By spring quarter of 2010, seven months into the study, less than 40 percent of the students were regularly doing their academic reading on the Kindle DX. Reasons included the device’s lack of support for taking notes and difficulty in looking up references. (Amazon Corp., which makes the Kindle DX, has since improved some of these features.)

Post from: Tom Satwicz

Kindle DX needs some work for educational use

A CHI 2011 paper.

We see a number of potential links between the creativecontributions prevalent in crowdsourcing and the processes,interactions, and results of generative techniques used indesign. These similarities provide promising opportunitiesfor involving the contributions of many people at amarginal cost to generate rich information about users andtheir contexts.

Lots more here.

Post from: Tom Satwicz

Crowdsourcing as a tool for HCI research

The story behind the logo.

The most successful effort to “brand” the state of New York came during the final moments of the state’s fiscal crisis in the 1970′s. Crime was rampant and, then as now, the state’s coffers were empty. Businesses (and their employees) were leaving in droves. Fear permeated perceptions of the state, and tourism was suffering. New York had lost much of its glamorous allure, and the state of New York turned to Madison Avenue for help. The state commissioned the ad agency Well, Rich and Greene and graphic artist Milton Glaser to develop a campaign, and the I [heart] NY slogan was born. Its goal: to promote tourism.

Post from: Tom Satwicz

I ♥ NY story

And the number of recreational colonoscopies performed is actually very low.

-Shadowfax

Via.

Post from: Tom Satwicz

Quote of the day

John Gruber had some nice things to say about Tweetbot so I thought I’d give it a spin. $1.99 later and I’ve discovered that it doesn’t work on my iPhone 3g (os 4.2.1). Instant crash.

I assume that the issue is my old phone, which I guess is fine. The problem is that it’s really not that old. I’m fine not having access to apps designed for newer phones, but why would the system let me download it if it wasn’t going to work?

There is something about the abandonment of legacy gadgets that reminds me of how cellular carriers treat people. What else am I going to do but get a new phone?

[update] Looks like a fix is on the way.

Post from: Tom Satwicz

Tweetbot Crashing

This could be one of the more interesting technology adoption stories going forward.

It’s not just that the brightest at Microsoft or Nokia or Google can’t make an upgrade stick. It’s that the upgrade is not universally beneficial to the value chain. To remedy this, licensors have to resort to contractual obligations to ensure upgrades, but enforcement is non-trivial and can lead to aggravated relationships.

Unless all licensees of a platform find compelling value in shouldering the burden of upgrades, they will continue to be really hard.

 

Post from: Tom Satwicz

Failure to upgrade

NY Times:

“Kids used to learn football in the playground, but now they learn the game more by the video game,” Madden said. “Strategy is probably a bigger part. But also as graphics get better, we can be better about showing proper tackling techniques. And to show that concussions are really serious: if we show players playing through them, then kids won’t understand.

Post from: Tom Satwicz

Madden gets real about learning and video games

Hidden inside Mad Men’s new contract is a stipulation that an extra two minutes of each show may appear only online.

Mr. Weiner said Thursday … that he would produce 47-minute versions of each episode that could be viewed online, even if AMC broadcasted versions that were two minutes shorter.

Assuming they are aired/posted within the same time period, why watch the broadcast version if the online version is what show’s creator had intended?

Yglesias has other thoughts on the announcement.

Post from: Tom Satwicz

Will Mad Men incentivise online viewing?

Not even Android.

Via.

Post from: Tom Satwicz

Nothing is free

Tech support via email:

There isn’t a lot we can do since this isn’t a system-wide thing.

Yeah right.

Post from: Tom Satwicz

Quote of the day