Microsoft Word requires at least 30% more keystrokes and 100% more mouse moves to accomplish certain editing tasks than would an optimal word processor. Forbes —Bad Design Can Be Costly Similar:Meet octobot, a soft-bodied robot that looks like the futureOur future robot overlords never looked …AestheticsJumpsuit for a female mechanic in my #neovictorian #steampunk project.…
“We are the Gist Generation. We have acquired a taste for hit-and-run, cut-and-paste knowledge. We expect a home page or e-mail correspondence to give us the gist and only the gist—time is money and you’re a click away from an iconographic trash can, so get to the point.” Jeff Barbian Similar:Joe Turner's Come and Gone…
This computer game tries something new. “If a character tells you he’ll call you tomorrow, he’s not kidding. You’ll have to wait a day to get his information. Faxes may arrive without warning, and instant messages may pop up onscreen when you least expect them — maybe even while you’re at work.” Wired.com —“Majestic” Invades…
“Organized religion was a primary target of every one of the twentieth century’s regimes of terror. But as is evident in Nazi and Communist terrors alike, organized irreligion (to put it in Royal’s sharp formulation) has proved far more dangerous than organized religion ever was.” Alicia Mosier Similar:Texas lawyer trapped by cat filter on Zoom…
You might assume there could not be a worse time for a field calling itself “Internet studies.” You would be wrong. The Chronicle of Higher Education Similar:Notes on Teaching August Wilson's Pittsburgh CycleI first taught Wilson’s Pittsburgh Cycle…AcademiaThe Value of Truth: We are living through an epistemological crisis. In the jargon of academia, the study…AcademiaMobile is…
“Lambert received the e-mail in December, a piece of scrap in the vast electronic junkyard that is the World Wide Web. Regrettably, she says now, she removed the letter’s forwarding markers and unintentionally put her name at the bottom, making it appear that she was the author.” Washington Post —Don’t forward that e-mail just yet!…
“[W]hat could be more scholarly than a nice, authoritative statistic, quoted from a professional journal in the student’s field?” The Chronicle of Higher Education —Telling the Truth About Damned Lies and Statistics Similar:The Secret Power Of Black TwitterA recent Pew study (Smartphone Ownership…CybercultureThe Business 9 Women Kept A Secret For Three Decades, by Lori Weiss…
The longer the company’s annual report, the less successful the company. This isn’t really a technical writing issue — usually companies with bad news to report need a lot of words to explaining themselves. But if this is what it takes to get some pinhead CEOs to appreciate brevity, so be it. Wired Similar:Robot wars:…
Danielle Preston —You Know You’re a Technical Writer When… Similar:Really, WCCC? AcademiaAI crawlers destroying websites in hunger for contentTraffic on my website has plunged over t…BusinessGoogle Autocomplete Still Makes Hateful Autocorrect SuggestionsThe top suggestion for a Holocaust searc…BusinessRiding on Square WheelsStan Wagon, a mathematician at Macaleste…DesignMS Paint AdventuresWonderfully silly take on old-school poi…AmusingHow do you…
A student of mine makes comments on interactive fiction, garish colors, and dancing text. Jan Carroll —Just For the Record Similar:Another section of a #neovictorian control panel for a #steampunk #blender3d project. I h…AestheticsIf not enough people are stopping by your table to hear your presentation, you take your p…AcademiaMy college writing students are out…
learns something from my freshman comp students. On March 13, 2000, I e-mailed web guru Jakob Nielsen to tell him that six of my freshmen spent 8-30 minutes on his site without finding a plain-text “search” link on the home page. A week or so later, I noticed that Nielsen changed his page, making the…
“[W]hen it comes to writing, whether you’re a seventh grader, a college student, a professor, a beginning copywriter, or an accomplished novelist, a B isn’t good enough.” Kathy Henning —For Writers, Writing Is Never a Waste of Time: Part 2 Similar:In August, 2002, I was blogging about ebook readers and email in teaching; how urban…
“[A] society without literature, or a society in which literature has been relegated–like some hidden vice–to the margins of social and personal life, and transformed into something like a sectarian cult, is a society condemned to become spiritually barbaric, and even to jeopardize its freedom.” Mario Vargas Llosa Similar:Suddenly Human (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season Four,…
The creator of Cliffs Notes has died. Here’s his obituary — although I know you probably won’t bother to read the whole thing. Similar:Far-Right Twitter Trolls Won’t Admit They Were Wrong About Killing of a “Patriot” in Denve… It was a reporter’s bodygu…CultureWeaving: Breathing: Thinking: The poetics of Emerson's NatureText derives from texere, which means…
On the tasteless side, but still very funny: “Some Features You May Need on Your Computer“ Similar:"It's called an amphora," the artist says.AestheticsComputer Interfaces in Star Trek's "Assignment Earth"I was watching classic Star Trek with my…CybercultureThe Trouble with Tribbles: A Television Adaptation by Richard GoreyShaenon K. Garrity – New Smithson!.AestheticsWe Got A Look Inside The…
“It is our duty, as responsible citizens, to stop the rot. Next time someone touches base with you or moves your goal posts, punch them in the face.” Clint Witchalls —Business and the English Language Similar:Why We Forget Most of the Books We ReadIt was pleasurable to encounter a famili…BooksInternet Explorer and Murder Rates: More…
“Europe once sought to bring enlightenment—literacy, civil society, modern technology—to benighted parts of the world. It did so in the name of progress and civilization. The ethic of Third Worldism dictates that yesterday’s enlightenment be rebaptized as today’s imperialistic oppression.” Roger Kimball Similar:The AI Mirror Test: Why Even the Smartest People Keep Falling ShortWhat is…
Imagine yourself creating a game with a world for other people to inhabit on your own computer. It is a world without sounds or visuals. Now, put yourself into the textual world and imagine yourself in that world and living through the game. Laura L. Hogue —Text-based computer game lets players interact with story. Similar:The…
The point is not that we should add stories to our sites to ensnare narrative-starved readers. The point is that the reader’s journey through our site is a narrative experience. Our job is to make the narrative satisfying. Mark Bernstein —The Narrative Web Similar:Lecturing is So Much Easier than Leading a DiscussionLecturing is So Much…
“Roget’s Thesaurus… should be roundly condemned as a crucial part of the engine work that has transported us to our current state of linguistic and intellectual mediocrity. Simon Winchester What’s another word for “thesaurus”? Similar:Historians Admit To Inventing Ancient GreeksI knew it! Busted!! “One night someone …AcademiaHemingway: The First Draft of Anything… Facebook.AmusingPart of my…