04/12/29907
NEWS & COMMENTARY
More Net firms in profit than might be expected
“ActivMedia Research reports that 61 percent of mid-sized online businesses and 39 percent of large online firms are profitable. ”
http://www.nua.ie/surveys/?f=VS&art_id=905356657&rel=true
IPO Disasters Give Underwriters Reason to Blush
“Dot-com-pushing analysts have long taken the brunt of criticism for over-hyping the market, but what about the investment bankers who took those companies public? Did they know they were selling damaged goods with no refund policy? ”
http://www.iht.com/articles/16977.html
A Computer Mouse Without the Trap
“Build a better mouse, and the world will beat a path to your door. At least that is what Johan Ullman, a Swedish medical doctor and ergonomics expert, is hoping. Dr. Ullman invented the pen mouse, which resembles a pen stuck into a small mouse or, viewed differently, an automobile stick shift in a gear box. ”
http://www.iht.com/technology.html
The glory days of e-commerce are over
“Broke and stingy e-tailers have taken all the fun out of online shopping.”
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2000/11/29/ecommerce/index.html
APROPOS OF NOTHING
Joey Ramone dead at 49 (biggerhand.com)
“Singer Joey Ramone, the punk rock icon whose signature yelp melded with the Ramones’ three-chord thrash to launch an explosion of bands like the Clash and the Sex Pistols, died Sunday. He was 49. ”
http://www.salon.com/ent/wire/2001/04/15/ramone/index.html
Suicide In The Netherlands Could Come In Easy-To-Swallow Pill Form
http://www.plastic.com/article.pl?sid=01/04/15/1846236&from=rdf
How many products can you spot in the JOSIE & THE PUSSYCATS trailer? (evhead.com)
http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=8503
In future anyone can be my DJ. or at least dack can.
http://www.dack.com/music/show/2001-04-12.html
I regret clicking this link, yet I share it with you anyhow. (camworld.com)
http://www.gpl.com.au/temp/EasterXcld.jpg
adn this one, for different reasons
http://www.crackerfactory.org/crouching_robot_hidden_kitten.jpg