meaning. beauty. whimsy.

Aug 5 / 9:10am

(For my designer friends) Angry Paul Rand

Strong language warning... and laugh out loud funny. Along the lines of Sh*t My Dad Says comes... The Angry Paul Rand. Enjoy.

http://twitter.com/AngryPaulRand

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Aug 4 / 8:30am

University Web sites

This pic from xkcd has been making the rounds...

A couple of us at work have it hanging outside our cubes or offices. There was a good article about it at InsideHigherEd.com today:

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/08/04/websites

Somewhat galling that they held up Devry as an example of a university home page that gets it right... galling because Devry does get it right, and we so often miss the mark, even when we know better. I have hope that our next major redesign project (in progress right now) will have a home page closer to the right side of that Venn diagram.

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Jul 23 / 6:19am

Some great radio coverage of Streetcar

http://wpsu.org/radio/single_entry/LL-3023/stories

Rock on, Stella. I mean Sunam!

WPSU did a segment on SCCT's production of A Streetcar Named Desire. Audio of the story and a photo of the director making gumbo available in the WPSU archives. There was also a story about the production in last Friday's Centre Daily Times.

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Jul 2 / 10:23am

Jakob Nielsen: usability of books, Kindle, iPad

The latest issue of Jacob Nielsen's AlertBox features the results of a usability study that compares the reading speed and satisfaction of reading books on the printed page, the Kindle, the iPad, and on a PC. No surprise that paper books provide a faster reading experience, though the iPad and Kindle provide a (marginally) more satisfying experience.

Full disclosure, about a month ago Sunam got me a Kindle for (early) Father's day. No, we didn't get the new DX with lower price and way-more-awesomer screen, and she bought it a few weeks before Amazon cut the price by 25%. Which would normally be enough to say, "Amazon, you are dead to me." But I can't, because I love my Kindle. I take it everywhere.

Having children has cut down a bit on my reading time, but I still sneak in a few pages whenever I get the chance. When it is cold enough to wear a coat outside, I almost always have a paperback (or two) stuffed into one of the pockets. I keep a novel in the van in case I get a few minutes to read. And now, I can carry this with me instead. It is smaller than a trade paperback, the screen is great, the text can go as large as I want, it handles PDFs (fairly) well... I already have a small library on it (including all the readings for one of my courses).

But I'm not ready to chuck my books yet. The Kindle and iPad are far superior to printed books in certain aspects. But not in all aspects. And much the same way that Correll and Melmac may create dinner plates that are far superior to china in certain respects, when company comes over, we still whip out the heavy glazed ceramic plates to eat on.

A final aside on the iPad, which scored a marginally better in user satisfaction than the Kindle. I seriously considered getting one. I was even willing to brave the out-of-date-in-one-year danger inherent in being an early adopter of any Apple technology. The thing is, based on how and where I use my Kindle for, the iPad has one serious drawback: it shoots out light into my eyes. I have enough issues with eyestrain and headaches without getting my corneas blasted in bed or on the couch late at night; I much prefer the indirect light of a bedside lamp. That being said, I've looked at comic books on the iPad, and for that, it blows the Kindle away. And I've seen lots of people using iPads in meetings, at work, at Starbucks, in the doctor's waiting room, all of who say the iPad has changed the way they work. So next year, if they come out with an iPad 2, I might be ready to get one.

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Jun 30 / 10:59am

Bloomberg says Verizon to offer iPhone in January

We've all heard the rumors... this is the latest from Bloomberg: http://bit.ly/cy562l
> "Verizon Wireless will start selling Apple Inc.’s iPhone to customers in January, two people familiar with the plans said yesterday."

So... guess I'll be hanging onto my dumbphone a few months longer.