January 5, 2007

Cabel Sasser introduces the Stupid Subway Sign Prank. "The game here is to pick something funny, but not so funny as to elicit questions." Check out this pitch for Bison Noodle Soup. There's also Sunset Minestrone, Fiesta Queso con Queso, and lots of good suggestions in the comments.

January 5, 2007

Using Enron as the foil for his argument, Malcolm Gladwell writes about mysteries as opposed to puzzles. He's talking about situations where there is no magical missing piece, but instead we often have an overload of information, a tangle that requires finesse and interpretation that isn't necessarily open-and-shut.

In the case of puzzles, we put the offending target, the C.E.O., in jail for twenty-four years and assume that our work is done. Mysteries require that we revisit our list of culprits and be willing to spread the blame a little more broadly. Because if you can’t find the truth in a mystery—even a mystery shrouded in propaganda—it’s not just the fault of the propagandist. It’s your fault as well.

There's a couple related posts in his blog. Gladwell writes about the strange fact that Wall Street insiders--those with motivation to really care ($)--didn't publicize the weirdness around Enron's financial statements. Enter the journalist hero: "Maybe we have underestimated the value of impartial, professionally-motivated, under-paid and overworked generalists in tackling the kind of information-rich, analysis-dependent “mysteries” that the modern world throws at us."

January 4, 2007

K.G. Schneider, the Free Range Librarian: "I hear klaxon horns whenever I hear of a management model that claims it will permanently change the nature of work. This would require permanently changing the nature of people. The reality (or, perhaps, my reality) is that work is an essentially dysfunctional activity. We are not wired at the most fundamental level to put on monkey suits and spend dozens of hours every week united in the common cause of an institution." That's in response to her first hearing the term "Management 2.0". It's already here, folks! Get ready! Whoo!

January 4, 2007

A couple additions to my growing series of links about understanding large-scale concepts. Here's a timeline of evolution from the beginning of Life up to Now. The image of the timeline is 135 feet long, and homo sapiens showed up right at around last pixel. And via infosthetics, a video comparing the planets, the Sun, and a number of other stars. The first five links in my scalar collection were about the scale of the atom, the Earth's population, the stars in the sky, showing 570 million years in 1 hour, and visualizing enormous numbers. Oh, as a bonus there's also the one I linked a while back where you can learn about existing in 10 dimensions.

January 4, 2007

BookSwim is aiming to be the Netflix for literature. You can draw up your list of books and have them mailed to you (for free). When you're done you mail'em back (for free), and they mail the next titles on your list. You just pay a monthly fee and read as much as you desire. I really hope this is wildly successful. It could be really dangerous for me, though, as I've got about 35 books sitting on the shelf in my to-read queue. Last thing I need is to make it easier. Michael Stephens shares some good comments:

"Add this to Starbucks book clubs, wifi, and music sales, iTunes movie downloads and "third place" contenders like the aforementioned Starbucks or Panera Bread and you have a whole bunch of services, physical spaces and web sites competing for what libraries used to have a hold on." Indeed, where will the library fit in? Can't afford to move too slowly. [via tame the web]

January 3, 2007

The Wall Street Journal is shrinking their newspaper. I'm really going to miss those 3 inches. I love giant newspapers like WSJ that make me feel like I'm flipping through billboards. Maybe there's a niche market for people like me who want huge newspapers? I'm thinking 36 inches by 48 inches or so for each page. Something I'd have to spread out on the floor and read like I did when I was a kid.

January 3, 2007

Dave Conrey talks about his circle of name-sharing friends:

We all went by nicknames because there are 2 guys named Chris, 2 guys named Sean and 2 guys named Dave.

I’m sure you can imagine what conversations were like…

“Hey Sean.” “yeah?” “No, the other Sean.” “Oh, yeah?” “Where’s Chris?” “I thought he was outside.” “No, the other Chris.” “He’s hanging out with Dave.” “which one?” “he didn’t say.”

January 3, 2007

The Nonist mulls the next step in blogging and more importantly, in art:

Much of what I’ve learned about blogging, from the standpoint of a creative pursuit, reinforces my perception that the form, which includes as a subset all preconceptions and consumer habits, may be an artistic dead-end.