Archive for April 2007

16 Apr 2007 0838H

The ethnography of traffic in Chicago Chinatown

I’ll probably do a screencast, a la Mike Madaio, about this soon, since it’s an obvious fit, but I just want to throw this out there first for potential feedback. The traffic pattern for this street is quite predictable given the design of the mall across the street, and yet it’s astounding to me, as [...]

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13 Apr 2007 0941H

$100 Laptop (OLPC) Interface

Wow, I’m really excited by the interface for the new One Laptop Per Child system. Looks like the MIT folks worked with Pentagram and RedHat to design it. I really like how they elaborate on their principles that guide the design of the UI, and then the demo does away with the desktop metaphor, which [...]

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12 Apr 2007 2057H

Shamefully unhelpful error message from Hertz.com

This sucky error message from Hertz.com violates helpfulness principles. Although the site tells you what the error is, it describes it from internal jargon, does not tell the user how to recover from the error, nor does it provide a way out. Twenty lashes! Let loose the Kraken!

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12 Apr 2007 1307H

Update: making better use of del.icio.us

So in the process of keeping up with all the articles I didn’t read in the last two weeks, I remembered a better way to keep track of them, as Scott Weisbrod of Critical Mass does on his blog, Experience Planner as “Weekly Linkage.” See, when you publish a feed via FeedBurner, you also can [...]

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11 Apr 2007 1713H

Scooped by 40 years

Back in October I made the observation that corporate politics impacts information architecture. Sure Garrett has mentioned it, and at happy hour on Fridays we often drown our sorrows because of it, but I thought I was rather clever for saying so. That is, until, in the course of catching up with the post-SXSW blogosphere, [...]

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06 Apr 2007 0835H

Speaking of seducible moments

So back back back a few months I was doing some benchmarking and I ran across this site which caught my attention mostly because of the naked woman in the tub covered tantalizingly by a diaphanous layer of foam. Just the way I like them, actually . . . And then I read the copy, [...]

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06 Apr 2007 0759H

Google Call?

Let’s skip over the Google Maps mashup talk for now and look at this piece. When I was surfing for the address of my senior kung fu brother, I found this mysterious call link under the Google map entry. And when you click the link, you get this block. Google will call your phone and [...]

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04 Apr 2007 0746H

Notes from Nashville

Favorably impressed with the area, generally. To begin with, the airport is being renovated, which is a good sign, it was modern and rather easy to get in and out from, although only two security gates means potentially long lines during rushes. The Whitt’s BBQ pork sandwiches ($6) with the peppery hot sauce, which has [...]

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02 Apr 2007 1954H

Web credibility and captology

First of all, I just want to say, I love my coworkers. I was a little reticent about this business trip, since it was three or four cities this week, but I came to the office and they made me feel right at home. So today I was in Cleveland at HQ and my boss [...]

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