Tivo Alert - The Duke Spirit Tonight On Conan
Now that the UK group The Duke Spirit has wrapped up their North American tour with BRMC, they have one stop remaining: a performance on Late Night With Conan O'Brien. Liela Moss and her bandmates will be on the program tonight, so don't forget to set those Tivos just in case your peepers just can't stay open that late.
The Most Important Skill
"The one skill that I would identify as the most important, and the one that can make the most positive impact on your profession, is that of mastering your capacity and ability to learn."
ISO50 vs. Bjork
Wow. Scott Hansen's work for Stereogum's Bjork cover songs project is awesome.
Timewaste - Rage Fan Vs. Hipster Record Store Clerk
"Dear Hipster Record Store Clerk,
Thank you for judging me on the CD I bought yesterday. Our passive-aggressive altercation made me realize how conformist I am for buying an old Rage Against The Machine album. Your condescension was just the intellectual wake-up call I needed..." And the lulz keep coming.
Showreel: Conrad Ostwald (Video)
This reel is seriously hot. Extra points for the soundtrack, which sounds like Stephen Hawking doing an 8-bit cover version of "I Just Called To Say I Love You."
She & Him.
"She & Him is a story of musical serendipity: Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward, each renowned in their own creative fields, meet and recognize a certain shared nostalgia." Me likey!
Threadless - Pulsars And Dying Stars.
Clearly, I do not frequent Threadless often enough. Be a dear and request a reprinting of Men's L & XL sizes for me.
Portishead - Machine Gun (Video)
The video isn't much to look at, but hey -- it's a new Portishead song! I have no idea why you have to log in to see it. That's just weird.
POP MATTERS
"Vinyl record sleeves with 2-sided insert featuring faux-academic material on pop music and the state of the record industry, seeded with promotional material for indie radio stations."
Declare Independence.
This Bjork video totally kicks. And is that string-machine a real instrument? Because that would be awesome.
Nailed It.
Jason Fried on why many web panels are so weak. I like seeing people on panels get ruffled and heated with one another. It's called passion, and there's not enough of it sitting behind those long draped tables.
Bloxes.
"Bloxes are building blocks made of interlocking pieces of corrugated cardboard, folded together.. Their unique shape and structure make them exceptionally strong and lightweight — you could build yourself a platform to stand on, and then pick it up and move it wherever you need to." By Aza Razkin. WANT.
Heima Screening On YouTube Tomorrow
Shot in Iceland, Heima follows Sigur Ros as they play small towns and other beautiful, unusual locations. If you have not seen this film, this is your chance to redeem yourself. Hopefully the YouTube version isn't too compressed. View the trailer in preparation for tomorrow.
Watch the Helvetica documentary.
It appears that Gary Huswit's "Helvetica" is now available, in full, on Google video. If you've never seen it, now's your chance.
The Question: Audiences
I'm not sure how old this is, but Ze Frank solicited answers from various people (including perennial Jaredigital fave Imogen Heap) regarding how their audience affects their work. Interesting stuff.
A List Apart: Issue 254
Two great articles by Andy Rutledge and Naz Hamid. Very thoughtful and well-written pieces.
Time Loop Theory.
It's a little difficult to wrap my head around it, but this LOST theory seems pretty plausible.
NewsFire is now free.
I used this as my main reader till a few years back. Not sure why I stopped; it's a very slick interface.
Morale-O-Meter.
I've been using this for about a week, and it's a lot of fun. I only wish that the service was a bit faster!
A&E (video)
As long as I'm gushing about Goldfrapp today, I may as well go ahead and point you to this fetching video for "A&E." Dancing leaf-people? Always a good decision.
Dear Colleagues
Generally good advice for all kinds of designers. I'm totally guilty of the 'not responding to email' thing, and assure you that it is due to a horrible lack of self-management and not snobbery. [via]
Goldfrapp - Seventh Tree
I am really liking what I'm hearing. Going to have to pick up this album ASAP.
NSA leaks 'Cloverfield' defense plan
"If tactical assault weaponry is incapable of pacifying the hostile megamorph, possible solutions are ... breeding and unleashing a similar-sized megamorph, although our one should have wings and breathe magical flames or something." AWESOME.
Morph.
I loves me some technology concepts, and this one from Nokia is a doozie.
New MacBook Pro.
Bigger hard drive, faster video card and -- gasp -- multitouch trackpad. WANT.
The Roaring Mouse
Armin Vit:
"I haven't expressed sheer effusiveness about a logo on Brand New before, but I think this warrants it: I love it. I would even call it "brilliantly executed" and stand behind it 100%."
I agree; this logo is awesome.
Linkpwnd.
My apologies for the RSS spam. I'm attempting to rejigger my RSS feeds and apparently I am a huge noob. Please bear with me as I figure it out.
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes to Plugged In links.
I'm moving my link list to del.icio.us, so I apologize for any annoying feedreader hoopla that may result from my tinkering with Feedburner et all in the next little while. Gracias.
Be my Netflix friend.
I just signed up for Netflix, so if you're there too it'd be great if you added me as a friend.
Free Prototypes EP
Record label Minty Fresh is offering a free download of The Prototypes' Je Ne Te Connais Pas EP. Nice.
Apple's Resolution-Independent Interface Patent
"Have an Apple High-DPI MegaCinema Display? No problem. Just scale the user interface to twice its regular size. Every single button, title bar, piece of text and scroll widget draws itself at a new size. The result is silky smooth — beautiful buttons, beautifully clickable, and beautifully high-resolution. That's the idea, anyway. It just needs to, you know, be programmed."
Packaging Design for Web-based Products
"Thinking in terms of an unpacking experience can help turn a typical web application registration process into an engaging event." Amen.
How can our spaces improve creativity?
"I truly believe if there were more environments that fostered and encouraged innovative and creative thinking...we'd be a different place."
The (Dutch) Music Industry Proposes "iPod Tax."
Another dumb idea. What I really want to know is what's up with Wired's choice of article graphic: Buzz Lightyear covered up by an archaic U.S. stamp on an iPod screen? Is that the Dutch symbol for taxes? I don't get it.
Stephen King Would Ruin LOST.
I know the guy was just having a conversation with buddies, but this is probably the worst ending you could suggest for LOST. Seriously, that's it? Weak!
Windows OSX, (cough), Vista.
Spotlight, Widgets, glossiness level set to 11. Yeah, Vista wants to be a Mac in the worst possible way.
Steve Ballmer explains the value of the Zune.
"I want to squirt you a picture of my kids. You want to squirt me back a video of your vacation. That's a software experience." Gross, dude. Sounds more like an STD experience to me.
Boyfriend.
"Welcome back! Today we're gonna show you how to deal with your daughter's good-for-nothing boyfriend." [video]
Zune Arts.
Great animations put to great music. Not your usual Microsoft fare.
A PSA by Jack Black.
"What's your parrot going to listen to when you go toe-to-toe with the English Armada? Jazz? I don't think so."
Thriving Office.
Because I would never trust someone who worked in a quiet place. Ever.
Beck: Interactive Design.
The first pressing of Beck's upcoming album, The Information, will come packaged with a blank CD cover and a booklet of stickers, eliciting fan participation in the creation of the official album art.
Explaining User Experience
"User Experience has been defined and visually demonstrated many times before, but I’ve never really seen the “nuts-and-bolts” of a User Experience project listed in a way that’s easy to understand..."
They're not fonts!
Vintage, but good, overview of typographic nomenclature.
The CW: Free To Be Saturated By Advertising.
The CW is reportedly trying a wide range of hokey advertising schemes including placing shows inside products (Veronica Mars visits Chili's! OMG cool!!!) and 3-minute advertising vignettes. Looks like I might be Free To Change The Channel.
iTunes 7's New iPod Docking Screen.
Though iTunes 7's overall design seems to be yet another step in a continually inconsistent and dreary direction, I did find this particular screen a welcomed addition.
The Shire.
Cheese wheels, weed and Hobbit children sold separately.
AboutUs.org - a Sham
If you haven't heard yet, a wiki site has appeared that is collecting all your personal information into one tidy page. Perfect for stalkers, criminals, busybodies and nar-do-wells! Bad for you.
Bold Moves.
"The American people love the truth. And they love an underdog. That's us." And with that, Ford launches what is possibly the most insincere, contrived, fake, staged, reeks-of-PR "real-time" campaign EVER, filled with buzzwords, crafted sincerity and disingenuity. It's painful to watch companies try to enter the "transparent business" space unprepared.
Which brands have the most word of mouth?
"Ford has the dubious distinction with the most word of mouth of any brand but doesn't appear in the top 10 list of net-positive. All buzz is not good buzz..."
AOL Retention Manual Revealed
Instead of investing in a system that people actually wanted to use, AOL created a system for duping customers into not exercising their right to leave for cheaper, higher-quality services.
Blowback.
Not only have the Bush-n-Blair bunch pooh-poohed the proposed UN cease fire between Israel and Lebanon [...] but now the Bush team is also supplying high-tech arms to Israel hastening the destruction of the Lebanese infrastructure and probably cementing the hatred directed towards the U.S. by not only the Arab world but by much of the 3rd world populace as well.
ABC's Streaming Video Success
I hope it did well enough to convince ABC to continue the program into the next season of LOST. I missed more than one episode at its original airing and it was nice to be able to hit the website the next day and watch it.
Wal-Mart Tries to Be MySpace. Seriously.
It's a quasi-social-networking site for teens designed to allow them to "express their individuality," yet it screens all content, tells parents their kids have joined and forbids users to e-mail one another. Oh, and it calls users "hubsters" -- a twist on hipsters that proves just how painfully uncool it is to try to be cool.
Label Placement in Forms
Excessive distances between some labels and their input fields forced users unnecessarily to take more time to interact visually with the form.
