Break the Page
A lovely site with thoughtful articles on the long-term future of the web.
There’s audio too, which is unfortunately locked up in the unhuffduffable roach motel that is Soundcloud, but I’m hoping that might change.
Tags: art
A Book Apart celebrates its third anniversary
Aw, my l’il ol’ book is three years old!
To celebrate, you can get 15% off any title from A Book Apart with this discount code for the next few days: HAPPY3RD.
Ten tips guaranteed to improve your startup success by Anil Dash
It’s a big ask, but if you can action these ten tips from Anil, your startup will crush it.
Our Incredible Journey
A collection of those appalling doublespeek announcements that sites and services give when they get acquired. You know the ones: they begin with “We’re excited to announce…” and end with people’s data being flushed down the toilet.
Instant artist statement: Arty Bollocks Generator
Don’t let James Bridle get a hold of this.
Map Projection Transitions
A lovely way of demonstrating the differences between map projections. Drag for extra fun.
They Keep Using That Word ∙ An A List Apart Column
David gets physidigital.
A List Apart Issue № 371
This issue of A List Apart is a great double-whammy. Lara Swanson has a ton of practical tips for front-end performance enhancements, and Brian dives deep into making your own icon fonts.
The World Wide Web is moving to AOL! by Brian Bailey
Biting satire that hits its mark superbly. Ouch! Be careful — this is sharp …and funny.
The gradient chart by Cennydd Bowles
A very handy technique from Cennydd for answering the “it depends” question of when you might need a separate device-specific site (‘though I think that a separate can be a good option in addition to a responsive site, rather than instead of).
Write The Future by Tom Hunter — Kickstarter
Now this looks like my kind of event:
A new micro-conference on science, technology, communication and fiction, organised by the Arthur C. Clarke Award.
Forty Years of Movie Hacking: Considering the Potential Implications of the Popular Media Representation of Computer Hackers from 1968 to 2008
An in-depth look at the portrayal of hackers on film.
Editorially: Write Better
A collaborative writing tool built by a dream team. I’ve been using it for a while now and it’s very nice indeed.
Brighton Science Festival Edo Wonderpark Hack Day
There’s going to be mini Science Hack Day at Lighthouse as part of this month’s Science Festival in Brighton. Come along — it’ll be fun.
Nick Cave Winning Competition Entries - a set on Flickr
Local music shop Resident Records ran a competition to win 20 pairs of tickets to an exclusive warm-up gig by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. To be in with a chance, you had to recreate an album cover. These are the winning entries.
You’ll spot Jessica’s creation in amongst them. We’re off to see Nick Cave tonight!
Submarine Cable Map
This year’s TeleGeography map of the undersea network looks beautiful—inspired by old maps. I love the way that latency between countries is shown as inset constellations.
Stratocam
Communal satellite eyes. A Mac screensaver is also available.
Mercator Puzzle!
This is fun. Drag the red country outlines around and slot them into place on the map. Sounds easy, right? But the distorting effect of the Mercator projection makes it a lot tougher than it looks.
The Last Pictures: Contemporary pessimism and hope for the future by Paul Glister
From the cave paintings at Lascaux to the Pioneer plaques and Voyager golden records to Trevor Paglen’s “The Last Pictures” project, Paul Glister examines the passage and preservation of art and information through time. Fascinating.
Or perhaps, as Paglen envisions, those who find a Pioneer Plaque, a Voyager Record, or one of our electromagnetic transmissions will be interested enough to search us out, coming upon a future Earth where all that is left of humanity are our terrestrial ruins and that artificial ring of geosynchronous satellites, with one of them having a particular golden artifact bolted to its pitted hull. In that scenario, about all that would be left for the visiting ETI to do in terms of learning about us would be grand-scale dumpster diving.
Form Follows Function
A gorgeous collection of experiments that showcase just how much is possible in browsers today.
phuu/sparksvg · GitHub
Remember when I made that canvas sparkline script? Remember when Stuart grant my wish for an SVG version? Well, now Tom has gone one further and created a hosted version on sparksvg.me
Not a fan of sparklines? Bars and circles are also available.
30 Great Reads from 2012 - Readlists
Some of the past year’s best long-form non-fiction, gathered together into a handy readlist for your portable epub pleasure.
CABINET // Trap Streets
A fascinating piece by James on trap streets, those fictitious places on maps that have no corresponding territory.
Jackdaws love my big sphinx of quartz - Stuff
The biggest plot holes of World War Two.
Warning: contains spoilers.
The Pinboard Investment Co-Prosperity Cloud
VC funding that actually makes sense, from the always-sensible Maciej Cegłowski.
The Web We Lost - Anil Dash
Oh, my! This excellent, excellent post from Anil Dash is a great summation of what has changed on the web, and how many of today’s big-name services are no longer imbued with the spirit of the web.
Either you remember how things used to be and you’ll nod your head vigorously in recognition and agreement …or you’re too young to remember this, and you won’t quite believe that is how things worked.
This isn’t some standard polemic about “those stupid walled-garden networks are bad!” I know that Facebook and Twitter and Pinterest and LinkedIn and the rest are great sites, and they give their users a lot of value. They’re amazing achievements, from a pure software perspective. But they’re based on a few assumptions that aren’t necessarily correct. The primary fallacy that underpins many of their mistakes is that user flexibility and control necessarily lead to a user experience complexity that hurts growth. And the second, more grave fallacy, is the thinking that exerting extreme control over users is the best way to maximize the profitability and sustainability of their networks.
Black Marble - City Lights 2012 - a set on Flickr
Gorgeous pictures from the Suomi satellite, just released by NASA
Ethan Marcotte AEA Boston June 18, 2012 on Vimeo
Ethan’s excellent talk from last year’s An Event Apart.
In this session Ethan reviews strategies for handling trickier elements that would make even the most seasoned designer quail: stuff like advertising, complex layouts, deep navigation patterns, third-party media, and, yes, actual, honest-to-goodness content.
Projecteo - The tiny instagram projector - Projecteo
We got a sneak peak of this lovely little Instagram-powered projector from the guys at Mint Digital at last week’s Skillswap. “It’s not a wheel. It’s a carousel.”
Now you can back it on Kickstarter.
Elite: Dangerous by Frontier Developments — Kickstarter
Nerdgasm! David Braben is bringing Elite back and bringing it up to date. And he’s funding the project on Kickstarter.
Best. Game. Ever!
Why George Lucas Is the Greatest Artist of Our Time - The Chronicle Review - The Chronicle of Higher Education
Camille Paglia is apparently a Lucas apologist like me.
A List Apart: Articles: Responsive Comping: Obtaining Signoff with Mockups
A peak behind the scenes at the responsive design and development workflow at Bearded. It makes a lot of sense.
CSSquirrel : The Savage Beatings Anti-Pattern
CSSquirrel shares my feelings on the email notification anti-pattern.
A List Apart: Articles: Mo’ Pixels Mo’ Problems
The kickass articles just keep on comin’. This one from Dave is a great overview of options for dealing with images in responsive designs.
A List Apart: Articles: The Web Aesthetic
A really great article from Paul that simultaneously takes a high-level view of the web while also focusing on the details. A lot of work went into this.
Street Ghosts project - Google Street View made Street Art and Public Concern
In the hippest areas for Street Art, life-sized pictures of people found on Google’s Street View are printed and posted without authorization at the same spot where they were taken.
Geeks, Swords and the Snow Crash Movie: Neal Stephenson in Conversation | Tor.com
A really enjoyable interview with Neal Stephenson.
A List Apart: Articles: Testing Websites in Game Console Browsers
An excellent in-depth article from Anna on the many gaming devices out there that have both an internet connection and a web browser.
Lanyrd: the early days | The Lanyrd Blog
This is a rather lovely history of the first two years of Lanyrd, starting with that honeymoon-turned-startup.
I really like the way that Lanyrd’s communications reflect the personalities of Simon and Nat: utterly brilliant, but also a little bonkers, with far more animals than would be reasonably expected.
LukeW | An Event Apart: Spirit of the Web
Luke’s notes from my talk at An Event Apart in Chicago.
Space Elevator Science - Climb to the Sky - A Tethered Tower by Michael Laine — Kickstarter
A Kickstarter project for space elevator research? Oh, hell yes!
A List Apart: Articles: Everything in its Right Pace
A great article by Hannah, focusing on the Long Web—it isn’t about the quantity of data you’re publishing; it’s the quality. This builds nicely on the article I linked to recently about digital scarcity.
SkyCube: The First Satellite Launched by You! by Tim DeBenedictis — Kickstarter
If this Kickstarter project gets launched, it will literally get launched.
Your Startup is Doomed « Tom Scott
The truth about startups. Got a startup? Take the quiz. It’s harsh but fair.
View from the ISS at Night on Vimeo
Another beautiful timelapse video made from photographs taken from the International Space Station.
The music from Sunshine gets me every time.
Bringing a knife to a gunfight — my slide deck from An Event Apart, Austin 2012 | Stuff & Nonsense
Andy remarks on the same synchronicity I talked about at An Event Apart Austin:
Every An Event Apart conference feels special, but at this one the (unplanned) recurring themes were spooky.
When Art, Apple and the Secret Service Collide: ‘People Staring at Computers’ | Threat Level | Wired.com
A good long read that tells the story behind an art piece that used the built-in cameras on Macs in the Apple Store, and the subsequent visit from the Secret Service.
A List Apart: Articles: ALA Summer Reading Issue
How about this for a trip down memory lane—a compendium of articles from over a decade of A List Apart, also available as a Readlist epub. It’s quite amazing just how good this free resource is.
The only thing to fault is that, due to some kind of clerical error, one of my articles has somehow found its way onto this list.
If this were Twitter, you’d be at-replying me with the hashtag “humblebrag”, wouldn’t you?
A Ship Aground
This is how London looked on my birthday, as recorded by the stationary meatspace protrusion of James’s Ship Adrift.
CLANG by Subutai Corporation — Kickstarter
Neal Stephenson would like your help in making a video game about sword-fighting that doesn’t suck.
ISS Star Trails - a set on Flickr
Beautiful time-lapse photography from Don “we’ve got a Dragon by the tail” Pettit, taken from the International Space Station.
GATHER. A Graphic Novel by Anton Peck — Kickstarter
Anton is a fantastic artist. Therefore, this graphic novel will be fantastic. Therefore, you should back the hell out of it.
A List Apart: Articles: Creating Intrinsic Ratios for Video
This really is a ridiculously smart way of keeping third-party videos scalable in responsive layouts. I’ve just implemented it on this year’s dConstruct site.
The next generation bends over - (37signals)
This post by Jason Fried is three years old but it’s more relevant than ever.
What a loss. Is that the best the next generation can do? Become part of the old generation? How about kicking the shit out of the old guys? What ever happened to that?
Form letter template for acquired startups — Gist
Just copy and paste.
Dear soon-to-be-former user…
1 2 3 |
|
MachineDrawing DrawingMachines : Pablo Garcia
In which twelve drawings of historical drawing machines are drawn by a computer numerical controlled machine.
An Essay on the New Aesthetic | Beyond The Beyond | Wired.com
Bruce Sterling writes about the New Aesthetic in an article that’s half manifesto and half critique.
Grab a cup of tea or hit your “read it later” bookmarklet of choice for this one—it’s a lengthy but worthwhile read.
A List Apart: Articles: Style Tiles and How They Work
Samantha does an excellent job of explaining how useful style tiles can be for visual design and iteration.
L’Eclaireur • subblue
Press play on each video, sit back, and relax.
A Whole Lotta Nothing: My Webstock Talk: Lessons from a 40 year old (now with transcript)
Matt has transcribed the notes from his excellent Webstock talk. I highly recommend giving this a read.
Webstock ‘12: Matt Haughey - Lessons for a 40 year old on Vimeo
I really enjoyed Matt’s talk from Webstock. I know some people thought it might be a bit of a downer but I actually found it very inspiring.
Photo Booth - Annie Ray Photo
Pictures from the photo booth at Jeffrey’s Hall of Fame celebration party on the last night of South by Southwest.
MATTER by Matter — Kickstarter
Bobbie’s new journalism project is up and running on Kickstarter. Get in there!
A List Apart: Articles: Responsive Images: How they Almost Worked and What We Need
A terrific article from Wilto detailing the thinking that went into the Boston Globe’s responsive image techniques and how browser pre-caching is now throwing a spanner in the works.
Jeremy Keith: Paranormal Interactivity on Vimeo
This is the talk I gave at An Event Apart through 2010. It’s all about interaction design with some examples from Huffduffer.
The Restart Page - Free unlimited rebooting experience from vintage operating systems
Wallow in nerd nostalgia and experience the Proustian rush of rebooting old operating systems.
angry, productive birds (tecznotes)
Mashing up Angry Birds and spreadsheets to better visualise project time-tracking.
The Star Wars Holiday Special | magazine | Vanity Fair
Add this one to your Instapaper/Readability queue: the behind-the-scenes story of the train wreck that was the 1978 Star Wars Holiday Special.
yongfook - Design is Horseshit!
There’s a good point buried in this tirade.
Here’s a more positive spin: with this much horseshit, there’s gotta be a horse in there somewhere.
Design Principles // Speaker Deck
The slides from my presentation at this year’s An Event Apart. Such a fantastic event …it was an honour to be on the roster.
astronautdinosaur.com
Ballardian astronaut paintings by Scott Listfield.
ART LIES | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
James Bridle in untrue art exposé: read all about it!
The comments are simply epic.
A List Apart: Articles: Say No to SOPA
A superb piece of writing from Jeffrey, scorching the screen with righteous anger. THIS. IS. IMPORTANT!
SOPA approaches the piracy problem with a broad brush, lights that brush on fire, and soaks the whole internet in gasoline.
Twine : Listen to your world, talk to the Internet by Supermechanical — Kickstarter
This looks truly wonderful: like a hardware version of “if this, then that.”
A Book Apart, 2011 Holiday Bundle
The perfect Christmas gift for the web geek in your life: get a discount of 30% when you buy all six books apart.
the understatement: Android Orphans: Visualizing a Sad History of Support
A damning indictment on the lack of any upgrade path for most Android phones. It’s disgusting that most customers have contracts that are longer than the life cycle of their phone’s operating system (and crucially for me; their browser).
Aral Balkan · Google Dart, or ‘how we lost the ECMAScript 4 battle so we decided to create our own language instead’.
Aral takes the words right out of my mouth. This is pretty much exactly how I feel about Dart.
The Deleted City
This is quite beautiful. An interactive piece that allows you to dig through the ruins of Geocities like an archeologist.
Such wanton destruction! I’ll never forgive those twunts at Yahoo.
Fuckers.
SPEED SHOW
I like this ad-hoc approach to staging one-night-only internet art shows:
Hit an Internet-cafe, rent all computers they have and run a show on them for one night.
10 Charts About Sex « OkTrends
This is may just be the best thing on the internet about data visualisation and statistics. And sex.
Making the QR Code InfoDressShe Bytes - Exploring Digital Art, Technology, Design
I had a lovely conversation at the Update after-party with Georgie about the infographic dress she was wearing. It’s quite lovely.
Escaping the Digital Dark Age
Stewart Brand wrote this twelve years ago: it’s more relevant than ever in today’s cloud-worshipping climate.
I’d like to think that it’s ironic that I’m linking to The Wayback Machine because the original URL for this essay is dead. But it isn’t ironic, it’s horrific.
Wait, what does your startup do?
Humour through noun permutations. The results are all-too believable.
xkcd: Standards
So true, it hurts.
Physical GIF by Greg Borenstein — Kickstarter
What a wonderful idea! Create a zoetrope from an animated .gif.
An Ear for Science: The Particle Physics Windchime | SLAC News Center
The story of the particle windchime—it turns subatomic particle collisions into sound—created at Science Hack Day San Francisco.
ISS-Notify by Nathan Bergey — Kickstarter
I want one! An ambient signifier (in lamp form) to let you know when the ISS is flying overhead. Geekgasm!
Red Pop - the big red button for your iPhone camera!
Brendan’s latest product looks like it’ll be a thing of beauty. But he needs help getting it funded on Kickstarter. If you like taking pictures with your iPhone, I suggest you back this project.
“Six-Penny Anthems II” - A classic Bearskinrug Article.
Rejoice! For Kevin Cornell’s new book is available to you through the power of print on demand. I’ve ordered mine. And should you.
LukeW | An Event Apart: Design Principles
Luke’s notes from my talk at An Event Apart in Atlanta.
웹디자이너를 위한 HTML5 - a set on Flickr
A peek behind the scenes of the printing of the Korean version of HTML5 For Web Designers.
Christopher Boffoli Photography
Homunculi in a landscape of food.
Customer Stories: A Book Apart | MailChimp
A wonderfully made video on the story of A Book Apart. Mandy should have her own show.
Anton Peck — Adopt a Monster
What could be better than of Anton’s 100 robots? How about one of Anton’s (even bigger) 100 monsters! You can pre-order now.
AEA Boston_2011 (by) Anton Peck (in) Journal
Anton’s personal account of An Event Apart in Boston. It really was a very special event.
Race to save digital art from the rapid pace of technological change | Technology | The Observer
Digital preservation in the art world.
LukeW | An Event Apart: All Our Yesterdays
Luke’s notes from my talk about long-term thinking and online preservation at An Event Apart in Boston.
In Radiolab We Trust
A great way of supporting the best podcast on the planet: a limited set of prints by five designers, illustrators and artists. Grab yours quick before they’re all gone.
From Me To You
The humble animated .gif is turning into an art form.
A List Apart: Articles: Orbital Content
A great piece about the changing nature of content ownership and distribution. And now I share it with you, validating its central premise.