http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/eric-schmidt-on-steve-jobs-10062011.html Great personal experience story from Eric Schmidt about Steve Jobs. The common burn on Jobs is that he was “just the business guy” and didn’t make or build anything he’s attributed credit for. Arguing the value of programming languages isn’t something even many tech executives could do. I’ve been in design and code reviews where I influenced someone else’s work based on my experience and expertise, directing them away from what would lead to problems technically and aesthetically. I’ve also worked with developers who had trouble articulating their value... Read full article →
So with Amazon using 2.3 for Kindle Fire, I guess Google will market Honeycomb and future Android releases (ice cream?) against this by choosing who gets it first. Was Honeycomb the end of making the latest Android version free and open? You want free and open, you get last year’s version? http://thisismynext.com/2011/09/28/editorial-amazon-android-google/
http://allthingsd.com/20110923/amazon-wins-reprieve-on-california-tax-in-exchange-for-jobs/ It just occurred to me: Amazon is a sales tax haven, a virtual Delaware, and the cost of Amazon Prime is easily justified for some state residents by saving sales tax on the price of goods, and the savings increase as you increase your purchases. A standardized online sales tax is inevitable with so many sales moving online and products moving state (and city) lines overnight. A website has to code for all 50 states’ sales taxes and maintain the fluctuations on that. How would it work if I... Read full article →
Google+ gets a big marketing push from the Google search home page. The simplicity of using a simple arrow is fascinating, though a colleague found it distracting.
I’ll save my money for the Raiders of the Lost Ark Blu-Ray http://www.reelz.com/movie-news/11794/steven-spielberg-promises-not-to-alter-e-t-or-raiders-of-the-lost-ark-for-blu-ray-release/ Does George Lucas have a good editor inside himself anymore?
History of the creation of the Apple logo (and the bite) shows how complex design rationale produces simple output: http://blog.howdesign.com/designers/that-iconic-apple/?et_mid=518063&rid=3805281
The first Silver Age Marvel comic turned 50! http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2011/08/50-years-ago-today-fantastic-four-1-changed-the-comics-world/ Four people hop into a space rocket and were doused with Cosmic Rays, giving them amazing abilities… and one gets pretty screwed by the deal. Why is the Fantastic Four relevant? Aside from this being the first comic book series to capture what made this age of Marvel great, flawed heroes, my favorite Fantastic Four character is The Thing. He hardly has much to brag about. Unlike the other three, this poor bastard was permanently disfigured by the experience. His origin... Read full article →
The design aesthetic is subjective, but tapping on other views should switch them. Instead, I’m “educated” that the common iOS UI pattern is “wrong”, and that I should swipe left/right. As John Gruber points out, the location of switching views would be better served as tappable tabs at the bottom. Who the hell puts “Cancel” first in a vertical UI? “Cancel” is not the first act I should be thinking about. If you’re gonna make an iOS app, embrace it and regardless of platform, use good UI logic and usability... Read full article →
A very clever, user-friendly design to prevent spam. I admire the effort to give something as low on the priority list as "Anti-Spam Tool" a Lego-branded, personal feel.
Information Week has an article about Adobe’s new tool for animation with web standards development: Why Adobe Edge Says Nothing About Flash’s Future http://www.informationweek.com/news/internet/webdev/231300020 I think “nothing” is a declarative statement that’s flawed. The title should be “Why Adobe Edge Says Nothing About Flash’s Immediate Future” to be more accurate and flexible to unpredictable developments. JavaScript has replaced a number of things people relied on Flash for, because JavaScript engines are a part of browsers that each browser development team has control of. Flash Player can’t be improved on by... Read full article →
