Upton: from Airbag Industries. Today we are learning about design.
From what I’ve read in the last two weeks I’ve learned this much: design is like water, it comes in a variety of quality and clarity, in abundance or scarcity, both under valued and under appreciated at the same time.
And…
Design is everywhere, it’s talked about everywhere, it’s for sale everywhere, it’s practiced everywhere. It is ingrained in global culture from street signs to home interiors, newspapers to product packaging.
I love this stuff. +
Guess what? It’s cool to be a web designer again! Co-founder of the Web Directions conferences, John Allsopp, is featured in the latest edition of Desktop Magazine speaking about, you guessed it, Web Directions! +
Chinese more likely to be web addicts: study. There are some interesting differences between Chinese and American internet users:
A survey of more than 2100 internet users aged 16 to 25 years old in both countries showed that about 42 per cent of users in China said they at times felt “addicted” to their web use compared with 18 per cent of U.S. users.
In addition to believing that the internet allows them to make more friends and socialise, the Chinese also felt freer to act, and express themselves, online.
Nearly three-quarters of Chinese users said they were free to do and say things online that they would not do in the real world, compared with 32 per cent of U.S. users.
I don’t know, I think a lot of people probably feel “free” to act and speak in ways they wouldn’t “in real life”. Look, for instance, at the behaviour on some online discussion forums as an example… +
Is Facebook Overrated? I’m just a tad over Facebook to be honest. I just can’t keep up with all the invitations to install this app, or join that entourage. But I couldn’t resisting mentioning this article…
A social network affords something more: access to the personal lives and tastes of the people in your circle, or at least as much as they’re willing to share. For that reason, explains Chamath Palihapitiya, Facebook’s vice president of product marketing, “I see Facebook as becoming more essential than search.”
“More essential than search”? What next then? Googlebook? Oh, wait… +
Project 007: Fountain Pens at Good Magazine. Who can relate to this:
The last time we tried to write a letter by hand we had to re-read it to make sure it actually made sense, and only looked like the work of a first-grader. Sometime in the last few keyboard-dominated years our handwriting skills took a nosedive.
I think if I’m going to write by hand it will not be with fountain ink though. The results with ballpoint ink are bad enough. The article includes photos of some great old fountain pens though. +
