March 2010
“Blogs: stop posting the same damn kinds of work over and over. No more fake...”
– Frank Chimero. I heartily agree. Design blogs have hit a wall.
I disagree however with the animated gif point. There can never be enough. Animated gifs are the haikus of our era. At least when Rising Tensions is at the helm.
Africa's Forever Wars: Why the Continent's... →
What we are seeing is the decline of the classic African liberation movement and the proliferation of something else — something wilder, messier, more violent, and harder to wrap our heads around. If you’d like to call this war, fine. But what is spreading across Africa like a viral pandemic is actually just opportunistic, heavily armed banditry. My job as the New York Times’...
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What Would Best Buy Do With Radio Shack? →
Business Insider asks this question.
In short: absolutely kill it. To my mind, RadioShack has three assets: private labels, their brand, and locations galore. Best Buy would be paying for their footprint. Period.
Right now, Best Buy’s business is strong, but they keep making efforts to expand into service like Geek Squad and equipment set-up. The margins for this business are absurd. With...
"you better come up with a firm yet charming...
humancomputer:
career coaching from my internship boss who is a MIT researcher for social media
Heh.
But really, it’s a tricky task to craft a reason that doesn’t offend those on the network. I’d go with either distraction or avoiding online stalkers.
Pure Genius: Southwest Airlines Baggage Strategy →
I’ve always wondered why most airlines charge for checking bags and not carry-ons. Carry-ons equal longer boarding times, more baggage reroutes, etc. It seems the time saved during boarding would be more worth a huge amount.
Turns out it’s because most airlines don’t have the logistical capability to easily manage checked bags. Southwest, however, has a fleet made up almost...
Brad Bird to direct Mission Impossible 4?
... →
The director is one of a few Cruise and Abrams are talking with… Fingers crossed.
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Virtual States
Over the last decade, tech journalists leaned heavily on certain device: comparing virtual communities to ‘brick & mortar’ states. For example:
“If Second Life were a physical country, it would be larger than Hong Kong, Singapore, and many Caribbean islands.” (Link)
“With more than 400 million active users worldwide and rising fast, Facebook would be the third...
“I’m sorry, but you can’t tweet ‘HAVE SUPER SECRET ARMY DEATH...”
– Gawker commenter ModernMindofM, on reports that Wikileaks staffers are being tailed by US intelligence. (Via Gawker)
AT&T 3G Launches MicroCell™: Bring service to your... →
Let me get this straight:
Pay close to $100 a month to have an account I can only use sporadically and never at home.
Pay $30 a month for broadband internet access at home.
Pay $150 more to install a box I power, connect and maintain so that I can actually use my phone at home
Still get crap reception, dropped calls, and failed calls all throughout my hometown, one of the densest cities in...
Back on the beat: Owen Thomas joins VentureBeat →
Rejoining fellow Valleywag alum, Paul Boutin.
They got the band back together.
Instapaper Blog: Preview: Instapaper on iPad →
When I listen to Genius Playlists on iTunes, am I participating with a dispersed, hidden, technologically-mediated community?
Or is it just some preordained shuffle?
“HERE ARE THE DANGER SIGNALS. ANY TIME TWO CHARACTERS ARE TALKING ABOUT A THIRD,...”
– From a letter David Mamet sent his writers on the TV series The Unit (via diablocodyisnotevenherrealname)
(via humancomputer)
Exclusive: How Google's Eric Schmidt Lost His... →
Not that we hope for such an end. Jaded gossips that we are, we can’t help but feel a twinge of empathy for Schmidt. The Google boss might have hypocritical views on privacy and an all-too-arrogant approach to users’ concerns, but he aches for true friends. “I don’t think he had any,” our source said. It’s a feeling of empty loneliness familiar to many of us who...
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Verizon should buy Palm.
“He went on to explicitly draw the line in a new war between persuaders...”
– From Soren Johnson’s GDC recap. Sounds to me like the event was Zynga versus everyone else. (Via DESIGNER NOTES)
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“As a Lehman wife, you raised your kids by yourself. You had your babies by...”
– Karin Jack, former Lehman wife, quoted in Vicky Ward’s spine tinglingly creepy piece about Lehman Bros’ obsession with executive marriages. (Via Vanity Fair)
“Over the course of the past few decades, however, our senses have been usurped...”
– Jalopnik on the Toyota recall and what it illustrates about culture. They’re absolutely killing it.
“We’ve long derided appliancelike vehicles for being the wrong answer to...”
– Jalopnik has the best discussion of the Toyota recall out there.
This picture, in this appliance-esque context, is awakening:
Google and Partners Seek Foothold in the Living... →
Google and Intel have teamed with Sony to develop a platform called Google TV to bring the Web into the living room through a new generation of televisions and set-top boxes.
I’d love them to succeed and break channels and shows out of horrible bundles, but… they won’t. Mobile is hard enough with the grip maintained by the carriers. Wait till they run up against Comcast.