Category: Thoughts
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On Being in IT
Following the train of thought of my last post on the same topic, it occurred to me something that is obvious but peculiar. We in the IT field are empowered with the possibility of innovating at a very low cost, and at a very fast pace. This has been true in the past decade, and…
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Penny Pinching Online Music, pt. 2
Back in August I wrote how Google Play Music All Access, the music streaming service with the longest name in the world, in just a week had changed the way I listen to and discover music. I did some math, and since August I discovered 13 new artists, for a grand total of 41 new…
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Google for Sci-fi Writers
As I am writing the sequel to Us & Them, I often have to do some math. Nothing complex, I just aim at having a coherent sequence of events that map well to space, time, and speed. Google, unlike other search engines, is capable of doing relatively complex calculations in units like AU, light days,…
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Innovation and Fear of the Unknown
Animals typically have a hard time with the unknown. The immediate reaction is fear. Intelligent animals then show curiosity, which sometimes wins over fear. We humans are no different, and the uncertainty that sometimes lies in front of us can force us into sticking to a well-known, understood path. We ignore the new road, and…
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The UX Collective Culture
When you design a UX, you try to guide the user through your machine’s interface in the most obvious and predictable way. Most UX/UI must make assumptions on what the user knows and what she doesn’t know. It’s a tradeoff between beginners and experts. There are, however, different levels of preexisting knowledge you can expect…