Chris

Ive Got Some Feedback

Jobs’s taste for merciless criticism was notorious; Ive recalled that, years ago, after seeing colleagues crushed, he protested. Jobs replied, “Why would you be vague?,” arguing that ambiguity was a form of selfishness: “You don’t care about how they feel! You’re being vain, you want them to like you.” Ive was furious, but came to agree. “It’s really demeaning to think that, in this deep desire to be liked, you’ve compromised giving clear, unambiguous feedback,” he said. He lamented that there were “so many anecdotes” about Jobs’s acerbity: “His intention, and motivation, wasn’t to be hurtful.”

This incredibly in-depth piece on Jonny Ive, the Senior Vice President of Design at Apple, reminds me a lot of the lessons and insights learned from Mike Monterio’s book Design is a Job.

To do good design work is to relish in good feedback. Don’t think designers or developers want you to say, “I like it!” when you really don’t. We all need to be honest – brutally and politely so – with one another to make better design.

Silence in Open Source Projects

If you contribute to open source projects, or are the sole creator of an open source project, you need to keep talking about that status of what you’re working on. Never stop.

Silence will deter people. Even if your code is super stable. Even if all features have been added. If I see that the last update on your blog/twitter/etc. was a year ago, I’ll assume the project is not actively maintained. That you’ve moved on. That OS updates and/or browser updates will render upon me issues and bugs that will never be addressed. That I should find something else to use.

In a world where OS updates are yearly and mobile apps are updated without interaction, it’s maddening to see open source projects – good, solid, useful projects – go into a sort of hermit state.

Quicksilver went through a period where it wasn’t actively being developed. Now that it’s seen some love, updates are frequent and communication is constant. I know that it’s a living project and something that is being worked on. I can rely on it and treat it as something that is solid and tactile – not infirm or fragile. A feeling I often felt during the ‘dark times’ where it lacked leadership.

Most recently I’ve seen this with the Sequel Pro application. An application I love and use frequently¹. Sequel Pro hasn’t updated in over a year ². Devs say it’s still active, but aren’t communicating that.

I’m not advocating for point release updates just for the sake of appearance. I’m advocating for putting effort into your communication.

If you’re part of an open source project that is actively being developed – even by just a few contributors – make sure it is kept alive. Make sure new users, and existing users returning to see what’s new, know the status of things. Clearly and plainly. If the project is still active, communicate that. If the project is done and mothballed – let us know that as well.

The result is more people using your thing. More people making it better. That’s worth your time.

Live in the richest, deepest, most productive way you can

When people die, they cannot be replaced. They leave holes that cannot be filled, for it is the fate — the genetic and neural fate — of every human being to be a unique individual, to find his own path, to live his own life, to die his own death.

Oliver Sacks on learning he has terminal cancer from the New York Times.

Tony Hawk on Selling Out

“Remember, you’re not selling out,” Jonah Peretti, a co-founder of the Huffington Post, told Denton. “You’re blowing up. Think in terms of hip-hop, not indie rock.”

(via Devour and Kottke.org)

“My set is my office, because that’s where I work.”

Professional interviewer of current presidents, Hank Green, talks about legitimacy in media.

Walter Cronkite wasn’t representing a political ideology, or even discussing politics when my father watched the news as a teenager. He was discussing the news. Cable news today uses the residual legitimacy of that bygone era (that they are simultaneously destroying) to degrade the legitimacy of their political opponents.

Man, the ‘news’ is really crap isn’t it? I think younger people ³ – with easy access to information covering multiple viewpoints – have a lower tolerance for bullshit and a higher propensity to detecting it.

Hank talks about authenticity and honesty in his essay, elements that traditional news is lacking. That lack of trust is something that news ⁴ once had, but is sorely missing. Younger people are often labeled as cynics when we balk at the junk ‘news’ they’re throwing out. We’re considered disinterested or disconnected when we tell folks we don’t watch the 9 o’clock news. When in reality, we can see through their dishonesty and are insulted.

Will that trust and authenticity come back to traditional media? I say no. I think folks like Hank are the future of news creation. That’s what their audience wants (and expects). Folks with access to more information want honesty and trust in who is telling them the news.

You can watch the interview with the President on YouTube. Hank even shares a few thoughts about the experience on the vlogbrothers channel.