(^_^)

So Apple put out some news about Snow Leopard today. I was surprised to find that, rather than the usual barrage of flashy new features on a new OS X release, the Snow Leopard page highlights a rather subdued but loaded categories of improvement:

Better. Faster. Easier.
Next-generation technologies.
More accessible than ever.
Exchange support.

As I glanced through this list and the short explanations afforded to each on the Snow Leopard front page my first thought was “O.K. but will people pay over a $100 for this?,” which was based on the invalid assumption that the pricing would remain consistent with previous releases. I was pleased to find out that Snow Leopard will be available with an upgrade price of $29, a very reasonable price indeed. Perhaps they were merely trying to undercut Microsoft, which apparently will make an upgrade from Windows Vista Premium to Windows 7 available for $50, or perhaps the influence went both ways.

It appears that Apple and Microsoft are focusing their coming releases on on building on the foundation of the existing software, rather than introducing a slew of new features. Apple purports, for example, that many tasks done in Snow Leopard will be faster and more responsive than in Leopard based on a number of refinements, core technology improvements, and rewrites. Refined, not reinvented, they say. Snow Leopard also features a smaller footprint of up to half of the space used by Leopard for equivalent functionality, though I have not found any details to indicate how much savings an average user might see. I’m particularly elated when I see Apple putting a major effort into such topics such as significantly reducing the wake-up and network connect times, and improving the services menu by making it contextual.

As I look through the improvements, I feel as if Mac OS X has gotten an affordable spring cleaning. There are still a lot of items on my honey-do list for Apple, but I’ll take what I can get! By focusing inward on Mac OS X, I think Apple has done a great service to itself, it’s users, and the future of the operating system. Will I buy an upgrade? Maybe..

Checkout more Snow Leopard improvements in the usual spot: http://www.apple.com/macosx/

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Grab a snickers...

Fri, 05 Jun 2009 08:01:03 -0700

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That paradigm shift? Yeah, it's coming

Wed, 03 Jun 2009 18:01:11 -0700

Recently I wrote Why Email Clients Need to Change which was a commentary on a post by the same name on gigaom. The gist of the post is that we are on the verge of a paradigm shift in personal information management, driven by the explosion of user generated content about which we care (ours and others). Managing all this information with our current application technology is untenable. Email clients, blogs, twitter, and so on, in their current form, won’t cut it. As ever more of our life is brought into the digital world, we will have better ways to deal with and organize this information.

As an example of the general problem, consider a well known problems with email. Email works well with linear conversations, but generally falls down when it comes to handling more realistic conversations, which tend to branch. For example, there is no good way to reply to just a specific part of a long email. We’ve made up conventions to do this which work well for short-lived threads, but these conventions quickly become a problem in long-lived threads where an email can be turned into incomprehensible alphabet soup (especially for those who are included in the conversation late in its life).

Also, consider an application which has recently had a lot of attention on the Internet: collaborative editing. Despite the upturn of good online collaborative editors, this is an application which is largely untapped by general users. I believe there are three major reasons why this is so. First, it simply has not yet become well known that this technology is readily available to us now (i.e. it has not crossed the gap). Second, the reason it has not crossed the gap is that the technology has not yet propagated to the most heavily used authoring applications, such as popular desktop word processors (and email clients. Confused about why you might want to collaborate on an email? read on). Finally, we’ve grown accustomed to working without the ability to collaborate at this level (i.e. simultaneously) for so long that the potential of collaboration is not yet realized by most users. Integration of online collaboration into a major application with a large audience is what is needed to bring it to the next stage (of course).

Google Wave looks like it may make a very large dent in these two areas, and many more. Rather than try to describe it, please take a look at the demo video from Google I/O where Google Wave was introduced a few days ago:

The video is a bit long, but until a more condensed version comes out this is the best we’ve got. I’ll be commenting a lot more on Google Wave in as time goes on, including some notes on how it solves various communication problems, but for now just watch and enjoy :)

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California Cities on Google Squared

Wed, 03 Jun 2009 16:52:46 -0700

Apparently the ‘height’ of San Diego is 5’8.. never knew.. XD

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Your email address & Posterous

Tue, 19 May 2009 12:41:27 -0700

Over the past few weeks I’ve seen an increase in the amount of spam to one of my email addresses, perhaps as much as three times the average from a month ago. It’s usually not possible to tell the exact cause of an increase in spam: unless you judiciously track and sparingly use an address, there is always the possibility that it’s arrival on spam lists was simply delayed or through an avenue you had not even considered. Nevertheless, I decided to try to search for the address in Google to see if I could find some clue, and I just may have found one.

Searching for the email address exactly as one would type it into the to: field of an email returns 6 results, four of which are within this blog. This alone is not conclusive, however, as my email address is a combination of my first name and the nickname under which this blog is currently subtitled and thus the email may simply have been tokenized and the keywords still matched (my name is in the link to my profile and the nickname is on the header of the blog).

So I searched again, this time replacing the ‘@’ and ‘.’ in the email address with spaces (i.e. self-tokenizing). This search turned up 76 results, 12 times as many as the results for the untokenized email address. I did the same thing for a different email address I’ve also used with Posterous and had similar results: searching for the email address itself returned a few results, one of which is on Posterous, while tokenizing the email address returned orders of magnitude more.

My concern is that spammers may discover a way to exploit these results to extract valid email addresses for spam lists. At first this may seem like an unlikely or perhaps unproductive attack, considering the number of possible email addresses vs. the number of Posterous users. Consider, however, that not many people have email addresses like k9OJ40az.39gj@poq1z1a.com, and thus just as in password cracking spammers can use a so-called dictionary attack (starting with the most likely words and working towards the less likely possibilities) to increase the yield by reducing the number of possibilities. As the number of Posterous users increase (and the number of other services that are vulnerable to this increase), so to does the returns. Furthermore, the harvest can be had simply by conducting a Google search, and would be difficult to detect at best when conducted via a botnet.

Is this a valid concern? Can anyone shed some light on the reason why the more specific, untokenized search for my email address returns less results than the tokenized version, and the likelihood of this being exploited?

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Respect the comment

Mon, 18 May 2009 09:49:51 -0700

Forgive me my ignorance if there is already a way to do this.

From Posterous (and most other blog platforms), I find one thing conspicuously missing: love of the comment. Posterous leverages the power of rich formatting in email clients, which has been under development for far longer than the rich editing tools of blogging platforms, to make posting both easy and powerful, but does not extend this same utility to commenting. Indeed, commenting seems to have no rich formatting tools at all (not verified). Posterous has introduced the ability to reply to a comment on your own blog via email (Introducing commenting via email), I want this taken a step further to allow other (logged-in) users to comment via email too!

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The People Vs. The Companies

Thu, 14 May 2009 10:14:01 -0700

I find it so odd and frustrating, this friction between ‘for the good of consumers’ and ‘for the good of companies’ in our society and economic system. That is to say that, often what is ‘good’ for the people is not good for enterprise, and vice versa, what is good for enterprise is often not good for the consumers they serve. Wouldn’t it be splendid if corporations generally tried to do what is good for themselves, except where it is not good for consumers? After all, are corporations not made up of people themselves? Why must corporate owners go to such lengths to further their own profits with little or no regard to the people that make the enterprise possible in the first place?!

Take as an example the measures that credit card companies take to ensure that consumers use credit cards for purchases so they can benefit from the fees merchants pay to make those purchases possible (which amounted to more than 42 billion dollars in 2007). Of course credit card companies want to keep this revenue, and at the time when the network was being rolled out it made a lot of sense to charge fees for the novel service. Unfortunately these fees are inevitibably passed on to consumers, even those who choose not to use a credit card, by spreading the fees out over the cost of the products.

This is not a ‘natural market dynamic;’ the situation is being artificially maintained by credit card companies who dictate the rules merchants must follow in the credit card processing contract, to ensure that consumers remain uneducated and merchants have little choice. For example, as I understand it merchant contracts usually state that if a merchant wishes to give discounts to customers paying in cash, they must post both prices and the credit card price must be more prominent than the cash price.

Credit card companies argue that this prevents ‘bait-and’switch’ tactics by merchants, where higher prices are charged at the register, but I don’t completely buy it. First, the cost of processing credit card transactions has continually dropped, yet processing fees have remained constant. If the credit card companies were really concerned about merchants defrauding consumers, I think they would reduce the processing fees to alleviate pressure to use a split price system. Second, why does the credit card price have to be more prominent, could they not be of equal prominence? If the system is well understood (i.e. has been around for a while), then consumers will generally be aware of surchargs related to credit card processing fees. Furthermore, since consumers would become aware of the fee and view it from the perspective of a surcharge, credit card processers would be forced stop price fixing in order to be competivive.

Most importantly, perhaps, is that the system being imposed by the credit card companies benefits them another way which is very damaging to consumers. The fact that merchants are generally forced to charge the same price even though cash and debit transactions actually cost less artificially encourages credit card use. This system is propping up the credit card debt problem in the United States, where 40% of households spend more than they earn (Credit Card Debt Statitsics, hoffmanbrinker.com) and the median family credit card debt is $3,000 (Survey of Consumer Finances 2007, The Federal Reserve Board (pdf)). If this processing monopoly were broken up, I think it could possibly have an effect on reducing credit card debt overall, since consumers would have additional motivation to actively avoid using credit cards unless really necessary.

Fortunately there is legislation in the works attempting to “lift constraints that Visa, MasterCard and other credit card networks impose on merchants’ ability to offer discounts for paying by cash or check” and “ban retaliation against retailers who charge less for transactions that don’t involve credit cards.” However, those who stand to “lose revenue if consumers cut card use are pushing back,” and “[h]eavy pressure from banks could force lawmakers to shelve the measure… to avoid sinking the broader bill.” (Paying with Cash Could Soon Pay Off, The Wall Street Journal).

Naturally… Which brings me back to the original point: wouldn’t it be nice if the companies could/would recognize the best way to benefit consumers, and push pro-consumer innovation themselves? Why must we always see this as a pro-conumser or pro-business choice? Why must it always be a fight? Why must corporations be prodded into making pro-consumer choices? I’m well aware of the fiduciary duty that corporate officers and employees owe to the shareholders, but what about the moral obligations that corporations owe to society?

I think it’s time for corporations to wake up and rethink their strategy, but alas the slumbering giants move slowly. Nature will take it’s course, however, and somehow I feel that slow moving corporations will lose advantage quicker than ever before if they fail to adapt. I for one contually strive to base my decisions and place my trust in companies based on their behavior in this regard.

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Get in the back of the van - Swede Mason

Wed, 29 Apr 2009 14:03:07 -0700

via youtube.com

….

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edushi.com maps of China cities (broken images fix)

Wed, 29 Apr 2009 12:29:34 -0700

Check out these maps of cities in China at edushi.com, they’re exquisite! Visit the site and click on a city name to explore.

The amount of detail is amazing, especially considering the number of cities for which they have created these 3D maps.

If you zoom the map out, and zoom your browser out, you can get an ultra wide view.

Some maps also have animations, such as the fireworks shown here:

I wonder why all the roofs are blue?

Wow!

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Gmail fail

Wed, 29 Apr 2009 12:20:35 -0700

This time it was Gmail that failed. At first I thought it was Posterous, but when I look at the mail I sent to Posterous, the same images are missing. I’ve used inline images in Gmail before without a hitch, but perhaps it was just overloaded this time.. Let me try that post one more time.

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edushi.com maps of China cities

Wed, 29 Apr 2009 11:28:27 -0700

Check out these maps of cities in China at edushi.com, they’re exquisite! Visit the site and click on a city name to explore.

The amount of detail is amazing, especially considering the number of cities for which they have created these 3D maps.

If you zoom the map out, and zoom your browser out, you can get an ultra wide view.

Some maps also have animations, such as the fireworks shown here:

I wonder why all the roofs are blue?

Wow!

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Untitled

Sun, 26 Apr 2009 10:54:34 -0700

I’ve been using Posterous for about a week now (be sure to check out my other Posterous at http://compusthetics.com too!). Take a look at the post list for byteplight.com. Where on earth do these page view numbers come from?? They don’t line up with the Analytics numbers by orders of magnitude. My first guess was that the numbers had something to do with the nesting problem noted in the earlier post That was strange (ad infinitum nesting), but why then does the post Why Email Clients Need to Change not experience similar numbers?

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The aesthetic beauty and simplicity of "archive"

Sat, 25 Apr 2009 22:32:43 -0700

Welcome to compusthetics.com, a celebration of that in the world (in particular the world of technology) which is aesthetically beautiful. Occasionally we’ll discuss grand schemes, breakthroughs, paradigm shifts, and unsurpassed elegance in computing. Other times we’ll break out the microscope and focus on seemingly inconsequential details which nonetheless have a greater impact on our daily lives than we probably ever noticed. Today I’d like to share my thoughts on one of those small details that’s undoubtably familiar to the majority of potential readers, but nonetheless deserves a special mention. That thing is, the archive button.

I’ve been using Gmail full time since January of 2006, and as of this writing I have approximately 8,000 archived in my personal Gmail account which total about 700 MB, or roughly 9% of capacity. While Gmail has many noteworthy features, such as labels (which I greatly prefer to folders but ironically I don’t find myself using since search is generally sufficient), and ever increasing free storage (which has roughly paralleled my own consumption, keeping my usage nearly level around 7-10%), the archive button and integrated search are undoubtably among the most important in my opinion. The tag line is simple: never have to delete again.

It’s so simple, it’s ingenious! If there is one thing I’ve learned in the last few years it’s that many spend more time organizing than they stand to gain from that same activity.

I used to spend precious time filing important little papers in a nice little file cabinet, with nicely labeled little files, where I put my nicely sorted little stacks of paper. Why?! One day better sense got the best of me (thanks to a friend), and it hit me like a freight train.

Here I was, with limited time on this Earth, wasting away my valuable time filing documents that I would more than likely never look at again! Even the handful of documents that I might ever look at again would only be looked at once or twice. Am I a cog, or what?! To make matters worse, file systems make us draw lines, and when we draw lines, things get lost. I don’t care who or how careful you are, or how you draw your lines, not everything fits nicely into a single bucket, and things get lost.

Since my epiphany I’ve adopted a very simple two pile filing system: one pile for things needing action, the other for those that don’t (or already have had action). The former is on my desk, the latter in a box. Everything, and I mean everything goes into the box at some point, and there is a new box for every year. For me, a 3-4” high box does nicely to fit all the paper baggage I generate in a year. If I ever need to find a document, I always know where to look: in the box! My system has been working well for about three years now and I’ve only ever needed to look through the boxes a handful of times (taking maybe 5-10 minutes each time), and I always find what I need because I consistently use them for everything!

This is essentially the Gmail archive and search features. Of course other email clients support this workflow too by creating a folder designated as the archive, but the problem with this approach is the sheer tedium of it! A button is much better: no dragging; just a single, simple, pain free click and you’re worry free. Your email is always there, awaiting your beck and call should you ever need it again. A few moments of though will surely allow one to come up with a way to find any email using the ultra-powerful and ultra-quick integrated search.

In order for this to work, I believe you must never delete! Deleting is the same as drawing a line—what to and what not to delete—and then were back to the same old file system. You’ll find yourself wanting to fudge that line, to delete something that you’re pretty sure you’ll never need, or keep something around that you would normally delete but this one seems more useful somehow. Later you will need to find something, but you just can’t seem to locate it. And you’ll wonder, did I delete it? Don’t let this be you! This life is complicated and you have enough decisions to make every day, why would you force yourself to make another decision when the answer is so obviously in front of you? I still find it ludicrous when I see people deleting emails in Gmail. Life can be simpler.

While everyone else was trying to build the bigger, better, more feature rich email client, Gmail stealthily gave me everything I needed in the simplest possible way. Sure you may find some feature lacking, sure you may prefer to stay stuck in your old folder paradigm, but listen carefully: you are probably working harder than you need to, and constraints make you a better person. Deal with it. Simplicity is one of the, if not the key metric for aesthetics in software design (and many other types of design too). If you seek simplicity, you will not only become a more efficient user, you’ll become a happier one too.

So kudos to the Gmail team for pioneering a system of utter simplicity yet power. I owe you a debt of gratitude for challenging convention and advancing the state of the art.

I’ll be revisiting Gmail, and many other applications like it, in the context of simplicity, personal information management, and more. For many years now I have been walking a path which has focused me to ever great extent on simplicity, beauty, and aesthetics, and which brings me ever closer to an understanding of exactly what these ‘words’ mean. I’m not exactly sure what this blog will be yet, for this extension of my journey is just beginning, but I do hope to share, with any of you willing to listen, the tales of my most important discoveries, as inconsequential as they may be. If you find something interesting, please do continue the conversation! I would like to learn from the world and I feel like this is my outlet to do it.

Thanks for tuning in and see you all again soon!

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Why Email Clients Need to Change

Sat, 25 Apr 2009 07:55:14 -0700

Today, I have to visit dozens of other sites and services to make sense of my online life. This is a waste: I already have a record of all these transactions in my inbox. I just need a better way to look at them.

via gigaom.com

I agree with what’s being said here, and I feel that we are close to a paradigm shift in the way we create and use an online ‘information inbox.’ Consider the myriad programs available to play or help organize this role:

Email clients
Contact management
Social networking sites (think Facebook news feed)
Social networking aggregators (e.g. friendfeed.com)
Information managers (e.g. Evernote)
Bookmark managers
Todo/productivity applications
Many, many more

Some of the tools mentioned are, in essence, an information inbox, and indeed these tools often can be configured to duplicate records by sending them to an email inbox. Others are a like a information sentbox by aggregating all of your content and allowing you to share your sent box with others. Finally, the others generally function like information archives, a place to store information that you’ve encountered and may want to reference later.

The problem with this myriad applications is, of course, that they are myriad. Information does not easily flow from one application to the next, and even if it does it’s often only in a ‘dumb’ way. The good news is that the explosion of personally generated content and content generated by others about which we care is stimulating an equally vast number of attempts to organize this information and tools meant to help information flow ‘smartly’ between applications. This explosion is what’s driving the paradigm shift I so eagerly await.

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