melanson.ca

Redefining Windows

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 20:29:00 -0500

It seems like a lot of folks aren’t exactly enthusiastic about Microsoft’s new Windows 8 logo. I like it quite a bit. It’s simple, meaningful and extremely flexible — none of which you could say about the previous logo — and it manages a feat that’s really quite hard to pull off with a logo.

It is what it says

This is a window.

It is what it is

This is Windows.

Redefining Windows

It also, I think, helps to redefine what Windows is. Between the logo and the Metro design language, it’s pretty clear that “Windows” no longer refers to a mish-mash of windows hanging in space.

It is a window, with multiple panes. Or multiple windows with multiple panes.

Simpler, more flexible.

Knowing Microsoft, some of the old Windows will stick around for a while, but all the hints are we’ll be seeing a lot less of it over time.

wired: Wired’s library of past issues. [via Wired]

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 19:08:19 -0500

wired:

Wired’s library of past issues.

[via Wired]

Marshmallow cannon in the White House. barackobama: Aaaand...

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 21:16:11 -0500

Marshmallow cannon in the White House.

barackobama:

Aaaand there’s video.

Box Brown’s latest for Distro.

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 14:30:45 -0500

Box Brown’s latest for Distro.

Some reading recommendations from latest issue of Distro. Click...

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 17:16:35 -0500

Some reading recommendations from latest issue of Distro. Click on through or check the app for the links (or click below).

“Maniac Tentacle Mindbenders: How ScummVM’s unpaid coders kept adventure gaming alive” by Richard Moss, Ars Technica
“Our Weirdness is Free” by Gabriella Coleman, Triple Canopy
“A Brief History of Clocks” by William J.H. Andrewes, Scientific American
“Can We Build Tomorrow’s Breakthroughs?” by David Rotman, Technology Review
“William Gibson’s Future Is Now” by Pagan Kennedy, The New York Times

Don't call it an ultrabook

Fri, 20 Jan 2012 15:18:00 -0500

Don't call it an ultrabook:

Latest editorial for Engadget.

Every year at CES, the tech-watching masses engage in a bit of trendspotting — an attempt to identify the one or two big themes of the show that may or may not come to define the year in technology. Some years those are easy to spot (tablets and 3D TV were two big ones recently), and other times they involve a bit of guesswork. This year, one of the most oft-cited trends is the “ultrabook.” Judging from the companies’ announcements at the show and some of the coverage they’ve received, you might think that’s a new sort of device or a radically new type of laptop. But, really, they’re just laptops. Small, thin laptops — but laptops.

It’s actually Ultrabook, with a capital “U,” and a (TM). The name is a wholly-owned creation of Intel, and the hype you’ve seen for them at CES is only just the beginning. Intel is reportedly planning its biggest advertising push in eight years to promote Ultrabooks, and it’s clearly already done a decent job of bringing hardware manufacturers on board the bandwagon. How many new “laptop” announcements do you remember from CES?

Bowie, “Blackout.”

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 12:18:47 -0500

Bowie, “Blackout.”

"Such is the power of his prose that when I glanced up from the pages of this book and surveyed the..."

Fri, 13 Jan 2012 16:40:23 -0500

“Such is the power of his prose that when I glanced up from the pages of this book and surveyed the street-side around me, I felt as if I were wearing Gibson-glasses. Cars lumbered past like ponderous elephants of rusty steel, not so different from the cars of 30 years ago, and seemed not to belong in the same world as the tattooed kid punching code into his laptop nearby. Under the spell of this book, I suddenly understood my surroundings not as a discrete contemporary tableau but as a hodgepodge of 1910, 1980, 2011 and 2020.”

- Pagan Kennedy on William Gibson’s “Distrust That Particular Flavor,” The New York Times.

If any trailer this year deserves to be watched frame by frame,...

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 18:03:07 -0500

If any trailer this year deserves to be watched frame by frame, it’s this. Around 44 second mark, especially.

Science fiction.

Thu, 22 Dec 2011 20:49:38 -0500

Science fiction.

"But is The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo a cyberpunk story? If you think of cyberpunk as a purely..."

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 16:17:26 -0500

“But is The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo a cyberpunk story? If you think of cyberpunk as a purely science fictional subgenre, then no. If, however, cyberpunk is a way of telling stories about the collision between crime, technology, and human augmentation - well, you’re about to see the most cyberpunk movie of the year.”

- Annalee Newitz on Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo for io9.

discoverynews: The Final Moon Mission Splashdown: 39 Years Ago...

Mon, 19 Dec 2011 16:06:19 -0500

discoverynews:

The Final Moon Mission Splashdown: 39 Years Ago Today

On Dec. 19, 1972, the Apollo 17 Command Module splashed-down 350 nautical miles southeast of Samoa in the Pacific Ocean, following the final Apollo flight to the lunar surface.

This final mission of the Apollo Program has the onerous distinction for also being the last manned space mission beyond Earth orbit in 39 years, the anniversary of which is remembered today.

Demystifying McLuhan

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 20:59:34 -0500

Demystifying McLuhan:

The winning videos from CBC’s McLuhan mashup contest.

poptech: National Geographic magazine presents 7 Billion: How...

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 17:18:52 -0500

poptech:

National Geographic magazine presents 7 Billion: How your world will change - to coincide with the arrival of the 7 billionth human being to our world. This app explores the challenges of a growing human population in a world of limited resources with informative videos, interactive maps, in-depth articles, and stunning photography.

The problem with bad product names and what we can learn from it

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 18:40:00 -0500

The problem with bad product names and what we can learn from it:

Product names generally fall into one of four different categories: good, safe, meaningless and bad. There may be better categories to group them in, but we’ll use these for the purpose of this editorial. In the first category I’d put something like Kindle, arguably one of the best new product names of the last ten years. iPhone and iPad, and their subsequent suffixed versions, are in the safe category. They’re perfectly fine names for a cellphone and a tablet, but they’re not as original or distinct as iMac or iPod were, which I’d consider good (iPod nano, shuffle and touch, on the other hand, are all safe names).

In the meaningless category are things like the MSI GT683DXR or ASUS XU6280, one of which I just made up. Some meaningless names can also be good in their simplicity — like the Nokia N9 or Nikon D3S — but they are still basically nothing more than differentiators. This is an acceptable option.

In the bad category are the majority of smartphones released in the past few years. Rezound. Rhyme. Vivid. Epic. Sensation. Thrill. Skyrocket. Conquer. Triumph. Enlighten. Infuse. Prevail. Arrive. Can you name the company behind each phone? And those are just a few examples from this year. The names aren’t just bad — they’re noise. Some names might fall into a fifth, slightly murkier okay category, but there are certainly more phones (and, increasingly, tablets) in the bad category than any other, and I’d argue that’s a sign of a larger problem.

Read the rest at Engadget

GE gets Tumblr. /via BoingBoing generalelectric: Selenium was...

Thu, 02 Jun 2011 21:12:44 -0400

GE gets Tumblr.

/via BoingBoing

generalelectric:

Selenium was traditionally one of the principle ingredients in solar cells. This chamber purified the selenium used for early photovoltaic cells. We found it in our archives, but can’t shake its uniquely futuristic look. (Taken with instagram)

Speaking of Shadowrun. lordroccogreyforge: Epic fake Cyberpunk...

Mon, 30 May 2011 13:32:37 -0400

Speaking of Shadowrun.

lordroccogreyforge:

Epic fake Cyberpunk TV show trailer.

Cyberlords Arcology for Android Started playing this today....

Sun, 22 May 2011 17:38:34 -0400

Cyberlords Arcology for Android

Started playing this today. It’s a lot like Shadowrun for the Sega Genesis — which is to say, kind of fantastic. There’s a free version, but I highly recommend paying the buck to play it without ads.

Vincenzo Natali’s Neuromancer

Fri, 20 May 2011 00:11:00 -0400

Vincenzo Natali’s Neuromancer:

I’m still a bit cautiously optimistic about the whole thing given the history, but Natali could really nail this.

Just stumbled upon one of these 1970s portable Philips record...

Sun, 08 May 2011 14:00:00 -0400

Just stumbled upon one of these 1970s portable Philips record players on eBay. Not surprisingly, it didn’t go cheap.