Design: September 2005 Archive Page

PC Gamers of the World Unite! You Have Nothing to Lose But Your Retail Chains! --Manifesto Games

Grek Gostikyan, science fiction author and game developer, resigned from Nokia in order to invest his energies in the indie game development movement. He blogs at Games * Art * Design * Culture.

The shuttle has cost the lives of 14 astronauts since the first flight in 1982. Roger Pielke Jr., a space policy expert at the University of Colorado, estimates that NASA has spent about $150 billion on the program since its inception in 1971. The total cost of the space station by the time it's finished ? in 2010 or later ? may exceed $100 billion, though other nations will bear some of that. --Traci Watson --NASA administrator says space shuttle was a mistake (USA Today)

This is painful to read. As an elementary student, I wrote to NASA in the 1970s, and somehow wound up on a mailing list for teachers. For years I received thick glossy publications full of diagrams and artist's renderings of planned missions.

I can barely remember the post-moon space program, and I think I remember news coverage of the abandonment of Skylab in 1974. I would have been about nine when Skylab burned up on re-entry in 1979, and I remember that well.

I was always thought more seriously about writing about such things than actually builiding or flying in them, but of course I daydreamed.

--Austrian national anthem 'sexist' (BBC)

Should that caption read "Austrian schoolchildren are taught the national anthem during solar eclipses"? I can't imagine why else they might be wearing those goggles.

I don't mean to make light of the subject.

I've written a handout on gender-neutral language, and in my American Lit class, we discussed the ritualistic rhetoric and nearly universal pomposity of national anthems.

But the photo choice is distracting and odd. (My sister suggests that perhaps it was the only handy photo of Austrian schoolchildren.)

Usually once a decade an invention comes along that makes everyone revise the way they think about an accepted form of technology. In the first decade of the 21st Century the invention is Uni-Screw?.

Uniscrew? replaces Slotted, Phillips,? Pozi-Drive,? Torx? and Square Head style screws and offers significant advantages compared to these fastening mediums. As such, Uniscrew? represents the most significant development in fastener technology for decades! --What is Uni-Screw? (Uni-Screw)

I like hexagons quite a bit, and I happen to like fasteners and tools, so naturally this product appeals to me.

But the language of the website reminds me of this article from The Onion: "Amazing New Hyperbolic Chamber Greatest Invention In The History Of Mankind Ever.

Thanks for the link, Rosemary.

Update, 07 Jul 2008: Link is dead... Wayback Archive, uniscrew.com.

--Keybag (João Sabino)

I can hear my wife now... "Where did I put my keys?"

It perfectly pulls together four important tools that no geek should ever be without (USB flash drive, LED light, Swiss Army knife, ballpoint pen). These functions have been skillfully integrated into this single super tool. Along with all these great features you also get the legendary construction quality and materials that Swiss Army knives have become famous for throughout the world. The USB flash drive portion of the knife can easily be removed, for safe airline travel (and successful passage thru security).
--Okay, please stop drooling (Think Geek)

Thanks for the link, Rosemary.

>>(makes fake cough sounding like "birthday")<<

>>(makes fake cough sounding like "October 11")<<

Hey, maybe I could use this to carve that.

--Wooden Case Mod... and more

My jaw dropped and I literally gasped when I saw these images. Are they real? Not a phenomenal CGI project? It doesn't matter -- it's beautiful! Thanks for the link, Will!

By the way, my birthday's coming up next month... hint, hint!

Customers create any structure they can imagine using Lego's freely downloadable Digital Designer software. If they then decide to actually build their creation, the software, which keeps track of which pieces are required, sends the order to this corner of the Enfield warehouse. There, employees put all the pieces (which are grouped in standardized bags) into a box, along with instructions, and ship it off. "We've been toying with this idea for a long time," says Steven Hawco, vice president of Lego's Shop at Home division, which is overseeing the project. "And now technology is giving us the ability to actually do this." --Michael A. Prospero
--Brick by Brick: Lego's New Building Blocks (Fast Company)

Isn't that a cute graphic by Henry Yung? Brilliant idea.

The faculty members contend that buildings that have been erected on campus over the last two decades have done a disservice to the Jeffersonian style — Thomas Jefferson founded the university in 1819 and designed the original campus – by attempting to make look-alikes and by paying too little attention to the use of buildings. --David Epstein --Jeffersonian Tradition or Shoddy Imitation? (Inside Higher Ed)

The grounds of Seton Hill University are nice, but nothing -- nothing compares with the central grounds of the University of Virginia. But once you get out beyond the old campus, the charm fades rapidly. I think the engineering school complex has character, and so do the older clusters of freshman dorms. While I haven't been to the campus since the remodeling of Cabell Hall, and I'm sure there are other changes I don't know about.

The Rotunda (which used to house the library) is the heart of the school. It's based on the design of the Pantheon, a Roman temple which became a church.

When I was in Rome, with a group of students from U.Va. in about 1989, we were standing in front of the Pantheon, and I said, in my best American Tourist voice, "Very Jeffersonian."

A guy next to me flinched and almost punched me. I have no idea who he was. It was rather amusing.

The PocketMod is a new way to keep yourself organized. Lets face it, PDA's are to expensive and cumbersome, and organizers are bulky and hard to carry around. Nothing beats a folded up piece of paper. That is until now. --The PocketMod

It is a folded-up piece of paper, but such a cool piece of paper! When I was an undergraduate, I had a geeky calendar program, and I would print out a single page with a week's worth of appointments and notes. At the end of the day, I'd transfer notes from the paper to my computer, and the next morning before I left I'd print out the next week's notes.

Then one day when I was walking past a Radio Shack, I saw a pocket-sized brochure advertising the Palm. I put the brochure in my shirt pocket, and before long I had the real thing in there. I've hardly removed it since. But still, sometimes I miss my sheets of paper -- reminding me of a time in my life when, if I had read the required number of pages and produced the required number of papers, I was done, and I had official permission from the universe to slack off for a while -- at least until somebody else told me what to do next. (Oh, the joys of youth.)

Via Metafilter.

Nvu (pronounced N-view, for a "new view") is a complete Web Authoring System that combines web file management and easy-to-use WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) web page editing. Nvu is designed to be extremely easy to use, making it ideal for non-technical computer users who want to create an attractive, professional-looking web site without needing to know HTML or web coding. --NVu (NVu.com)

A former student suggested this for the next time I teach web authoring. The last time I taught "Writing for the Internet," we jumped right into blogging, which slowed us down when we moved on to design, and suddenly cyberspace wasn't push-button simple anymore. Next time, I'm going to bite the bullet and teach some basic HTML along with blogging, but once I've done that, I'll move to a WYSIWYG editor. I'd been using FrontPage Express, simply because it's free and small enough that students can put it on their portable drives or use it at home, but it's an ancient program by now.

I hope the program is less geeky than the silly acronym, but the reviews I've seen look very good. Hurrah for open source!