beatnic - just wondering

• Creating Passionate Users: Stop your presentation before it kills again!
  Ditch the slides
  (tags: presenting presentations powerpoint keynote slides)

How well do you know your European countries?

Try dragging and dropping 45 countries to their correct places on the European map in this Flash-based online learning game.

You have to be pretty accurate to get a right answer and there are no country outlines to help, only land and sea. I got 35 on my first go but learned enough to get 40 with an average error of 88 miles next time round.

Simple and effective.

Thanks to my mum for the link :)

More games available here.

• GUUUI - The Interaction Designer’s Coffee Break
  Is that a picture of Jakob Nielsen in the banner?
  (tags: interactiondesign visualdesign webdesign userexperience informationarchitecture)

Out of the gloom
a voice said unto me
“Smile and be happy,
things could be worse.”
So I smiled and was happy
and behold
things did get worse.

I don’t know where this originated, but it was on the pinboard at home when I was growing up with a big yellow smiley face above it. I liked it because it made my parents laugh.

• Core77.com / design magazine + resource
  Industrial Design Supersite - it says so on the banner
  (tags: industrialdesign productdesign design)
• Core77 - Visionary Stupidity
  “The Donald” has become as “visionary” a brand as any out there. And one cannot help but wonder how designers work with Trump as their client.
  (tags: design industrialdesign productdesign)

Visionary stupidity: in which Cordy Swope discusses how companies go wrong with product design and development.

My approach to design is as “consumer in context”. I leave the domain knowledge to the experts.

The article argues that without a good dose of ignorance and objectivity in the design process brands become myopic to the point of self-annihilation, citing Braun (which these days should be a major competitor in the MP3 player market, but will always be associated with male grooming products and kitchen utensils) and Smart (which should have stuck to their original car concept and not tried to diversify).

Naivety is a good thing. And the best strategy is always realised through hindsight!

• Social bookmarking - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  Includes useful list of links to tools out there
  (tags: socialbookmarking socialsoftware wikipedia tools tagging tag tags web reference)
• LookSmart’s Furl - Your Personal Web
  Where better to bookmark a link to Furl?
  (tags: socialbookmarking internet web furl)

• Technorati Weblog: State of the Blogosphere, August 2005, Part 5
  Dave Sifry on The A-List and the Long Tail. Top blogs are up there alongside mainstream media in Technorati’s authority and influence ranking.
  (tags: blogs blogging davesifry technorati longtail alist blogosphere stateoftheblogosphere august 2005 statistics media)
• The End-All Guide to Small-Screen Web-Dev
  Useful article by Heidi Pollock covering the ins and outs of what to think about when designing for handhelds
  (tags: handhelds handheld pda mobile smallscreenbrowser interfacedesign webdesign design css xhtml heidipollock)
• BBC NEWS | England | London | Cyclist killed in machete attack
  Too close to home. Thoughts with the cyclist’s friends and family.
  (tags: cycling murder London denmarkhill camberwell)
• InfoDesign: Understanding by Design - News
  (tags: interactiondesign design webdesign interfacedesign informationarchitecture userexperience)

• online information 2005 - speaker zone
  I’m doing a turn on content management
  (tags: onlineinformation events conferences)
• BBC NEWS | Technology | Total recall boosts PDA writing
  Interesting idea this - drag (or trace as the IBM researchers say) over the letters on an on-screen keyboard to form the words you want to write on your PDA. Feels quicker and more intuitive than graffiti alphabet, but I’m not sure about the Atomik keyboard.
  (tags: design productdesign interfacedesign inputdevices interfaces handhelds PDAs)

• Powerkiteshop
  Kites and everything you need to fly them with
  (tags: kite kites kiting powerkites kiteboarding kitesurfing)
• North Morte Farm
  Camping in North Devon
  (tags: camping devon northdevon campsites)

• Horniman Museum
  Great for young ones, loads to see and do and free events going on regularly
  (tags: museum horniman eastdulwich se22 foresthill london)

• velorution
  Bicycle blog
  (tags: cycling blog velorution)
• Checkbox Label Positioning in CSS
  How to line up your form elements
  (tags: css interfacedesign webdesign)

A couple of days ago Flickr introduced an interestingness algorithm (much of which they’re keeping a secret).

So now you can see your photos according to views, favourites, comments and interestingness.

It’s a no brainer.