Author Archives: Doug

What “the media elite” read

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The Atlantic has an ongoing feature where they ask media-famous people what they read, or more accurately what their media diets are.

The latest piece is by Aaron Sorkin and is mostly unremarkable aside from this gem:

The homepage on my web browser is Yahoo, which I’m told it shouldn’t be, but I’ve just been too lazy to change it. From time to time I’ll read some of the comments under stories on it to get a sense of what it must be like at a Klan meeting.

If you’re only going to read one piece in the series, make it Shirky’s, though it is a year old and a lot could possibly have changed since he wrote it.

The paywall

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The New York Times announced their long-anticipated pay wall yesterday, and as Felix Salmon points out, it doesn’t make a lot of sense:

The message being sent here is weird: that access to the website is worth nothing. Mathematically, if A+B=$15, A+C=$20, and A+B+C=$35, then A=$0.

…

The pricing structure is also a strong disincentive to use the iPad app at all, of course. If you’re already paying $15 every four weeks to have full access to the website, why on earth would you pay extra just to be able to read the paper on its own dedicated app rather than in Safari? I, for one, prefer the experience of reading nytimes.com on the web on my iPad, rather than reading an iPad app which has no search, no links, no archives, no social recommendations, etc etc. If the NYT wanted to kill any incentive to read and develop its iPad app, it’s going about it the right way.

My first inclination after the announcement was to consider a Sunday-only subscription for it’s included online access across all devices; strangely the Sunday-only option is no longer available for Minneapolis on nytimesathome.com.

The App Wall

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MG Siegler has hit The App Wall and so will you:

Granted, my usage right now is very extreme. Leading up to SXSW next week, I’m heavily testing out five to ten new apps that people are hoping to launch there. But the fact of the matter is that this is the way things are headed for everyone. It will take the average user longer to hit it, but everyone will eventually hit this app wall.

In this regard, apps are in a way just the new websites. There’s only so many you can visit throughout the day and so you find the ones you like and cycle through those day in and day out. Only on the rare occasion does a new site break into this must-visit cycle.

Photographing war in Brazil’s favelas

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There was a low-grade war in the slums of Rio de Janeiro a couple weeks back. The Big Picture has the photo set that should be fascinating to any Brazilophile.

The photographers who shot these photos, just like those who shoot photos in Afghanistan and other dangerous zones throughout the world everyday, risk their lives. I call that journalism. Compare that to WikiLeaks, which cowardly risks other people’s lives.

An open letter in support of mustachioed emoticons

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An open letter to the purveyors of instant messaging software —

Sirs,

For years I’ve been an avid user of your products. I’ve sent and received thousands of messages. Often these messages have contained emoticons — your clever portmanteau of emotions and icons.

There’s the sad face for when I’m feeling sad, the furled eyebrow for when I’m confused and the straight face for when I’m shocked but don’t want to comment.

And then there’s the cowboy emoticon; oh how I love the cowboy emoticon.

But, dear people, there is a whole group of IM users who have heretofore gone unrepresented by your emoticons: mustachioed Americans. I am afraid I cannot be silent on this subject any longer.

Did you know 18 percent of Americans wear mustaches?* Are they not people too? If you shave their upper lips, do they not get cold in the winter?

My dear IM software developers, I call upon you today to correct this injustice. Come together and agree to adding mustachioed emoticons to your fine products. I humbly suggest you standardize on a colon followed by a left curly bracket to trigger the digital representation of these fine, manly pieces of Americana.

Make haste, my good people. Let not this injustice stand any longer.

:{

*Made-up statistic

Update: My friend and colleague Gerardo Obieta has lent his considerable design skills to the cause with the poster below. Please show your support for mustachioed emoticons today.

TimeScapes

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I’m still reading about how it was produced, but “TimeScapes” from photographer Tom Lowe looks absolutely amazing.

Looks like he shot everything with RED. I surely can’t imagine this film being shot a few years ago. Goes to show the advances that are being made in videography technology.

I can’t tell if this is being released in theaters or what, but some of the behind the scenes stuff is just as stunning as the resulting footage. Just wow.

Ecuadorian restaurants in Minneapolis (we need more)

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A tweet last week from a fellow hungry marketer spurred me to spend an hour of my Saturday morning looking for Ecuadorian restaurants in Minneapolis. Sadly, I only found four (and I already knew of three of them). I learned along the way that Ecuadorian restaurants in Minneapolis must feel obliged to also serve Mexican food to keep the gringos happy; what else explains this City Pages taco challenge?

As far as I know, none of these places serve the most stereotypical Ecuadorian dish, so your best bet is still to call ahead to Chino Latino if you’re craving guinea pig. (Though I only found a single restaurant outside Quito that had guinea pig on the menu when I was in Ecuador.)

The choices (and reviews):

Have I missed any?


View Minneapolis Ecuadorian Restaurants in a larger map

Concept phones

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I’m not sure what this says about the state of industrial design for mobile devices, but two of the coolest phones I’ve seen lately are mere concepts that will likely never see the light of day. It’s too bad because Apple needs some competition when it comes to creating pocket size art that isn’t only technologically impressive, but beautiful to behold.

First up on the roster of imaginary phones is the HTC 1 designed by Andrew Kim. Outside the Google Nexus One, I can’t think of too many HTC-made phones that don’t look like they were designed by an engineer. This thing is sleek with it’s single hard button, dual cameras and minimal UI, and its base swivels to act as a stand for watching videos.

And just today a new Nokia concept was making the blog rounds. Designed by Jeremy Innes-Hopkins, the Nokia Kinetic is supposed to stand on end to notify the user of important info.

Acting as a notification might be a little far-fetched, but actually, the self-standing (sans notification feature) should be fairly easy to accomplish. Proper weighting in the bottom portion of the phone should make the Kinetic stand upright, and that thicker portion also acts as a great grip for taking photos (notice the shutter button), not to mention ample room for a battery. My only quibble here is the call and end buttons which are anachronistic thinking to me. Those could easily be replaced with context-sensitive soft buttons on the touch screen.

I’ve been to my fair share of auto shows, and concept cars are always something to look at. It’s time mobile device makers get in that mindset.

My favorite of these phones is the Nokia, but I hope we see plenty more concept phones and that handset makers start taking risks and turning these things into reality.