Steve Jobs’ Playboy Interview (Alexandria Issue #027)
Featured Article
“We’re living in the wake of the petrochemical revolution of 100 years ago. The petrochemical revolution gave us free energy — free mechanical energy, in this case. It changed the texture of society in most ways. This revolution, the information revolution, is a revolution of free energy as well, but of another kind: free intellectual energy. It’s very crude today, yet our Macintosh computer takes less power than a 100-watt light bulb to run and it can save you hours a day. What will it be able to do ten or 20 years from now, or 50 years from now? This revolution will dwarf the petrochemical revolution. We’re on the forefront.”
More Amazing Reads
Technology’s Role in Uncovering Racism — www.collaborativefund.com
“It feels as though we are at a tipping point in terms of accountability. Thanks to the rise of crowdsourced documentation and distribution, we can see racism more clearly than ever before. As saddening as these videos and images are to see, it is their very proliferation that is enabling us to have the opportunity to weed out racism more comprehensively. We have to capture it and share it before we can get rid of it.”
What Happens When The Internet of Things Becomes an Accomplice in Domestic Abuse? — eyeondesign.aiga.org
“…there are typically three stages to domestic abuse: when a person is in the relationship, and often cohabiting with an abusive partner; when they are preparing to contact the police or move to a refuge; and when they have left and are trying to rebuild their lives. “Across all these stages, technologies carry different risks but also opportunities to victims, stretching from means of punishment or control to something more empowering…”
Narrative-Market-Fit — www.perell.com
“Media narratives are governed by an analogous idea: narrative-market fit. The closer an article’s topic reflects the zeitgeist, the better narrative-market fit it has. Just as companies with product-market fit are more likely to be funded, stories with narrative-market fit are more likely to be written. When a topic is in the public eye, writers are incentivized to focus on them at the expense of more important but less popular stories. Instead of fitting the narrative to reality, they fit the narrative to their readers’ demands.”
Lazy Work, Good Work — www.collaborativefund.com
“If you anchor to the old world where good work meant physical action, it’s hard to wrap your head around the idea that the most productive use of a knowledge-worker’s time could be sitting on a couch thinking. But it’s so clear that it is. Good ideas rarely come in meetings, or even at your desk. They come to you in the shower. On a walk. On your commute, or hanging out on the weekend. I’m always amazed at the number of famous ideas that came to people in the bathtub. But tell your boss you require a mid-day soak, and the response is entirely predictable.”
Britannica’s Curiosity Compass: The Science of Curiosity — curiosity.britannica.com
“When something piques your curiosity — say, an interesting fact, or an unexpected noise in the other room — your brain enters into what’s called the “curiosity state.” First, the parts of the brain that are sensitive to unpleasant conditions light up. This shows that you are slightly uncomfortable, because you recognize you are lacking certain knowledge. Then, the parts of your brain responsible for learning and memory kick into high gear, so that you can learn, and remember what you’ve learned, more efficiently. It is at this point that you are primed to begin your search for answers. And when you actually begin learning new facts in your curiosity state, something even more interesting than heightened memory happens: your reward circuitry kicks in.”
Eigenquestions: The Art of Framing Problems — coda.io
“When Coda was founded, we found ourselves faced with a number of tricky choices. From years of working together previously at YouTube, Matt Hudson (our founding PM) and I had developed a bit of a shorthand for how to “frame” problems. Over the years, we’ve refined and formalized the techniques, and we teach these skills as part of onboarding new employees at Coda. This document is a handbook of these techniques.”
Resources
A5 Letter Builder Notebook by Dotgrid — www.dotgrid.co
“Introducing the Letter Builder Notebook. Designed in collaboration with Ian Barnard, this is the perfect notebook for practicing your technique and becoming a better lettering artist.”
Dark Ages of the Web — pavellaptev.github.io
“The year 1994 when all began and the great era when the web we know today was born. It was the time when developers and designers only learn how to do web, collect and create a web experience from scratch — before landing pages, burger menu, Z and F-Pattern, adaptive design, flat design, eCommerce, functional animation and micro-interactions… Let’s watch what we used in the past Web…”
Mindful (Beta) — Chrome Web Store — chrome.google.com
“Mindful is space for your thoughts, ideas and ongoing tasks. It works where you work. In every new tab. Login to Chrome to automatically sync your Mindful notes using your Google Account.”
