“So while [techies] trump up our skills at designing “easy to use” interfaces for our applications, millions of people are still trying to figure out how to get our beautifully designed application out of its zip file or disk image.  Or where in fact the Downloads folder is. Or what, exactly, a folder is. [...] I’ve watched firsthand as people who’ve struggled to do basic computer tasks as long as I’ve known them pick up an iPhone and be cruising around within hours, if not minutes. For people who do not already thoroughly understand computers, New World devices are easier to understand and easier to use.”

“A detail from the iPad keynote: Steve demoes the Mail application and he puts it in horizontal mode. Oh, look, an Inbox list pops in. Neat.

And I think, hmmm I wonder if you can resize that splitter, making the source list wider. Its a tiny target, so it would be hard to grab…

And then I realize: you can’t resize it.

And a bright light did shine upon my liberated face and a voice did whisper a thunder: You’re free. Free of pointless preferences and finger-baiting adjustments.”

[via Minimal Mac]

No camera? How will we do video chat?

Good entry price point of $499, but I’m irritated that I can’t use my $30/month iPhone internet on this thing. You want me to pay for internet per device? Seriously? Where is the Kindle internet model where it comes with free internet for life?

I can totally see myself sitting down to read a nice long book with the iBooks app. But I’m still skeptical I’ll buy many books this way — $15 for a new book, and no re-sell or lending capability? I don’t mind that with music, but I rarely read books more than once and want to be able to pass the book on when I’m done.

I feel bad for Kindle owners. Given the attention this thing is getting, the screen-looks-like-paper feature was an overrated (but necessary?) step to advance the art of eBooks. Sorry Amazon. Thanks for your efforts. Good luck with your ePaper initiatives – the rest of us will be happy with color alternatives.

The new apps look amazing. Especially the calendar program. And the iWorks apps. Can’t wait to try them out.

Interesting that Apple made their own “Apple A4” chip instead of putting an Intel chip into the device. I wonder what this means for the future of other Apple devices.

Oh yea, and the iPad name is horrible. Please Apple, please. Give up on the iEverything name. The original iMac was what? 1998? This is a tired, dull, and not-what-we-expect-from-a-leading-company-like-yourself name. Canvas would have been so much better. Or Slate. Or just “Apple Tablet”. iPad? iPad?!?

“Checking is something that we do with the motivation of confirming existing beliefs. [...] Testing is something that we do with the motivation of finding new information.”

So when you “test” your software, are you really testing? Or are you just checking?

Opinions and criticism welcome. Theme design by WPShoppe and it’s called Cleanr. Probably a little too clean, but I like it.

I’m an Apple fanboy to be sure, but what exactly can’t the iPhone do?

“The Nexus One seems like a nice enough phone, but it’s nothing revolutionary (it’s got a trackball, for God’s sake). Everyone is still operating inside the same box that Apple defined three years ago.”

On one hand, I’m glad to see some competition for Apple. But I don’t know that most consumers can see what’s happening: Google is playing the Microsoft game. Copy Apple as closely as possible and as quickly as possible. Android will always be a second-rate smartphone (or super-smartphone).

Google’s Android phone operating system will rearrange the icons, change the colors, and maybe even do a couple unexpected things. But the genius at Apple is already working on the next big thing – not trying to copy their competitors.

“The World Has Changed – Why Haven’t Your PM Tools and Approaches?
In the last 10 years many changes have occurred in the world of managing IT projects, yet we still see the same tools and approaches being employed. Is this because they are classic and timeless? Are the traditional PM approaches so successful that they do not need to be dragged here and there following trends and immature technology fads? No, I fear it is more that people are creatures of habit, and the usually more mature project management community, are worse than most at evaluating and adopting new approaches.”

The first thing you must do is admit you have a problem with your project management process. It isn’t the business analysis, coders, or testers that is broken. It’s the process that is broken. Not the people. Once you can admit that, the world becomes much much less stressful.

So anyway, NG did some analysis and found “The United States spends more on medical care per person than any country, yet life expectancy is shorter than in most other developed nations and many developing ones. Lack of health insurance is a factor in life span and contributes to an estimated 45,000 deaths a year.”

The chart is shocking:

A lot of companies seek to control employees. They have handbooks and policies. They monitor emails. They make rules about what’s allowed and what’s forbidden. [...]

Imagine an employee handbook that just said: “We trust you. Be mischievous.”

This makes a lot of sense to me. If the company trusts you with corporate secrets, company property, and access to production servers … maybe the policies on appropriate use of YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook are misplaced.

“Someone asked me where I get all my good ideas, explaining that it takes him a month or two to come up with one and I seem to have more than that. I asked him how many bad ideas he has every month. He paused and said, “none.”

And there, you see, is the problem.”

Sounds a lot like photography advise: the best way to get a good photograph, is to just take a lot of pictures.

“In addition to expanded accessibility for those with hearing disabilities, the combination of captions withmachine translation expands YouTube accessibility across the globe. If a caption track is available, it can be translated automatically in any of the 51 currently available languages. As a result, video content otherwise not accessible due to a language barrier can now be understood by a significantly larger user population.”

“You might think a lot gets done when you multitask, but a study conducted by Stanford researchers Eyal Ophir, Clifford Nass and Anthony Wagner says it isn’t so.”

“I think of functional spec as one of the worst inflictions that has ever happened to the software development world. I think functional specs are a relic of a time when building features was a very, very hard and long process and you had to do all of this upfront planning because once you wrote anything in software, it was pretty much impossible to change it. I don’t think that functional specs is a technique that’s any longer relevant.”

“When people compare software products, they often compare checklists of features. In other words, the product that has the longest checklist appears to be the best. Well we try to do exactly the opposite. We try to “under-do” our competition by doing less than they do, by having the shortest feature list. That is, in essence, our biggest feature.”

He continues with an excellent analogy:

“We keep comparing ourselves to the notion of chefs. When you walk into a high-end restaurant, you really don’t get a whole lot of choice. Usually, the hallmark of a high-end restaurant is the chef’s menu. The chef prepared courses of a dinner in advance where he made all the choices. You eat there because you trust the chef’s judgment and want his taste. Well, we try to do the same thing. Instead of just giving you a super-long menu, we’ll just give you this set course of plates and you’ll have to trust our judgment on it, and I think you’ll end up with a much tastier meal in the end.”

• Start an email newsletter using Mad Mimi or Mail Chimp. Give the responsibility for the newsletter’s creation and performance to one person and offer them a bonus if they exceed metrics in sign ups and in reducing churn.
• Offer a small bonus to anyone in the company who starts and runs a blog on any topic. Have them link to your company site, with an explanation that while they work there, they don’t speak for you.
• Have the president post her (real) email address in every invoice and other communication the company sends out, asking people to write to her with comments or questions.
• Do not approve any project that isn’t run on Basecamp.

Just like software, in the end it isn’t a lack of access to tools or high startup costs. It’s just plain courage to do it.

2) iCam’s latest update now lets you record video on motion and view it remotely on your iPhone. I hear it works through most firewalls that would otherwise block the video (nice!).

3) My favorite innovation in video, however, is USTREAM. They now have a free Apple-approved iPhone app that let’s you broadcast video from anywhere. This is truly amazing and will enable all sorts of citizen journalism. Can’t wait to see how this one unfolds.

We recently replaced our kitchen glasses (11 years old, missing half the set) with new Duralex Picardie Clear Tumblers. One of the reviews, specifically the one below, reminded Sarah and I of the Tuscan Whole Milk reviews and ultimately sold us on the product. After a week’s worth of use we have not been disappointed and we may just be Duralex fans for life. Prior to this glassware search, we had never heard of Duralex before.

These are the New Glasses of the House:

Anyway, I’ll let the lyrics speak for themselves. You can buy the song here.

Cheers,
Peter

Verse 1:
Oh, for the sake of momentum
I’ve allowed my fears to get larger than life
And it’s brought me to my current agendum
Whereupon I deny fulfillment has yet to arrive

Chorus:
And I know life is getting shorter
I can’t bring myself to set the scene
Even when it’s approaching torture
I’ve got my routine

Verse 2:
Oh, for the sake of momentum
Even though I agree with that stuff about seizing the day
But I hate to think of effort expended
All those minutes and days and hours
I have frittered away.

Chorus

And I know life is getting shorter
I can’t bring myself to set the scene
Even when it’s approaching torture
I’ve got my routine

Bridge 1:
But I can’t confront the doubts I have
I can’t admit that maybe the past was bad
And so, for the sake of momentum
I’m condemning the future to death
So it can match the past.

Bridge 2:
when I can’t confront the doubts I have
I can’t admit that maybe the past was bad
And so, for the sake of momentum
I’m condemning the future to death
So it can match the past.
[ Momentum Lyrics on http://www.lyricsmania.com/ ]