escape to insanity

Quirksmode.org has a great article today on why we (”we” meaning web professionals) need to shift the way we pitch proper web standards to clients and/or business executives, who know little more than the buzzwords they’ve been getting drowned in:

Right now nobody’s interested in a mobile solution that does not contain the words “iPhone” and “app” and that is not submitted to a closed environment where it competes with approximately 2,437 similar mobile solutions.

Compared to the current crop of mobile clients and developers, lemmings marching off a cliff follow a solid, sensible strategy. Startling them out of this obsession requires nothing short of a new buzzword.

Therefore I’d like to re-brand standards-based mobile websites and applications, definitely including W3C Widgets, as “HTML5 apps.”

- “HTML5 Apps” on Quirksmode.org

*slow clap*

Throughout 2009, I recorded several dozen statistics about a) the pop culture I consumed, b) the people I talked to, c) the beer I drank, d) the places I visited, e) the vehicles I took to those places, and f) the amount of sleep I enjoyed each day. Those statistics spread across several thousand cells of a spreadsheet, which I then condensed and animated into the 2.5-minute video clip embedded below.

Dan Meyer has put together a really great short video summarizing some of his activities over the last year. In the same sort of tradition as Nicholas Felton’s Annual Report, it’s an interesting snapshot of someone’s life down to some nitty-gritty details.

Plus I’m just a sucker for infographics.

When the iMac came out, Apple drew a line in the sand. They said: we are no longer going to ship a computer with a floppy disk drive. The entire industry shit its pants so loudly and forcefully that you probably could have heard it from outer space.

Are you insane? I spent all this money on a floppy drive! All my software is on floppy disks! You’ve committed brand suicide! Nobody will stand for this!

Fast-forward to today. I can’t think of a single useful thing to do with a floppy disk.

-I need to talk to you about computers by StevenF.

*slow clap*

I’m still sort of on the fence on this tablet thing. I can definitely see how it’ll be immensely useful for lots of industries, or around the home (as an ebook reader, a portable newspaper/simplified browser, even a board game platform), etc. I don’t agree with all the “it’s the laptop replacement device!” hype going around through – for some tasks, you need a dedicated keyboard or some other way of inputting larger amounts of text than you can comfortably type on an on-screen keyboard. The iPhone’s on-screen keyboard is fine for typing out short text messages, etc, but you wouldn’t want to compose a novel on it.

I won’t be buying one myself, not yet at least, but I’m still incredibly intrigued by the love-hate reaction it seems to be getting at the moment.

Imagine a neurobiology-obsessed version of Greg Egan writing a first contact with aliens story from the point of view of a zombie posthuman crewman aboard a starship captained by a vampire, with not dying as the boobie prize.

- Charles Stross, describing Egan’s book Blindsight

If that description doesn’t immediately make you drive to your local library or bookstore to find this book, there’s something seriously wrong with you. (or you can download a copy from FeedBooks.com.)

Designer/infographic guru Nicholas Felton released his much-anticipated Annual Report today, and the internet marveled. For the last few years he’s put out a summary of his year’s activities – the number of hours worked, number of drinks enjoyed, etc. While it might sound boring at first (”who cares how far this guy drove last year?”) it’s put together in a pretty impressive display.

While I think his 2008 Annual Report was a little cooler-looking, this year’s Annual Report (compiled from over 500 survey cards he handed out over the year) is still very well-done. Bravo, sir.

Check out the Feltron 2009 Annual Report.