I love finding new websites, especially sites that provide even more fantastic links to rampantly further my internet browsing on a quiet Saturday afternoon. I’ll follow John’s example, since my birthday’s tomorrow; Argument #26:
ARGUMENT FROM INCOMPREHENSIBILITY
(1) Flabble glurk zoom boink blubba snurgleschnortz ping!
(2) No one has ever refuted (1).
(3) Therefore, God exists.
Yeah. If you’re not likely to be insulted by atheistic humor, you should check it out.
I was a bit confused if the WordPress dev blog was playing an April Fool’s joke with their announcement of “Wordpattern”. Having read it over, I’m fairly convinced it’s a joke, but should note that I can tend to be unfortunately gullible, at times. In any case, here are some items of humor I came across while researching this “hoax(?)”.
Our groundbreaking, no-nonsense approach of creating a fast and lean CMSMS (CMS management system) is unparalleled and will fulfill the need of every user out there – we won’t be content with anything less.
A “Content Management Software Management System”? Awesome.
The Wordpattern features page has some choice tidbits:
4 Minute Install
The latest InstallMark™ benchmarks clock the WordPattern install process in at 3:47 – that’s a 25% improvement over WordPress 2.0, and a whopping 41% faster than Textpattern.
Gidgets
Like widgets, only cuter.
I think this marks the first time a web application benchmarked its install speed. I also like BJAX, Web2.1 (beta), and invisible URLs. The roadmap section is not to be missed, detailing Wordpattern’s “5 milestones” (the 5th being World Domination). I like the idea of “Tiger Teams”, as well as the Marketing and Evangelism Team. Also linked from the roadmap is Huhcorp, who they’re evidently working with. Their page is hilarious as well.
Our name will confuse you, but, you have to admit, the logo design is pretty cool. And we’re good at turning regular words into “e-words,” such as “e-consulting,” “e-business” or “e-sexual harassment.”
Our office is really modern and we’ve got nice computers and stuff. If you ever saw it, you’d say “Wow, cool office. These guys are legit.”
Following more links, to Huhcorp’s “ideas” page:
Our female staff members are all hot, so, even if there’s nothing to meet about, we’ll sit and flirt with them, and charge you for the time. When one of our new-age marketing gurus or design experts or consultants has an idea, the rest of us look at him or her with serious expressions and write stuff down on paper.
I’m really temped to quote their entire site, because I find it all completely awesome, but you should just go and check it out for yourself. The coup de grace of this Wordpattern Masquerade is on the legal page, where one finds the following:
The Fine Print
All content, code, images, sounds, smells, ambience and the warm fuzzy feeling you get while basking in our glow are Copyright (Q) 1972-1976 The WordPattern Concern. WordPattern™, the WordPattern Logo™, the letters W™ and P™, the colours white™ and black™, and the non-breaking space™ are registered trademarks. The WordPattern Concern does not represent the accuracy or reliability of the information on these so-called “web pages”, after all you can’t believe anything you read on the internets these days.
Things like this make April Fool’s Day worthwhile. But on a more serious bent, why don’t companies make their “serious” web pages this interesting? Would I want to use a company like Huh? for marketing by looking at their website? Maybe, and maybe not, but they would certainly stand out from the crowd, and that’s never a bad thing. Offering serious and quality information about your product is a good thing, certainly, but it can be oh so dull. I would love to see companies manage to fit factual aspects into entertaining text. I mean, when was the last time you READ through the entirety of a corporation’s site because it was entertaining? Yeah, me neither. If we’re going to start talking about aspects of Web 2.1 (beta), I think a defining feature should be humor.
** Mention of “Wordpattern” dates back awhile, at least to January 2005. It appears the original coinage of “Wordpattern” (and Textpress) belong to Jina Bolton, though her post is lost to everything but Google’s cached pages. Her post was in response to this post on Joshuaink. Here’s Google’s cached version (2nd post down) if you’d like to read it. There, I’ve done my snooping for the day.
Device warns you if you’re boring or irritating.
The “emotional social intelligence prosthetic” device, which El Kaliouby is constructing along with MIT colleagues Rosalind Picard and Alea Teeters, consists of a camera small enough to be pinned to the side of a pair of glasses, connected to a hand-held computer running image recognition software plus software that can read the emotions these images show. If the wearer seems to be failing to engage his or her listener, the software makes the hand-held computer vibrate.
I’m curious what you’re supposed to do AFTER the device has told you that you’re boring your listener to death. Start juggling? Make weird noises? Sadistically continue, ignoring the vibrating device, eager to find out just how tolerant some people can be? Obviously this is not a tool that should fall into my hands, but seriously, they should consider programming some social cues into the hardware to offer alternatives to a conversation about “How I organized my sock drawer this morning by color, and how tomorrow I will do it by style”.
Gada.be is a handy alternative for anyone looking for a new way to search, or anyone tired of search engines with ulterior (commercial) motives. One neat aspect is that you can search straight from your url bar by typing in your search terms seperated by dashes and followed by .gada.be. For instance, entering in http://sexy-librarian.gada.be will search for posts containing both the words “sexy” and “librarian”. Use dots instead of dashes to perform a phrase search.
The Net’s New Age. Business Week has an interesting if fairly general article on some of the big “Web 2.0″ products in the works from the major companies.
The implications reach far beyond the Net. The new Web is changing the business model for media and communications companies. Traditional players in these markets have built their businesses on a foundation of brand and content, forming a customer base and marketplace. In the Web 2.0 era, they’ll aim to cultivate a community of users on the Web, according to Troy Young, executive vice-president and chief “experience architect” at Organic, an online advertising and consulting firm.
Personally, I’m going to get annoyed if every single website I go to wants me to be part of its “community”, interact with it on a personal basis, and create a profile so it can pander to my tastes. Having the content and tools is great, certainly, so long as function maintains dominance over form, and pages don’t get interactive when they don’t need to be.
43 Things is social networking in a self-help sort of way. You create a list of 43 things you’d like to accomplish. Simple enough. The neat part is the tagcloud of goals on the front page, allowing you to see the aspirations of people worldwide. If you’re feeling helpful, you can find someone who has a goal that you’ve successfully accomplished, and offer them advice. If you like the concept, check out some of the other things the folks at The Robot Co-op are up to.
Catching up on some remaindered art links before I start getting into new stuff, hopefully next week.
Lines and Colors generally mentions some very worthwhile artists. I was particularly taken with their post about Ree Treweek, an artist whose work reminds me a bit of Brian Froud. Ree is a South African artist, though her style shows influences from all over.
Ree (pen name for Cherie) Treweek is a South African artist and illustrator. Her fascinatingly detailed illustrations and drawings usually start as an ink drawing that she brings into Photoshop to be fully developed, occasionally in collaboration with Jannes Hendrikz.
The images look anything but digital and modern, however. They seem to be from another era; or even from another, perhaps mythical, culture.
And here is another Lines and Colors post, this time on Jamie Hewlett.
English comics artist Jamie Hewlett made a name for himself as the co-creator of the early 90’s irreverent, over-the-top, punk-camp comic series Tank Girl, (which was made into an unbearably campy movie in 1995).
In 1998, Hewlett teamed up with former flat-mate Damon Albarn of the british band Blur to create Gorillaz, a virtual “zombie hip-hop” band in which the band members exist only as cartoon characters drawn by Hewlett. Gorillaz has gone on to be by far the most successful virtual band ever, selling millions of records.
Mecca Cola is a fairly old story, but I only first heard of it the other day. I love their slogan. Quite the statement. My opinion is that if you want to fight against consumerism, don’t drink unhealthy and overpriced beverages. But that’s just me.
Demand for bottles of Mecca Cola – which bear the slogan “No more drinking stupid, drink with commitment” – is already soaring.
Perhaps they should rename the company: Earnest and Julio Gauloise. Sure, we all laugh when we think of wine in a box. We’ve all (ALL) tried it though. Some of the more unfortunate of us may have even sampled some Rossi from a giant bottle made specifically to get you inebriated at bottom dollar. French Rabbit is different. With a tagline such as, “Savour the wine. Save the planet.” how can you possibly resist trying it? Ignore the annoying Flash page and go save the planet, one blackout at a time. We all have to do our part, right?
Tamea doesn’t update her blog very often. Not nearly often enough, really. But when she does, her posts are always very worthwhile.
Why you should fall to your knees and worship a librarian.
Librarians have degrees. They go to graduate school for Information Science and become masters of data systems and human/computer interaction. Librarians can catalog anything from an onion to a dog’s ear. They could catalog you.
While we’re on the “librarians are cool” kick, you should check out Batgirl was a Librarian and Librarians are SEXY. I don’t know if all this stuff really applies to “guybrarians” or not, but my positive self-image would like me to assume that it does.
Quote of the week, from Unshelved.
Return to your chosen profession – providing vital information to anonymous potential terrorists.
I really want to try and add that into my CV somewhere, now.
Freevlog has a great tutorial for setting up your own vlog (video blog). You too can have your antics pasted all over the internet for the world to see! The world trembles with anticipation, I’m sure. Still, it’s a great tutorial and you should check it out.
LJ Talks to Waynn Pearson and Don Buckley of the Cerritos Library. A model of the integration of flash and substance, molded to fit their users’ needs.
Lots of people come to visit. If they can’t match your budget, what can they take away?
DB: Creating a positive experience for the guest not just intellectually but also emotionally. Broadening the definition of what a library can be. “WOW” customer service: staff scanning the horizon, walking around, and finding a way to say “Yes.” What we like to hear is, “You have a beautiful building, but it’s the people who work here who make it really special.”
Google Charm makes its debut. Google’s chief executives offer their candid commentary on their growth, prospects, and the controversial China decision. Of course, they maintain some secrets.
That said, however, no-one is exactly sure what Google really wants to do in the future. Speculation among experts is rife about what the company wants with all that dark fibre – but in the end, your guess is as good as mine.
But that’s fine with Google.
“The mystique works to our advantage,” says Eric Schmidt, shaking our hands as we leave the room half an hour late.
“If you’re not on myspace, you don’t exist.” By now, everyone’s heard of MySpace. So what are some of the secrets behind its success, and what can we take from it? How about ultra-fast release cycles?
Skyler’s comment about how myspace keeps changing and growing organically, almost every day, is a passionate user’s view of what the developer’s call quick release cycles. Where software developers are typically on release cycles of 6 months to a year, the Threadless guys said that even two weeks was a little long. In fact, virtually all of the web 2.0-ish folks at the conference mentioned these quick release cycles as crucial.
National Archive Films on Google Video.
Over 70 years ago, the National Archives was founded to preserve
American historical documents, as well as the moments and events that
could be saved in still photos, films, and audio recordings. Today the
Archives is home to everything from rare historical footage (newsreels
and government documentaries from the 1930s) to the 1969 moon landing.
The NYPL cracks down on internet use, and against the homeless.
“Homeless people depend on free access to internet in libraries to find out about job listings, keep themselves informed and email résumés to potential employers,” said Rogers, who regularly searches craigslist.com for weekend jobs or part-time work.
Baa, Baa, Rainbow Sheep? Some teachers at nursery schools in England may be taking political correctness a bit too far.
“The fact that black is a color appears to be lost on the PC police,” wrote Ian McPhedran in a column in the Advertiser, a newspaper in Adelaide, Australia.
Work is now over and it is time to go dancing tra la la.
I am hoarding links and hiding them in my del.icio.us.
If you look, you might like some of them.
Ta ta!