Enemies of learning. Charles Feltman's Enemies of Learning (2-page .pdf) is a quick survey of personal factors that make it harder for us to approach the unknown. A few of the “enemies” that George picked out: Our inability to admit that we don't know The desire for clarity all the time Inability to unlearn Lack of […]

It's the User-Interface Guidelines stupid!. If you want to design a user-interface that is intuitive you need guidelines.  And then you have to encourage developers to follow them.  Oh, and if you Google “Windows User Interface Guidelines” here is where you wind up.  That seems about right. [Ernie the Attorney] LOL, nothign new hear, there […]

[NYT] Amazon Plan Would Allow Searching Texts of Many Books. “Executives at Amazon.com are negotiating with several of the largest book publishers about an ambitious and expensive plan to assemble a searchable online archive with the texts of tens of thousands of books of nonfiction, according to several publishing executives involved. Amazon plans to limit […]

i love the smell of moonbats in the morning. Someone thinks I am an admirer of fascism just because I think John Gilmore was an idiot for wearing his “Suspected Terrorist” button on an airplane. fasácism n. often Fascism 1. A system of government marked by centralization of authority… [A Small Victory] Fascism is a […]

white house communication enhancements. Could there be a better, more public, more embarrassing example of poor interface design? The real question is whether it was born of ignorance or malice… Doc Searls’ step-by-step attempt to email President Bush John Markoff’s New York Times article on the new system… [mamamusings] I emailed them to complain, I […]

flash toys. adrian's cool flash toys featuring adrian's battlebots. [MetaFilter] toys, yummm

media technologies for open communication. While I agree in principle with Fiske in rejecting the technological determinism point of view, I also believe that due to the social construction of communication technologies there ought to be some characteristics of particular technologies that are better fit to serve the designer. My argument is that if a […]

Best Happiest place on earth. Reading Metafilter today, I am struck with how lucky I am. In some countries, journalists who question the party line… [Blog de Halavais] Saturdays are the best days for irony and sarcasm. Alex was more up to the challenge than I was.

Shake'n'Bake Social Theory. Real innovation in social theory is hard but brute-force approaches can yield results. Henry’s comments on Public Choice Theory reminded me of a simple way to innovate theory that you’re welcome to apply in various contexts as you please. [Kieran Healy's Weblog] a problem is that the metonymic replacement or substitution of […]

Chat Rooms Fastest Cause of Relationship Breakdowns. The University of Florida just released a study on this subject, “Online Dating Virtually Irresistible To Some Married Folks.” [Roland Piquepaille's Technology Trends] you mean, it is replacin the telephone? or the secret letter? oh my… it is interesting thouh to note that it isn't anything new that […]