Steve was one person of many who was trying to improve fonts and typography on computers. Another was Donald Knuth.

I'm not trying to detract from the fact that Steve did successfully push fonts forward, but we certainly would have high-quality fonts even if he hadn't been around (it would have just taken a bit longer).

Interesting.

The Nest is certainly pretty, but unless you have an iHouse, I don't think it would fit into the decor of your house as well as the Honeywell Round. The Nest is designed to stand out, which isn't really what you want in a thermostat.

Better than the article, certainly.

Sadly, no.......all that and he STILL didn't explain Twitter.

Yeah, I was expecting him to give some explanation of cool things that make the Nest thermostat better. But he didn't.

Maybe it's not better.

+1 truth.

The article claims Twitter is a user experience failure. That it's too hard to understand or something. Really? I can't think of much that is easier to understand that Twitter.....maybe someone else can parse the words from the article and explain them better than I did:

I'm not sure the article is saying anything. For example, #1 on the list is the Nest thermostat. It has a lot of words talking about Nest, but nowhere in there does it explain why nest is so amazing. It has a pretty picture, but it's hard to see why it is qualitatively better than the old fashioned thermostat.

Seriously, if you're going to write two paragraphs about why something is good, you ought to at least throw a sentence in there explaining why it is good. Below is the relevant paragraph from the article.

People are going to buy computers to do stuff. Email, facebook, ms word, that is what the average users says they do on the computer. One big problem with netbooks was that people assumed that could MS Word, and when they found out they couldn't they returned the computer. This is a solution where OEMs can expose people to other OS while still allowing MS Office to run. Maybe some people realize that they don't need MS Office. Maybe they don't want to pay a monthly fee for Office and realize that Google Docs or OpenOffice is sitting right there fore free. Maybe the next computer they buy doesn't have MS WIndows.

This is scary enough that MS, allegedly, has in the past prevented OEM from installing two OS. The last thing MS wants a computer user to know is there is another OS. Look at the misinformation on the Mac, how expensive it is, when my last Macbook Air was $1000. Yes, more expensive that they mythicla $300 MS laptop that runs everything, but about what a good laptop costs. We can argue price, but MS is scared of users knowing there is choice.

We also see this in past EULA in which certain versions of MS Windows could not be the guest OS. This is likely the future of the PC. A reasonably functional and free client OS on top of which a virtualized guest OS can be run. This is basically what MS is doing now with the instant upgrade. Start with a functionality locked out, and buy a full OS after the fact. Like the Mainframe manufacturers used to do. You have all the hardware, but have to pay extra to use it.

Strictly speaking, for the program to be allowed to exist, it should be constitutional AND terrorism should be a problem AND the program should work.

It needs to be able to overcome all three of those barriers before being allowed.

The good old ends justify the means justification for violating the 4th amendment.

Oh no, we don't exist to 'help serve and better the human race." That sort of thinking leads to the euthanization of homeless people.

Ah, everybody loves charts and hates numbers, but videos like these never show the poor guy playing with page after page of endless numbers and tweaking formulas until the charts look nice, and then sitting there tweaking colors/fonts/etc so the slide looks good. Oh, sure, the autoformat will pick a bunch of colors, but if you're making anything of any complexity you probably want the colors to mean something so that the clip-art over here matches the color of the line over there. This stuff is really tedious, and good luck doing it with a touch-screen...

I think the aluminum is just the cheap way to increase the fuel economuy. The basic problem with a truck is the aerodynamics and the engine. The aerodynamics are always going to suck, and there is little that can be done about that. The engine, OTOH, can be adjusted.

Right now most trucks are powered assuming that they are going to be carrying a significant load, and that consumers are going to be expect a good performance with that load. The result of this, and the reason many like trucks, is that when they are not loaded they are overpowered and therefore can achieve a great speed. That many people buy trucks for speed and not load is indicated by the number of automatics that are sold.

This need not be the case. We had an old Toyota pickup and it was a four cylinder 100 horse power r siries engine. When loaded it was slow, but like most people I did not drive it loaded all the time. But it was a working truck. We had a big chevy truck as well for work around the farm. Fords engines are not inefficient, at around 50 horsepower per cylinder. The point is that most people are driving around in a six cylinder truck wasting gas when what they need is 4 cylinder. It can be significant. In they city my six cylinder car get 16 MPG while my 4 cylinder car, just a fast, gets over 20.

If you never want to see a comment by a poster again, then you hit the mute button on that person and their comments are never seen again. Like they dont exist. The server can track how many mutes are on a person and if enough are there, then a human can step in and scope the individual and issue a reprimand if necessary. Of course if you mute someone then automatically you are muted for them...its always bi-directional whoever initiates it. Would that be so hard?
And maybe your website signup rate is going down because of all the personal information you are requiring during signup and the captcha you are using for proof of life.