accidentaldesign

Why Wouldn't It Be Any Other Way?

Thu, 10 May 2012 09:45:31 +1200

Jonathan Ive said in the documentary ‘Objectified’:

A lot of what we seem to be doing … is getting design out of the way. And I think when forms develop with that sort of reason and they’re not just arbitrary shapes it feels almost inevitable, it feels almost undesigned. It feels almost like ‘well of course it’s that way, you know, why wouldn’t it be any other way?’

This is what happens with Apple’s designs. Other companies can no longer see past them, they become the new ‘obvious solution’ for that product category. Then you get comments like this from HP President of Industrial Design Stacy Wolff in response to their obvious MacBook copycat products:

The thing is that you have to design what’s right, and that is that sometimes the wedge is the right solution, silver is the right solution. I see a lot of differences as much as the similarities. I think anybody that’s close enough to the business sees that there are differences in the design. Ours is rubber-coated at the bottom. We use magnesium; they didn’t do that — they use CNC aluminum. We did a brush pattern on our product; they didn’t. We did a different kind of keyboard execution. We did audio as a component; they didn’t. So there are a lot of things I can list off that are differences; but if you want to look at a macro level, there are a lot of similarities to everything in the market that’s an Ultrabook today. It is not because those guys did it first; it’s just that’s where the form factor is leading it.”

In other words “of course this is where we’d end up, why wouldn’t it be any other way?”.

bigweek: Apple’s welcome letter.

Tue, 08 May 2012 09:48:12 +1200

bigweek:

Apple’s welcome letter.

Football, dogfighting, and brain damage : The New Yorker

Fri, 04 May 2012 16:06:47 +1200

Football, dogfighting, and brain damage : The New Yorker:

(via Instapaper)

m.guardian.co.uk

Tue, 10 Apr 2012 18:05:10 +1200

m.guardian.co.uk:

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Hacking Is Important

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 12:25:45 +1300

Hacking Is Important:

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Print - The Hunter Becomes the Hunted - Esquire

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 12:31:44 +1300

Print - The Hunter Becomes the Hunted - Esquire:

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Too many gadget choices: product lines simplify as fatigue sets in | The Verge

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 10:32:19 +1300

Too many gadget choices: product lines simplify as fatigue sets in | The Verge:

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2011: Shift Happens

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 13:11:55 +1300

2011: Shift Happens:

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App Developers Betting on iOS Over Android

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 12:48:53 +1300

App Developers Betting on iOS Over Android:

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Waldo Jaquith - On the impracticality of a cheeseburger.

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 14:34:59 +1300

Waldo Jaquith - On the impracticality of a cheeseburger.:

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How to Fix Apple TV 2 Netflix Bug

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 09:05:00 +1300

I’ve spent the past few days tearing my hair out over a bug with the Netflix app on the Apple TV 2 version 4.4.3. Solution: rolled back/reverted/downgraded to the previous firmware version.

The specific bug I was experiencing was that after signing into the Netflix app I was presented with only two menu options: ‘Search’ and ‘Sign Out’. The search function wouldn’t work, so my only option was to sign out. The Netflix thumbnails on the home screen of the Apple TV were still being loaded normally and if I got my password wrong I couldn’t sign in, so the Apple TV was contacting Netflix servers OK as far as I could tell.

I tried resetting all the settings, changing regions, changing my account email address, ‘deactivating all devices’ via the Netflix website, restoring the Apple TV in iTunes, changing my network settings and refreshing my router. Nothing worked.

I wasn’t sure that it was a bug with the latest Apple TV firmware because I upgraded on 17 November and the bug only surfaced now. But my last resort was to try to find an older version of the firmware and restore to that.

You can find all past versions of the firmware here at iClarified.com. I downloaded the previous version 4.4.2.

In order to restore to this version you must connect the Apple TV to your computer only by a Micro USB cable. Select it in the iTunes sidebar. Option-click the ‘Restore’ button on the device page and browse to the .ipsw file that you’ve just downloaded.

After doing that everything is back to normal, just one version behind.

Update, January 10:

It turns out it was a problem with the DNS service I was using provided by Unblock-US.com. I have since switched to OverPlay.net which works just fine with the latest Apple TV update and the latest version of the iOS Netflix app. They also provide a VPN service which is a handy extra.

I Don't Understand What Anyone Is Saying Anymore

Tue, 06 Dec 2011 13:58:18 +1300

I Don't Understand What Anyone Is Saying Anymore:

Dan Pallotta on how ridiculous business conversation has become.

(Via Ben Brooks)

"Apple didn’t invent the iPad or the iPhone, another company did. That company however..."

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 12:41:32 +1300

“Apple didn’t invent the iPad or the iPhone, another company did. That company however couldn’t make batteries last in their devices. Apple saw the company and went, well we’ve learned lots about batteries with our iPod (through other companies again) so bought the company. Slap their batteries in and take over the world. It’s good business, no denying that, but it’s strength lies in business, not creative technology.”

- Best reader comment I’ve seen in a while. Stuff.co.nz always brings out the loonies.

"Sometimes the truth of a thing is not so much in the think of it, but in the feel of it."

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 12:47:29 +1300

“Sometimes the truth of a thing is not so much in the think of it, but in the feel of it.”

- Stanley Kubrick when asked for an explanation of ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’.

Steve Jobs « The New Adventures of Stephen Fry

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 12:56:37 +1300

Steve Jobs « The New Adventures of Stephen Fry:

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Steve Jobs Solved the Innovator's Dilemma - James Allworth - Harvard Business Review

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 07:06:23 +1300

Steve Jobs Solved the Innovator's Dilemma - James Allworth - Harvard Business Review:

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m.guardian.co.uk

Mon, 17 Oct 2011 06:54:33 +1300

m.guardian.co.uk:

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gladwell dot com - creation myth

Mon, 17 Oct 2011 06:51:53 +1300

gladwell dot com - creation myth:

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Lock screen improvements in iOS5

Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:21:00 +1300

There’s a lot of new stuff to discover in iOS5. I like these improvements to the lock screen:

All notifications received while the phone was locked are shown in a list. They’re actionable by swiping across them while the screen is locked.
Before iOS5 you could double-tap the home button to bring up volume controls while listening to audio. It always drove me nuts that the double-tap was only registered after the screen turned on so, really, it took one tap to turn on the screen, and a double-tap to bring up the controls. In iOS5 the double-tap is registered from when the screen is off, so now it really only takes a double-tap to access the volume controls.
This action brings up a camera button so that you can start taking photos right away without unlocking the screen. And the + volume button now acts as a shutter button.

"There are two kinds of people in this world: people who touch their screens, and people who do not..."

Fri, 07 Oct 2011 14:33:01 +1300

“There are two kinds of people in this world: people who touch their screens, and people who do not want anyone to ever touch their screen—and you can guess which one I am”

- John Siracusa on episode 35 of 5by5’s Hypercritical podcast