February 2012
20 posts
1 tag
Why videos go viral →
Kevin Allocca, a trends manager at YouTube, explains why certain videos go viral. I love all the nyan cat iterations. [YouTube via Gizmodo]
2 tags
Dropbox can do what Apple, Microsoft and Google... →
Garry Tan wrote a response to Farhad Manjoo’s post regarding Dropbox, and he also makes a few good points:
Earlier in the piece Farhad talks about how things just plain worked as Dropbox synced things from his Windows desktop to his Macbook Air. What are the odds of Apple getting their sync client right for PC’s? Just about zero, considering what they’ve done in the past with...
2 tags
Samsung Galaxy S III looks pretty hot →
The ultra-thin bezel at the top of the phone seems a little too thin, but this phone looks pretty slick (and has some ridiculous specs to boot):
1.5GHz quad-core Samsung Exynos processor
4.8-inch “full HD” 1080p resolution with 16:9 aspect ratio display
A 2-megapixel front-facing camera and an 8-megapixel rear camera
Ceramic case
4G LTE
Android 4.0
[BGR]
2 tags
Dropbox is a feature, not a product →
I’m a huge fan of Dropbox, but this article by Farhad Manjoo for PandoDaily is one of the more negative outlooks I’ve seen yet for the service — and he makes some great points:
Someday, someone will figure out how to make this sort of thing work well, but I suspect it will most likely be one of the companies that makes a major operating system: Either Apple, Microsoft, or...
2 tags
Google's new "batshit crazy" UX →
Google recently redesigned their sites so that users can no longer click on the top-left logo to take them “home.” First of all, this is not one of those “OMG I hate the new Facebook/Twitter redesign” overreactions — this is a legit UX gripe, and I am clearly not the only one.
Dustin Curtis recently linked to a post by former Google designer Kevin Fox on why this...
2 tags
Please steal these WebOS features →
So why was it so easy for me to use the TouchPad for work, but not the iPad? I think it’s because there are a number of things the TouchPad does that make it more suitable for work.
Now that it is becoming increasingly obvious that HP won’t do anything useful with webOS, it’s time to start stealing the things it does well. Here are some of these things.
Lukas Mathis points out all the great...
1 tag
Kevin and Phebe - "Buzzer" →
Kevin and Phebe is a series of web shorts that are quick and to the point. I particularly liked this episode. Extra bonus points because a friend of mine is friends with “Kevin” from the series. You can see all the episodes on their site, The Wildness. [Vimeo via The Wildness]
4 tags
Bokeh and art →
Samsung made this cute little video using custom bokeh shapes. They also published this handy little tutorial in case you wanted to mimic their results. [YouTube via PetaPixel]
3 tags
On Google, Apple, and "privacy" →
I’m not really too interested in last night’s WSJ “scoop” on Google and its mobile Safari practices, but if you want to read up on it, this piece by John Battell is probably the most balanced I’ve read so far:
In short, Apple’s mobile version of Safari broke with common web practice, and as a result, it broke Google’s normal approach to engaging with consumers. Was...
2 tags
About Gatekeeper →
The folks at Panic — developers of popular apps Transmit and Coda — wrote up a pretty good article explaining the pros and cons of Gatekeeper, a security feature offered in the newly announced OS X Mountain Lion.
Today’s Mountain Lion announcement introduces an important new security feature, called Gatekeeper, in addition to the “sandboxing” feature that premiered in Lion. I’d like...
1 tag
How to erase people from your photos like a boss
Thanks to modern day technology, there are a lot of post-processing tricks illusions (a trick is something a whore does for money) that photographers can use to enhance their images. Scalado just announced a new tool called Remove that can literally remove anyone from the background of your pictures — absolutely perfect for preventing ex-girlfriends strangers from ruining your shots....
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How Samsung plans to win over Apple fans →
I’m sure you’ve seen those commercials where Samsung takes a dig at Apple fans waiting in line for the next iProduct. At first I thought they were kind of silly, but it turns out there’s a method to their madness:
For starters: The washed-out look of the commercials was purposefully unsaturated and a bit milky, because the tone visually embodies the boredom of waiting in...
2 tags
BoxHead portrait tutorial →
I really like this portrait tutorial by my friends at BoxHead Studios. Great stuff. [BoxHead Studios]
1 tag
Giants fan
I really like this shot that I took at the NY Giants Super Bowl parade yesterday. This girl caught my eye, but everyone was packed in like sardines, so I didn’t have enough room to look through my viewfinder as I normally would. Instead, I extended my arms in the air and blindly fired off a couple of shots. Luckily, this one came out pretty well.
3 tags
Chinese Oreos also come in wafers!
Jason Kottke recently posted that Oreos in China are actually tube-shaped. Essentially, Kraft had to rethink the entire cookie :
It turns out that if you didn’t grow up with Oreos and develop an emotional attachment to the cookie, it can be a weird-tasting little thing. And this started a whole process in the Chinese division of Kraft of rethinking what the essence of an Oreo really...
1 tag
The problem with the iOS Home Screen →
The iOS Home screen is conceptually broken. Not “broken” as in unusable, unstable or technically flawed. From an engineering standpoint, the iOS Home screen works. The concept of the Home screen we interact with today is broken because the Home screen wants to be a real, physical, tangible surface while providing access to the gates of the intangible: apps. Apps are data, information,...
1 tag
I got mail!
The other day was my birthday, and I received a single birthday card in the mail. It was awesome. Thanks, Ang!
1 tag
My kind of dress pants
Forget jeggings (they’re not nearly as comfortable as they sound, trust me) — dress pant sweatpants are the future. I would probably “dress up” way more often if I actually owned a pair of these. Just think about it for a second. Sweatpants… that look like dress pants. How have these not been invented before? Next up: sweatpant suit. [Betabrand via PetaPixel]
2 tags
The Dangers of Fracking →
A beautiful fracking website by Linda Dong. Informative, too! [Dangers of Fracking via Daring Fireball]
4 tags
Bark Hot Dogs = I wants it
Ever since watching this, I really want to try Bark Hot Dogs in Park Slope, Brooklyn. The only problem is, well, it’s in Park Slope, Brooklyn (sorry, Bear).
I’m actually not a huge hot dog fan, but just like this news anchor, I can always appreciate a great sausage. So who knows, maybe one day I’ll make the trip to Brooklyn to see what this Bark Butter is all about. In the...