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"…maybe David is party to a formula for popularity, despite the fact that no art of any real value, including all Hollywood films of the past 30 years, has ever been made by pursuing one. Good artists do what they believe in and don't merely court public approval. In these respects they are the opposite of politicians. Zing!"
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"This TV is playing a built-in MPEG of static, instead of just displaying solid blue or solid black like they used to do. I think that's kind of awesome. The map has become the territory." Blimey.
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"When I started writing this post, I didn’t have a conclusion in mind, but now that I’ve got to the end, the thing I want us to remember next time is just that: all the scales matter. Every part is important. The two days Sarah and Brian spent moving small pieces of vinyl, Ivan’s 4am printing-and-cutting, FOUND’s jumping-up-and-down to see if crowd movement broke their tech, last-minute shopping trips for slightly larger balls, all the things. Worry about it all. Fix everything." Lovely write-up from Holly of the big thing we did in Edinburgh. Also: good about the nature of the huge, and good about the nature of work. Worry about it all. Fix everything.
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"Experience designers love a bit of Saarinen: “Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context – a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan.” That’s what’s wrong here, an RFID card is not considered within the context of a wallet, containing multiple competing RF field creating information and ID objects, and this new, electric wallet isn’t considered within the larger system of shops and the invisible RF world." Companies don't design for seams – and, as Chris points out, when they do, it's for seams between all their own products.
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"As amazing as it was to find the disk, the file was corrupt and couldn’t be read; all attempts to view the now 20 year old animation failed. It was part one of a science fiction saga titled “Porth” that our friend Cory had made by stretching the animation tool to the absolute limits. To say the least it was worth putting some effort into saving this file." Data archaeology.
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"We made a commitment to real choreography. I basically drew a line in the sand and said, “If this interface is going to be great, and we're going to make a dance game that's gonna be transformative, you have to be able to dance 'Crank That' by Soulja Boy.” That’s the bar for a good interface."
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"I went forward with this theme; what if movies we were all familiar with were made a different slice of time? Who would be in it? Who would direct it?" These are marvellous, not just for the art, but for the casting and direction calls. Friedkin's "Terminator"; Peckinpah's "Wolverine"; John Ford's "Drive" starring James Dean. Perfect.
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"Molesworth sa on the contry the most beatiful form in art is a Ronald Searle GURL from St Trinian’s in a tunick with black suspenders and armed with a hockey stick to beat the daylites out of another gurl or maybe just a teacher chortle chortle." Economist obituaries are always worthwhile, but this Ronald Searle one is marvellous
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Two-player game designed to encourage awkward/fun bodily contact. Well, finger-contact. Really lovely idea: the sort of thing shared screens are designed for.
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"If school programming languages that serve children best end up looking quite a bit different from conventional programming languages, maybe it’s actually the conventions that need changing." Several good points from Alex, and some good points about breaking away from equating "computational" with "procedural".
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"Dawn H Foster tweeted this weekend asking whether she was alone in feeling less intelligent now than she did when she was younger. I know exactly what she means. Those earlier versions of me were more certain in their ability because life hadn’t chipped the armour plating of arrogance off them. I’m at a point where I have let that go too far though and wear away at the confidence beneath it. Whether the next incarnation of myself turns out to be paranoid and shaky like the Thin White Duke at his darkest or on the cusp of a new prospects like McCartney circa 1961 is up to me." This is very familiar.
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"My energy is flagging and he is disappearing over a rise. I wonder: Had he even known I was there? Had I imagined our moment of shared transcendence? And I wonder: Will no one take my ammo?" Battlefield is often like this, which is why it's frustrating, and why it's brilliant.
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"I spend every day writing Rails code in vim, and I’ve optimized the heck out that process. The screencast contains the best of what I’ve learned for creating and editing Rails code at top-speed. Come look over my shoulder and I’ll show you my best stuff." Might give this a pop at some point.