A comparison of a twenty year old computer with a recent one. And it does support what I felt all along. But this is only half of the story: Computers became what they are because we wanted them that way. People kept buying more Mhz, and decided for the OS with more features. But while what’s called a ‘PC’ ballooned in it’s technical specs there was maybe a gap left below that nobody seems to care about. What about a machine that does web browsing, text editing and digital photo management really well. I would argue that the hardware would cost not more than 100 to 150 US$. Getting the apps right and the OS out of the way is a little bit harder. But it’s possible. “One-Upping” this imaginary concept by one notch and it seems even to be more attractive: Don’t sell the machine. give it to people that sign up for an internet connection with you. Lot’s of ISPs want to get more clients, but are unable themselves to get such a concept working. Really working means to make it work like the iPod worked. The machines are cheap, people would sign up to have them technically monitored remotely. Lot’s of things can be done. There are ample possibilities from here: Sell people computers that are locked down so that their kids can use them. Sell people media access, like music or videos, if that should be a market. This might be the right personal computer for real life persons. The other stuff didn’t really work for many people.
Category: history
yikes,
Supposedly USA Today printed
this
Inlcuding a sentence like:
That amount is equal to $516,348 for every U.S. household. By comparison, U.S. households owe an average of $112,043 for mortgages, car loans, credit cards and all other debt combined.
Microsoft presents a new‘product’. Probably as much of a product as that data watch from them. Of course it has been there before: the mulitouch interface then there seems to be elements reminiscent of this
User interfaces are an interesting topic. Not much has happened since God (or was it Xerox or maybe even Apple?) gave us the mouse.
It will be decades before Microsoft can start copying really innovative work like this study by C. Woebken
Looking at this is list of things that get into the way of objective assertion it feels surprising how we managed to get to skyscrapers and novocaine after all. Actually that list would be really worth looking at, one by one and day by day. But of course there are not only cognitive biases but also much more mundane hassles preventing efficiency: Like forgetting things. Of coure I found this list on BlogsNow. Amazing that I could live for 90 days without it.
If you ever should grow tired of movies as a concept then this might bring you back within a couple of minutes:
images of fast food: ads vs.reality
I would not be surprised if you would ask people what they just ate and showed them both pictures they would pick the one from the advertisement. Not the one from reality. The romans left their vast cities for centuries to people that had no clue how you could make such things. The Colosseum was actually a housing complex for most of the 2000 years it existed. Our civilisation will leave billions of silver discs with all sorts of ‘realities’. Like movies, TV shows and games. People might not be able to make new ones, but they sure will inhabit our cultural spaces. Fake or not: we don’t care today. We eat the burger from the billboard rather than the one in our mouth. Why should people care more in 200 years when realities might have deterioated even more.
Want fries with that?
Interestingly enough rocketboom seems still to be sourcing vilodex.
The Lester Bookbinder Reel seems to be a vilodex exclusive right now. While googling around for other works of his I came accross these two videos. One is by him,
the other one: I don’t know.
A friend send me a link to this blog
I like it allot. I like that this is a concept that uses what exists and makes something unprecedented out of it. A digital SLR, a blog, a person with a sense for fashion. Add to that the world around and you have something that is truly inspiring. I like the absence of cynical comment in those pictures. At least that’s how I read them. People are depicted as an inspiration. Not in the Borat kind of way. It’s the other end of the scale actually. Same World. Same everyday people. It made me very happy to learn about this link and project. Now I have to surpress the urge to replace the 10d with a 5d and start twexus-2. Which would be shot on raw, stored on drives and printed on the 24″ wide hp.
Nigel Dick wrote in 2004 about Music Videos. It’s an interesting read. He does write in the present tense. Although it feels very much that he describes the scene of the 80s and 90s.
Intel showing us some bad sci-fi:
The problem with bad sci-fi is the same problem that most bad things have: Lack of originality, inspiration and flawless execution. A year ago Intel, Microsoft and Samsung got very excited about UMPC. While the rest of world simple uttered ‘umpc!’ So it didn’t go anywhere. Nor will it ever. Intels new ultra mobile vision is as inspiring as Ariel