http://www.niblettes.com/blog Tasty Little Nuggets of Design and Innovation Goodness Wed, 14 Jan 2009 19:01:05 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Using IM (instant messaging) to access application isn't exactly new anymore.  Imified is a good a example.  But really, only geeks develop this, only geeks use this, and only geeks get excited by this.  Remotely controlling applications by sending text messages through IM is essentially just a new protocol for telnet. What is ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2009/01/14/im-telnet-for-the-people/ Wow.  I thought I didn't care for Gladwell's brand of slick packaged pop-intellectualism.  It looks like The Register has even less patience than I. Gladwell has made a career out of handing simple, vacuous truths to people and dressing them up with flowery language and an impressionistic take on the scientific method. ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2009/01/11/follow-up-on-gladwell-and-other-aspostles/ I don't usually like to write about myself.  But I read something recently from an incredibly unlikely source that crysalizes why I'm such a curmudgeon.  That source is Entertainment Weekly's article on the 2008 People's Choice Awards. The only thing I can hope for is this: When people like Kid Rock and ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2009/01/09/why-im-such-a-curmudgeon/ How much change can a system absorb and still remain viable and functional?  Resilient systems have a high threshold for functioning under change.  The internet is resilient.  It was designed to conitue working during war by instantly rerouting data traffic around damage anywhere in the overall system. The opposite of resilient is brittle.  ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2008/12/22/resilience/ Everyone is talking about Malcolm Gladwell and his new book.  And everyone now includes me. Gladwell and excellent writer.  He is one of the very best storytellers you're likely to read.  But telling a great story and revealing great insight are two very different matters.  And I have never experienced any real insight from ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2008/12/18/gladwell-tasty-but-not-nutritious/ A couple themes have been perculating in my head over the past several months: disposability and resiliency.  While they may seem related, I don't intend a connection--they've just bubbled to the surface at about the same time.  Here is the gist... 1. Designing disposable experiences may create more value than deeply ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2008/12/07/new-themes-disposability-and-resiliency/ A couple months back Dean Martin (that cracks me up) of the Rotman School at the U of T wrote a piece  on the Creative Class blog titled Creativity that goes deep. The following might seem a little nitpicky. But its important to remember, this is a guy who runs a ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2008/12/05/rotmans-dean-martin-wrong-on-business-and-design/ A CBC blog has a short but observant post about Canada's digital backwardness.  More interesting are the comments.  One commenter writes: If Canada wants to draw creative, educated professionals, it's going to have to foster a progressive environment which is attractive to digitally-able, post-materialist, 21st-century citizens. Wow.  Not sure I could agree more ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2008/11/28/more-people-recognize-canadas-digital-backwardness/   Its dangerous to draw conclusions from history that is too fresh, but I'm going to anyway. Canada is a country with an essentially pre-industrial economy.  What I mean by that is our economy is based almost entirely or natural resource extraction.  Sure our extraction methods are more advanced today, but in essence ours is ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2008/11/25/canada-wont-be-competitive-in-the-21st-century/ I took a photography class a little while ago. It was held at a local high school. I has been a few decades since I've even been inside of a public school. I've never been a fan of public school. The only thing I can say ... http://www.niblettes.com/blog/2008/11/20/uncomfy-school-chairs-hamper-learning/