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Solzhenitsyn on Data Privacy

Posted by mattc at Dec 16, 07 04:23 PM ... Comments (0)

As every man goes through life he fills in a number of forms for the record, each containing a number of questions . .. There are thus hundreds of little threads radiating from every man, millions of threads in all. If these threads were suddenly to become visible, the whole sky would look like a spider's web, and if they materialized as rubber bands, buses; trams and even people would all lose the ability to move, and the wind would be unable to carry torn-up newspapers or autumn leaves along the streets of the city. They are not visible, they are not material, but every man is constantly aware of their existence.... Each man, permanently aware of his own invisible threads, naturally develops a respect for the people who manipulate the threads.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Cancer Ward, 1968.

If I asked you to build White City

Posted by mattc at Dec 13, 07 11:37 AM ... Comments (0)

Clearing out my desk prior to moving up to the 3rd floor. Finding odd bits of paper I've collected over the last 3 years.

Here's a poem taken from a poetry workshop in White City, I think, prior to the BBC building two giant buildings (the Media Center & Broadcast Center) amidst their community in W12. I thought it, albeit unknowingly, chimed well with the user-centred design process :)

If it had been straight
they'd have wanted it curved
If it had been rounded
they'd have longed for awkward angles
If it had been left to them
there might not have been anything...

but maybe that's what
they might have wanted

The author was Christina Gestra, 2006

HTML

Posted by mattc at Aug 9, 07 12:25 PM ... Comments (0)

Trying to fix HTML is like trying to graft arms and legs onto hamburger. There's got to be something better ...

Ted Nelson, attributed on http://xanadu.com.au/ - see also Embedded Markup Considered Harmful (xml.com).

Adaptability = Longevity

Posted by mattc at Jun 24, 07 04:08 PM ... Comments (0)

An interesting conversation from this week's Bottom Line on Radio 4.

On the theme of longevity in design Evan Davis paraphrases one of his guests, Keith Clarke, Chief Executive of the engineering consultancy WS Atkins :-

Clarke: Usually the way you think you will expand is wrong...

Davis: What you are saying [on designing for the future] is it's not about how long you plan for it's about how much flexibility you build in to what you design, and obviously it will last longer if it's more flexible.

Babbage on (badly taken) Criticism

Posted by mattc at May 12, 07 10:14 AM ... Comments (0)

Propose to any Englishman any principal, or any instrument, however admirable, and you will observe that the whole effort of the English mind is directed to find a difficulty, a defect, or an impossibility in it. If you speak to him of a machine for peeling a potato, he will pronounce it impossible: if you peel a potato before his eyes, he will declare it useless, because it will not slice a pineapple.

Charles Babbage, quoted in The Code Book by Simon Singh.

Singh paints Babbage out to be an perennial starter-but-unfinisher of things, which I find quite encouraging.

On YouTube Commenting

Posted by mattc at Mar 29, 07 07:41 AM ... Comments (0)

can we not have ONE SINGLE FUCKING VIDEO WITHOUT PEOPLE HAVING AN ARGUMENT?? the comment section usedta be my fave part of youtube but now people only use it to snipe at each other instead of discussing the clip. i know this post is also not about the video but ive had enough of it!!

longjohncider, YouTube, March 28 2007

On Moving Customers To A New Computer System

Posted by mattc at Jan 18, 07 02:42 PM ... Comments (0)

It's been like changing engines in an airplane midair without any of the passengers noticing.

Steve Mitgang, Senior VP, Yahoo. Quoted in Wired, January 16 2007.

Idler

Posted by mattc at Dec 13, 06 02:59 PM ... Comments (0)

Travailler moins, produire plus. (The less you work, the more you produce)

French paradox, quoted in How to be Idle, by Tom Hodgkinson.

Choices, Choices

Posted by mattc at Nov 26, 06 09:46 PM ... Comments (0)

Putin is not an evil person, or an angel, but a normal human being that manages to do one thing and fails to do another.

Putin aide, Guardian G2.

Not that i'm a Putin apologist, I just thought it was quite an accurate summary of the human condition and an honest explanation of the choices facing a political leader.

Frank Pick

Posted by mattc at Nov 26, 06 09:43 PM ... Comments (0)

The test of the goodness of a thing is its fitness for use. If it fails on this first test, no amount of ornamentation or finish will make it any better; it will only make it more expensive, more foolish.

Frank Pick, Design and Industries Association, 1916

Borges on Classification

Posted by mattc at Nov 26, 06 09:27 PM ... Comments (0)

On those remote pages it is written that animals are divided into (a) those that belong to the Emperor, (b) embalmed ones, (c) those that are trained, (d) suckling pigs, (e) mermaids, (f) fabulous ones, (g) stray dogs, (h) those that are included in this classification, (i) those that tremble as if they were mad, (j) innumerable ones, (k) those drawn with a very fine camel's hair brush, (l) others, (m) those that have just broken a flower vase, (n) those that resemble flies from a distance.

The Analytical Language of John Wilkins, Jorge Luis Borges

Notes from Testing Computer Software

Posted by mattc at Nov 26, 06 06:47 PM ... Comments (0)

Here's my notes from the very useful Testing Computer Software by Cem Kaner.

There's some quite concisely expressed profundities in the early chapters, my two favourites being ...

A great programmer is less likely than a incompetent tester. (chapter 2)

... and ...

The 'quality' of software is fundamentally measured in human terms. Therefore, in testing for bugs we are looking to determine the *degree* of usefulness of the system to the user. (chapter 4)