Category: Design

Link List – February 23, 2018

I’m trying to use less social media, but as a voracious reader-and-sharer — the early 21st century equivalent to the hunter-and-gatherer — I now don’t have an easy outlet for sharing interesting things I discover. So, I’m going to start a regular thing here on my site where I collect some recent bookmarks and share them. No commentary, just the headline and a link.

America First | VICE News Tonight’s Special Report On Trump’s First Year In Office (HBO)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtHZVhxQPH8

Black Panther’s Director Is Very Into Stardew Valley Right Now
https://kotaku.com/black-panthers-director-is-very-into-stardew-valley-rig-1823243607

Design’s Lost Generation
https://medium.com/@monteiro/designs-lost-generation-ac7289549017

Homeopathy Explained
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HslUzw35mc

The Things You Should Always Carry With You in Japan
https://lifehacker.com/what-you-should-always-carry-in-japan-1822670049

The File (Dis)connect
http://magnusmanske.de/wordpress/?p=509

What Ever Happened To Brendan Fraser?
https://www.gq.com/story/what-ever-happened-to-brendan-fraser

The Case Against The Jedi
http://popculturedetective.agency/2018/the-case-against-the-jedi

Xbox chief calls for more inclusivity and an end to toxic gamers
https://www.polygon.com/2018/2/21/17037172/xbox-phil-spencer-toxic-gamers-dice-2018-keynote

I’m building my dad a computer. Here is what we put together
https://pcpartpicker.com/list/QPdRsZ

Here are two things about maps on the Internet
https://kottke.org/18/02/mapping-apps-and-how-advertising-subtly-warps-user-experience
https://blog.emacsen.net/blog/2018/02/16/osm-is-in-trouble/

VLC 3.0 is out!
https://www.videolan.org/vlc/releases/3.0.0.html

Ride Review – Kawasaki Z900RS
http://www.returnofthecaferacers.com/2018/02/ride-review-kawasaki-z900rs.html

Here are three games I’ve been playing recently
http://www.celestegame.com
https://xenobladechronicles2.nintendo.com
https://www.guerrilla-games.com/play/horizon

Let me know with a comment or email if you find any of it interesting. It’s like a newsletter about random stuff I like. Subscribe!

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Dangerous Data

I once worked on the data management team for a large healthcare provider. There is an incredible amount of power and possibility in using data to empower and enact dramatic changes – especially in large traditionally slow-moving organizations. That said, there is an inherent risk for our own individual and group biases to seep into the algorithm and output from such systems.

In this episode of TED Radio hour, “Can We Trust The Numbers?” computer and data scientists share some of the overlooked aspects of where data science can fail our good intentions.

“It’s more than you think. It’s about power because they get to decide what experiment. It’s about power because they get to math-splain. It’s also about power because they get to decide what success looks like.”

Bonus points for Kathy O’Neil coining the phrase, “Math-splain”.  😀

(via Jackie)

 

Star Simpson – XOXO

Star Simpson builds hardware with soul, currently working on sky machines at Otherlab. The creator of the PLIBMTTBHGATY series of coding events and the TacoCopter drone delivery concept, Star’s latest project is Circuit Classics, reviving the hand-drawn circuits of Forrest M. Mims III as hardware kits.

If you’ve ever done something creative 1 you’ll know the alternating feelings of “This is crazy”, “This is terrible!”, and “This is great!”. I enjoyed Star Simpson’s talk on how that craziness is what often leads to some of the best things people have ever made.

I’ve languished in sharing more videos from XOXO, but this one is rather timely. Just the other day I learned that the circuit board designs Star talks about are now available over at Adafruit!

As Those Who Make

It’s not, of course, that there’s anything wrong with making (although it’s not all that clear that the world needs more stuff). The problem is the idea that the alternative to making is usually not doing nothing—it’s almost always doing things for and with other people, from the barista to the Facebook community moderator to the social worker to the surgeon. Describing oneself as a maker—regardless of what one actually or mostly does—is a way of accruing to oneself the gendered, capitalist benefits of being a person who makes products.

– Why I am Not a Maker – Debbie Chachra

I make communities. I do it with other people. It is just as valuable as those who make the architecture, content, documentation, and software that these communities use and support.

My Favorite Twitter Bot

Nearly a year ago I tweeted the following.

It was always funny and frustrating to me when folks shared screenshots from their mobile phones with such low battery. For some reason the low battery bugged me. It’s like living on the edge, man!

So then today I get this reply.

Rahat actually coded up the damn thing! And it works really well. Even better, the source code is up on Github under an MIT license.

I was curious if I was the first to think of it. I wasn’t, which is cool. It looks from my sleuthing that the first mention was back in 2013.

I love the Internet – and the people on it.