Archive for September, 2007

iTold you so

Sunday, September 30th, 2007

Can’t help feeling all the mock outrage about hacked iPhones being bricked by Apple’s latest update is a little unnecessary. It’s simple: you fucked with your phone, and you knew you were invalidating the warranty. Deal with it.

I get that people want to use third party apps and generally I do support devices being open and flexible. The sooner the mobile industry moves away from network exclusivity and locked handsets, the better. But for now, like it or not, that’s how these companies make their money and they’re sticking with it. You took a gamble and lost, so enough of the wailing and chest-beating. If I hacked my PS2 to fry eggs as well as play games, could I still take it back to the shop when it broke?

Apple’s recent conduct has been, well, almost Microsoftian, and that’s kinda worrying. Let’s hope they return to the light side soon enough. But I’m with them on this. Seriously, if you want an open-source platform to hack around with, install Ubuntu. Don’t get an iPhone.

[Clearly, I'm not talking about people whose phone has been nerfed due to no fault of their own. That's far more worrying, and raises even more questions about Apple's shoddy QA - which is probably the one thing giving me second thoughts.]

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Rules of the city

Monday, September 24th, 2007

Back from a deserved break in Prague; was starting to feel a little tetchy. And a lovely city it is too, with jarring juxtapositions of Iron Curtain housing blocks and red-roofed historical buildings, and wonderfully specific museums. And again with the impressive knowledge of English – a particularly good thing for the casual weekend traveller; Czech is frankly a pretty unusual language and not something I felt brave enough to try much of.

Lovely font used in the Metro (anyone know what it is?):

Just the right length of trip too. I find the first day is always spent getting the ‘feel’ of the city, and it’s only really from the second day onwards that you start to actually get past the stage of finding differences.

This phenomenon got me wondering what exactly the ‘feel’ of a city is. I think it’s ultimately about learning the unwritten rules of the city – the societal norms, if you will. Sure, you need to learn some basic geography too, but there are maps for that sort of thing. I’m talking more about learning how things are done, what local customs you’re transgressing, the space in between interaction.

It’s taken me a few months to get the hang of London’s unwritten rules. But I’m now able to exclusively reveal them to you. Stand on the right of the bloody escalator, try not to push in front of me as I wait for passengers to get off the Tube, and for goodness sake don’t stand in the middle of the pavement on Buckingham Palace Road during rush hour fiddling with a map and a 25kg backpack.

I think it’s safe to say I qualify as a Londoner now.

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First dance

Sunday, September 16th, 2007

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Hidden logo messages

Friday, September 14th, 2007

These have already done the rounds, but hey, I think they’re cute. Can you spot the hidden images in the two logos?

No? You sure?

Posted in design, psychology | 2 Comments »

The Aiwa Facebook: £149 at Currys

Tuesday, September 11th, 2007

Nice Facebook analogy from Iain Tait: Facebook is an all-in-one stereo system – fine for beginners but ultimately a bit limiting and of mediocre quality (web 2.0 is separates, natch). See also Wired’s article Slap In The Facebook.

This was also one of the recurring themes at BarCamp Brighton, particularly with such a strong Microformats and semantic web flavour pervading the whole weekend. Lots of bold words about Facebook’s inevitable (albeit it far-off) demise.

Although in principle I agree, I thought this was a little strong – I’m still rather ambivalent about it all. Facebook’s certainly a useful tool and it’s great to see so many people contributing to the web, sharing media and so on. I just regret that there’s this great big mainstream love affair with a walled garden concept I hoped the web had outgrown.

Of course, the interesting question is how those of us nearer the front of the curve can convince our less geeky friends that separates are better, without sounding like horrible snobs. Believe me, I’ve tried, and believe me, I sounded like a horrible snob.

Posted in web | 1 Comment »

How to avoid the UX dark side

Sunday, September 9th, 2007

Slides from my short presentation at BarCamp Brighton:

May not make much sense without the audio (but then if your slides don’t need a speaker why are you bothering to present?). Also please forgive typographic quirks introduced by SlideShare.

Been a fascinating weekend so far, and I’ve finally lost my Werewolf virginity. My theory that all unfamiliar games should be played aggressively didn’t really hold up.

Tags: barcampbrighton, presentation

Posted in user experience | 2 Comments »

Brighton on the rocks

Thursday, September 6th, 2007

Dear Reader,

I am currently packing my gadgetry for a weekend of unabashed geekery: dConstruct and BarCamp Brighton. If you need to get hold of me this weekend, I will likely prove unavailable, unless you can teach me some tricks on how to integrate User-Centred Design into an Agile development environment.

Next week’s blog activity will be dominated by long words and IA in-jokes. For my old school readers, I understand that this will be a disappointment. Don’t worry. I too miss those days when I posted about how much alcohol I’d consumed. Therefore I shall endeavour to return with tales of inebriation also.

I have not forgotten you, and I thank you for your patience.

Cennydd

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