Alasdair Watson – Page 75 – Unreliable information since 1972

Bookmarks for October 25, 2010

The Most Popular Phone in the World
This is the sort of thing that it's useful to keep in mind as perspective, when considering technology. "90% of the phone for 20% of the price" is something that could be applied to all sorts of different sorts of development work. (Especially since is it my experience that the first 90% of any project, the rough functionality type work is indeed, less that half the work/cost.)

Tags: design, technology, development, mobile

Mike Heffernan – Ghosts of the London Underground – Unexplained Mysteries
Mostly bookmarking this for myself, although I imagine a few people here might be mildly diverted by it.

Tags: london, underground, research

The Right To The City
"The right to the city is not merely a right of access to what already exists, but a right to change it after our heart’s desire.”

Tags: cities
China Mieville: Letter to a Progressive Liberal Democract
I wish I had his way with words.

Tags: politics, writing, uk, cuts
apiphile: If it helps, try to imagine I am less of an annoying git and more of a conduit for wisdom
Del, on writing with clarity and purpose. I would like to forcefeed this to oh, really, everyone. Including myself.

Tags: writing, friends

First they came for the quangos…
I imagine this one will be doing the rounds today.

Tags: funny, uk, cuts
Kupenga Kwa Hamlet at Oval House Theatre 16th November to 4th December
I am told that this is "An exhilarating re-telling of the classic story of betrayal and vengeance, told by two outstanding, award-winning Zimbabwean performers using music, dance and a fusion of traditional African storytelling with contemporary Township Theatre practice. Fast, powerful, moving and unlike any other Shakespeare you have ever seen." I'm planning on going. Anyone else?

Tags: theatre
Osborne will escape public wrath if Labour lets him win the blame game | Jonathan Freedland | Comment is free | The Guardian
Good piece on the importance of the blame game in today's cuts. Remember: it is not Labour who is responsible for these cuts. If you are disposed to blame someone other than the current government, I suggest you blame the bankers. And if you are disposed to suggest that they should have been more heavily regulated, then, well, I agree with you. And I suggest you ask yourself how the Conservative party of the time argued they should have been regulated. (Hint: it was not more heavily.)

Tags: politics, uk, cuts
london futures | images that bring ideas to life and frame the climate change debate in a way that everyone can understand
Will have to try and get to the Museum of London to see this.

Tags: design, photography, london, environment

Surviving the Future: Jamais Cascio excerpts on Vimeo
Mr Cascio being clever, as per. Wouldn't mind seeing the whole documentary if the opportunity were to arise, but these bits from Jamais are worth the price of admission on their own.

Tags: future, planning, empathy
Noteshelf for iPad on the iTunes App Store
If and when I get round to buying an stylus for the ipad, I could see this getting a lot of use, mostly at work. (I've tried handwriting without a pen, just using a fingertip, but it's a but rubbish.)
Facebook in Online Privacy Breach; Applications Transmitting Identifying Information – WSJ.com
By this point, there really isn't a lot of point in saying anything. I'm just y'know, sighing and rolling my eyes.

Tags: facebook, privacy, news

Things I Don’t Have to Think About Today « Whatever
By way of some slight recompense for the discussions of the last few days, I offer this commentary by much better writer than I.

Tags: culture, privilege

BBC News – Spending Review: Universities 'to face £4.2bn cut'
This *has* be delibarately leaking of a massively inflated figure, so as to make the real figure seem much more palatable when it eventually comes out. It just has to. The alternative is simply unthinkable.

Tags: politics, education, cuts

the creative internet (106 things)
Possibly the single biggest and most interesting time-suck I've seen on the internet to date. I've run across a lot of these things before, individually, and the ones I know are very awesome, which makes me think the rest of them will be too. One to sit down with when you've got time to spare, and want to be blow away by the artistic cleverness of others.

Tags: design, creativity, art, inspiration
Gay Sex vs. Straight Sex « OkTrends
I adore OKTrends (OKCupid's stats analysis blog) out all measure. Especially when they prove bigots wrong with y'know, actual facts.

Tags: statistics, gender, sexuality
Locals and Tourists – a set on Flickr
Photography heatmaps for various cities – things tourist take photos of compared to locals. Fascinating stuff.

Tags: visualization, cities, photography, flickr, tourism

Amazon Introduces The Digital Pamphlet With ‘Kindle Singles’
Ooh, now this is very interesting indeed. I could probably assemble 10,000 words on any one specific subject quite easily. They might even be entertaining enough to be worth buying.

Tags: publishing, ebooks
Pass The Parcel by Delilah Des Anges
Del has made her frankly excellent book, Pass The Parcel, available for purchase, for which you should all be very grateful. Del is a writer of no small talent, and deserves your cash, so you should fork it over at your earliest convenience. In exchange, you're going to get a novel containing Weird London and collection of freaks, losers and bastards with will have you clamouring for more. Go.

Tags: writing, london

Soylent is people! Word processor plugin crowdsources your editing | Blog | Futurismic
Add some reputation metrics on top of this "accept edits by X" "only allow people with a rating of X or more to edit" that sort fo thing, and some anti-idiot tools "remove all edits by X", and er, yeah. The grunt work part of professional copy editing is going to go the way of the dodo. (The curatorial and advisory role, on the other hand, becomes more and more important…)

Tags: writing, crowdsourcing