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Earlier this year, OLPC workers dropped off closed boxes containing the tablets, taped shut, with no instruction. “I thought the kids would play with the boxes. Within four minutes, one kid not only opened the box, found the on-off switch … powered it up. Within five days, they were using 47 apps per child, per day. Within two weeks, they were singing ABC songs in the village, and within five months, they had hacked Android,
~ Given Tablets but No Teachers, Ethiopian Children Teach Themselves | MIT Technology Review -
If Apple can take liberties with Braun industrial design, why shouldn’t Braun borrow a few tips from Apple marketing…
(via Braun Japan goes sexy and simple with their website | The Fox Is Black)
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Legend speaks of a sandwich—very discreet, somewhere—a sandwich well-concealed and expertly invisible. A sandwich so secret that its most vocal defenders absolutely doubt its existence. And they cite this prevelant doubt as the only actual proof of its existence. Sure, but do they have to say it with such skepticism? The only tangible proof was uncovered some years ago when an advertisement appeared in the Aberdeen Examiner. A mail-order cassette titled Sounds of the Secret Sandwich. A cassette which was largely blank, save for a brief conversation at 23’10”. A little child says, “Dad, dad!” and the wind is blowing. Then, this raspy voice says, “What is that? Are you wearing a beret?” The kid says really loud, “WHAT??” And the older voice says, “That’s cute, come here, show me, what is that you’re wearing on your head?” And there’s some movement and the kid is quiet, the wind dies down and the older voice says, “Oh, sure, I know what this is—it’s a—uh—it’s a dead bird.” So, I have my doubts about the validity of this recording.
~ _why’s Estate - The Secret Sandwich -
In the same day of interviews you might meet some smart 19 year olds who aren’t even sure what they want to work on. Their chances of succeeding seem small. But again, it’s not their chances of succeeding that matter but their chances of succeeding really big. The probability that any group will succeed really big is microscopically small, but the probability that those 19 year olds will might be higher than that of the other, safer group.
~ Black Swan Farming -
Long before the actual city of New York, the city of New York existed in the mind of its creator. In this dream city, there lived an ordinary man. (Ordinary in the sense that only dream people can be. Which is to say: Extraordinarily plain for a very wispy, immaterial person.) This man drew no attention to himself. He walked in such a way that he completely complied with crowds. His height was such that he was constantly overshadowed, though always present. His home was situated in a place where no one would ever look and his street address consisted of an imaginary number, such that it didn’t translate from the dream into the mind. It is common for such people to live this way in a dream, and it is most orderly of him to do so. This ordinary man concealed a great secret from the mind of his creator. This secret was called the Berkowitz Manuevre. You know enough about it now, so please go away.
~ _why’s Estate - The Berkowitz Manuevre -
When people are myopically focused on fighting, they lose sight of everything else. They begin to look very much like their enemy. The skinny kid bulks up. He becomes the bully, which of course is exactly what he had always hated. A working theory is thus that you must choose your enemies well, since you’ll soon become just like them.
~ http://blakemasters.tumblr.com/post/23250566538/peter-thiels-cs183-startup-class-12-notes-essay (via johnerik) -
I was on the way to a meeting yesterday when I walked right past this little grey box strapped to a light pole, at about knee level. I did a double take after thinking to myself “that thing looks like it’s designed to attract as little attention as possible.”
The only identifying marks were the “eco-counter” label, and a tiny serial number. After some ethically grey internet sleuthing, I found this URL: http://public.visio-tools.com/?ECO07111540, which corresponds to the box. This little grey box at Fell and Scott streets, designed to be invisible in plain sight, is counting/recording/aggregating every bike that passes it, and sending the data wirelessly back to a server somewhere for someone to look at.
The same company makes similar models to count pedestrians, by measuring small fluctuations in temperature caused by your body heat as you walk by. They’re good enough to detect two people walking closely together. They make counters that are designed to be buried under dirt paths, hidden inside of posts, and all other variety of camouflage.
There are at least dozens of these around San Francisco. Maybe hundreds. I’m totally fascinated by them. Who is paying for them? Who’s looking at the data?
Our city has a private API.
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I once knew a woman who interned at a magazine where she wasn’t allowed to take lunch hours out, lest she be urgently needed for some reason. This was an entertainment magazine whose raison d’être was obviated when “menu” buttons appeared on remotes, so it’s hard to see this pretense of indispensability as anything other than a form of institutional self-delusion. More and more people in this country no longer make or do anything tangible; if your job wasn’t performed by a cat or a boa constrictor in a Richard Scarry book I’m not sure I believe it’s necessary. I can’t help but wonder whether all this histrionic exhaustion isn’t a way of covering up the fact that most of what we do doesn’t matter.
~ The Busy Trap -
All glory comes from daring to begin.
