Ben Kraal

'The Last.fm for Research Papers' Tops 100,000 Users

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:53:47 +1000

'The Last.fm for Research Papers' Tops 100,000 Users:

itsthemusicpeople:

infoneernet:

Mendeley, a Web service that lets users organize and share research papers, recently announced that it has surpassed 100,000 users, and that its database now includes some 8 million works. The announcement has generated a lot of hype for the fledgling company.

Seen at The Chronicle of Higher Education (Subscription may be required for some content)

Oooh, this looks awesome.

"Designers thus define actors with specific tastes, competencies, motives, aspirations, political..."

Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:39:06 +1000

“Designers thus define actors with specific tastes, competencies, motives, aspirations, political prejudices, and the rest, and they assume that morality, technology, science, and economy will evolve in particular ways. A large part of the work of innovators is that of “inscribing” this vision of (or prediction about) the world in the technical content of the new object.”

- Madeleine Akrich, “The de-scription of technical objects” (Chapter 7 of Bijker & Law, 1992, Shaping Technology / Building Society: Studies in Sociotechnical Change)

This is my absolute favourite quote about what designers do.

(via mikespinelli) If I was in the market for a two-tonne...

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 13:20:28 +1000

(via mikespinelli)

If I was in the market for a two-tonne street-rod, I’d be right into a stripped and slammed ‘69(-ish) Mercury Cougar.

James Morrison and Emma Pask, live at Taronga Zoo in early 2009,...

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:13:39 +1000

James Morrison and Emma Pask, live at Taronga Zoo in early 2009, rocking hard with a bit of Nat King Cole.

Things to note:

Yes, it seems that James really is that much of a dag, I’ve never seen him not tell terrible jokes as the lead in to a song.
At about 4 minutes in, James starts a solo where he does circular breathing for about a minute. Amazing.
Then, at about 5 minutes in he flips the trumpet over and plays it upside down.

(via AgentK77)

"If I had a nephew getting his Ps I would suggest a two-speed slushbox, too. He’ll still crash, but..."

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 11:42:34 +1000

“If I had a nephew getting his Ps I would suggest a two-speed slushbox, too. He’ll still crash, but he’ll crash slower, and learn the value of momentum.”

- Dr Ben makes funny and true.

I have two nephews just on/getting a license. One already has a sluggish auto car ready and waiting, the other may be getting my now-surplus-to-requirements sluggish auto car. This is a good way to make sure one continues to have nephews, and not bits of nephew and car wreckage scattered along the side of the road.

(via elderdave)

You know it.

"If all you do is SEO, you need to expand. Hire a visual designer and some kickass coders and become..."

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 10:10:05 +1000

“If all you do is SEO, you need to expand. Hire a visual designer and some kickass coders and become a real web agency. Start making sites good from the get-go instead of cleaning up other people’s messes. Besides, if all you do is SEO, your days are numbered. Social media is rapidly becoming much more important than Google.”

- Derek Powazek slams SEO. You should read this. (via chrbutler)

Friends, this is important.

Until recently, in our war against the robots, the robots have had the upper hand.

Now, the tide is turning as we once again play to our strengths.

There are those among us who would not use such radical strategy; those who believe that we can never win against the robots — that the best we can do is play their game.

We believe they are wrong.

Save the Enzos: A web address concerning mobility

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 10:29:57 +1000

Save the Enzos: A web address concerning mobility:

I was trundling through my dashboard this morning and I found I was “liking” every second one of Mike Spinelli’s posts on Save the Enzos. Which is somewhat ridiculous.

So, instead, I suggest that you all follow Mr Spinelli’s excellent blog.

"One prediction: Microsoft will emerge as a champion of the open web platform, supporting..."

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 09:40:27 +1000

“One prediction: Microsoft will emerge as a champion of the open web platform, supporting interoperable web services from many independent players, much as IBM emerged as the leading enterprise backer of Linux.”

- The War For the Web - O’Reilly Radar

A VERY bold prediction from Tim O’Reilly IMHO. He should put this up as a 5 year bet on the Long Now website. I would take the other end of this bet. The strategy behind Tim’s side of the bet is smart and would be a savvy move, but I just don’t think that kind of strategy is in Microsoft’s DNA. It’s always build vs buy for them, and either way, they have to own it. I see no early indications of embracing openness.

(via thegongshow)

I’m with thegongshow. Unless Balmer gets religion sometime soon, it’s not going to happen.

travors: Bellen! See also the “Richard Scarry Book of...

Sun, 15 Nov 2009 21:19:13 +1000

travors:

Bellen!

See also the “Richard Scarry Book of the Future” from Merlin Mann’s 43Folders podcast.

"In my experience all Physics teachers are more than a little cranked. So you’ll obviously fit right..."

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 13:03:22 +1000

“

In my experience all Physics teachers are more than a little cranked.

So you’ll obviously fit right in

”

- Dr Ben.

I just accepted a position to teach Physics and general (junior) science here from next year, which for me is gonna be fully old school bro. Farewell to a career in breaking stuff, hello to a career en-learning youngsters to science.

(via elderdave)

As I said: Awesome news, Dr Dave! Congrats!

Oh, innovation, you say?

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 12:16:28 +1000

According to Accenture:

high-performance businesses in the CE [consumer electronics] industry have begun to embrace a consumer-engagement-driven model of innovation

A “consumer-engagement-driven model of innovation”, you say? Oh, yes. We call that design.

(via This Week In Consumer Electronics, via Putting People First)

[Also, the article at TWICE never once mentions “design” but uses variations on “innovation” thirty times.]

Do and Don't

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 16:29:00 +1000

Let’s say you’re reading a paper for a class. The paper’s title is “Fooing the bar: Baz for the Qux and the Quux” by A. Sheila and S. Bloke and it was published in 1999 in the Journal of Quxian Studies.

Suppose you want to talk about what the authors say in the paper. You do not say:

In the paper “Fooing the bar: Baz for the Qux and the Quux” by A. Sheila and S. Bloke, they introduce the concept of blah blah blah…

(Don’t tell me the title, I can find it in your reference list.)

You certainly don’t say:

A paper by A. Sheila and S. Bloke in the 1999 Journal of Quxian Studies argues that the concept of blah blah blah…

(The paper doesn’t argue, Sheila and Bloke argue. And I can find the name of the Journal in your reference list.)

You do say:

Sheila and Bloke (1999) were the first to introduce the concept of blah blah blah…

And then you give a full and correct reference.

"To me the attention-hogging aspects of most games has found perfect embodiment in the AR craze. They..."

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 15:15:05 +1000

“To me the attention-hogging aspects of most games has found perfect embodiment in the AR craze. They want to impose another screen between us and the world.”

- Russell Davies, playful, saying, dammit, what I wanted to say with much more style.

Also, click through for the hilarious pie-charts describing Jason Bourne movies and the experience of wearing a watch. (Only Russell Davies could make those two concepts related.)

The Animals, House of the Rising Sun Alan Price rocks that...

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 12:43:39 +1000

The Animals, House of the Rising Sun

Alan Price rocks that Hammond just about as hard as I’ve ever heard. And Eric Burdon could give Jimmy Barnes screaming-in-tune lessons.

(via Kinksforever)

Prototype as if you are right. Listen as if you are wrong.

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:09:42 +1000

Prototype as if you are right. Listen as if you are wrong.:

Diego Rodriguez:

Once your prototype is ready for the world, it is important to listen as if you are wrong. You (and everyone around you) must be willing to respect the evidence that the prototype brings back, whether you like it or not. You must also go out of your way to put your prototype in to the world. Hiding it in a closet is only cheating the process, and ultimately, yourself.

"next time you hear something akin to “that’s the worst idea I’ve heard in a long..."

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:05:00 +1000

“next time you hear something akin to “that’s the worst idea I’ve heard in a long time.” Say “Perfect, when did you know it was awful?””

- Ryan Jacoby’s do_matic:To get it right, be interested in being wrong.

Compare with Diego Rodriguez’s “Prototype as if you are right; listen as if you are wrong”.

Co-incidentally, or perhaps not, Ryan and Diego both work for IDEO.

Vanilla

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:03:49 +1000

Why is everyone so down on vanilla?

“That’s so boring; so vanilla.”

Have you ever tried real vanilla? It’s delicious.

And lo there was A Logic Named Joe

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 05:55:00 +1000

mjhoy:

The Guardian:

And in 1946, an astonishingly complete vision of the future appeared in the magazine Astounding Science Fiction. In a story entitled A Logic Named Joe, the author Murray Leinster envisioned a world in which every home was equipped with a tabletop box that he called a “logic”:

“You got a logic in your house. It looks like a vision receiver used to, only it’s got keys instead of dials and you punch the keys for what you wanna get … you punch ‘Sally Hancock’s Phone’ an’ the screen blinks an’ sputters an’ you’re hooked up with the logic in her house an’ if somebody answers you got a vision-phone connection. But besides that, if you punch for the weather forecast [or] who was mistress of the White House durin’ Garfield’s administration … that comes on the screen too. The relays in the tank do it. The tank is a big buildin’ full of all the facts in creation … hooked in with all the other tanks all over the country … The only thing it won’t do is tell you exactly what your wife meant when she said, ‘Oh, you think so, do you?’ in that peculiar kinda voice “

Citroen DS (via Old Car Manual Project)

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 14:22:23 +1000

Citroen DS (via Old Car Manual Project)

"It is obvious that the iPhone has fallen from the sky inasmuch as it appears at first sight as a..."

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 14:09:33 +1000

“It is obvious that the iPhone has fallen from the sky inasmuch as it appears at first sight as a superlative object. We must not forget that an object is the best messenger of a world above that of nature: one can easily see in an object at once a perfection and an absence of origin, a closure and a brilliance, a transformation of life into matter (matter is much more magical than life), and in a word a silence which belongs to the realm of fairy-tales. The iPhone has all the features (or at least the public is unanimous in attributing them to it at first sight) of one of those objects from another universe which have supplied fuel for the neomania of the eighteenth century and that of our own science-fiction: the iPhone is first and foremost a new Nautilus.”

- With apologies to Roland Barthes…

On the Twitter Drew Smith suggested [1, 2, 3, 4] that Barthes 1957 piece on the Citroen DS also worked for the iPhone.

As Drew continues Barthes:

Until now, the ultimate in phones belonged rather to the bestiary of power; here it becomes At once more spiritual and more object-like, and despite some concessions to neomania, it is now more homely, more attuned to this sublimation of the utensil which one also finds in the design of contemporary household equipment.