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The author fails to make an important distinction about the people that created the logo.

It's one thing to say that a design agency came in and designed a logo in a weekend. It's another thing to say an internal design team bared down to create a logo in a "weekend" (in quotes, because Marissa may simply be using the term to mean done in a short timespan).

I've worked on both the agency and client side, and the huge difference is that an agency comes in and has to learn very quickly about the client's business (more often than not getting it wrong the first time around) while the people working at the company live and breathe the company culture day in and out. At an agency, you're often jumping between a few clients, but unless you've been the agency of record for a number of years, it is simply not possible for you to have the depth of understanding that an internal marketing team will have. What an agency CAN bring is some fresh outsider thinking not colored by the company's history, but there's no reason the right people within the company can do so as well.

Perhaps the issue is that there is this expectation that everyone should know how to "use" a computer. We forgive older generations, because it's something they never grew up with while being appalled at younger generations because they're not using computers to do technical stuff. News flash: computers are not the end all be all of the world. It's simply an aspect of it, and while some kids won't give a crap about how computers work, others will be wildly passionate about it. Some kids will grow up to be doctors, lawyers, scientists, teachers, artists, philosophers, and excelling in their domains does not come with a requirement of knowing how to connect to a wifi network.

You seem pretty intent on drawing a negative picture of people who can do both design and code, labeling them the worst designers you've ever worked with or a jack of all trades whose ultimate route is some idiot manager role.

There's nothing but benefit for a designer to also pick up some coding skills or a developer gaining an appreciation of design and interaction. And I see no reason someone can't excel at both if they truly desire.

Perhaps the worst designers you've worked with did both, but don't let bad logic lead you to think that the best designers do not.

You may want to check out a program called Divvy. You can set key commands to set the position and size of any window. There's other programs similar to it, but this is my favorite one.

If you can get access to someone's iPhone for 30 seconds you can install a web app that looks just like the iPhone interface but with various surprises when anything is pressed.

http://www.iphoneception.com

The lowest brightness you can achieve by the standard Mac controls is equal to the halfway mark of this brightness app. So this app adds a huge level of control between that lowest setting and pure black.

I'm often unsatisfied with the lowest brightness setting when in a dark room, and this solves that perfectly. I just downlaoded it right now and tried it out and it works perfectly. I'd recommend you do the same as it's free before making judgment on it.

Edit: I just saw your edit, and I think you have it incorrect. Try clicking the brightness app menu bar icon, and then use your keyboard brightness keys to adjust, and you'll see at the lowest setting, it goes to the halfway mark.

In my experience, I would tend to agree that customer service from the government is generally better than corporations, from the DMV (though states my vary), County Clerk Recorders, Passport offices and even the IRS, and they generally seem happier than customer service folk at corporations who read verbatim from support guide trees and are incentivized to do what's in the best interests of the company rather than you.

I'm probably not the best person to have a debate about this since I don't have a traditional CS background. I dabble in many different languages, but I'll never claim to be an expert in any.

To your point about this not being in the book JavaScript the Good Parts, I re-downloaded my purchase from Oreilly to double check, and throughout the book, all functions are declared as variables. Here's a screenshot from the second page of the "Functions" chapter, which is the first time a function declaration is introduced in the book: https://dl.dropbox.com/u/1517499/Screen%20Shot%202013-03-26%...

Edit: Just an edit to add that I quickly perused the pdf and couldn't pick out anywhere where he explained why he recommends this way. In any case, I'm always open to any arguments one way or the other.

I learned this method with the book JavaScript the Good Parts, though it was a while ago and I can't remember the specific reasoning behind the books' recommendation.

From the other commenter's SO link, I found this link to go more in depth into the differences of declaring functions, and it seems to come down to having stricter control on the order of events with no surprises.

http://javascriptweblog.wordpress.com/2010/07/06/function-de...

And here's an example of one of the surprises you'll run into if you don't declare your functions in this way: http://www.adequatelygood.com/JavaScript-Scoping-and-Hoistin...

If you use jquery, I wrote this really simple snippet that I use for quick down and dirty debugging.

var logit = function(x){$('body').append('<div id=logit></div>');$('#logit').css({'background':'#000','position':'fixed','bottom':0,'right':0,'color':'#fff','padding':5,'font-family':'arial','font-size':'9px','z-index':9999});$('#logit').append(x+'<br>');};

It could very easily be adjusted for non-jquery too.

Then just call it like: logit(whateverYouWantToDisplay);

But what are we gonna use then to open the germy bathroom doors, for the 95-ish% of us who use the paper towel we dry out hands with to also open the door and then drop in a bin next to it?

I imagine Microsoft could have a very lenient policy with its employees speaking on behalf of the company's interests, but its very dangerous territory if you don't approach it with respect and sensitivity. Personally I think it's simply best to not speak publicly on behalf of the company you work for unless its your job to do so.

It seems from the abstract that they're not looking for causation between those two but what other factors are involved that can explain the correlation.

I don't see anything particularly terrible about how the js was built. It's not the style I would have done it, but I wouldn't blame the programmer. He/she was most likely just following specs and doing what they were told and not involved at all in the strategy or design. This site is what you get when programmers are treated as end-of-the-line production workers.

Just backed and looking forward to trying this out!

I just have one question/suggestion just in case it makes sense. My main hesitation with using a browser-based IDE is that with native apps, I can use standard quick-keys to navigate documents very quickly using just the keyboard, such as flipping between documents, jumping my cursor to the beginning or end of a line/document and shift-arrowing/tabbing to make a selection. These are very basic and simple things, but without them, I would have to painfully use my trackpad/mouse to make selections, navigate the cursor around, or switch between documents. Just wondering if you're considering this type of functionality that will let me perform quick and simple actions through keyboard commands.

This is hilarious, but it doesn't take into account one of the major factors of online advertising, and that is branding, or brand awareness. While the official EA ad may not get as many clickthroughs, what it will get is subconcious eyeballs, and given enough impressions of the same ad in various formats, same EA logo, car, game title and branding, you don't need people to click on the ad to start to recognize that there is a new Need for Speed game available. It's similar to flooding the airwaves with a particular TV ad. The goal is awareness, which over time, can lead to a purchase, whether the person decides at some point to purchase online or offline. Maybe they're at GameStop and EA has placed an in-store display with the same EA Need for Speed branding. The person may have forgotten about the game, but walking in to this GameStop, they're memory is refreshed of it by being previously exposed to it through digital or television.

So in short, what's more important? Immediate click-through satisfaction or building real brand recognition that can show greater returns over time, mostly in ways not calculable?

http://justthefirstframe.com

A new way to discover web comics.

But also recently http://iphoneception.com

Thanks joshu and swah! I'm actually the creator of the site and am doing this completely manually. I've explored here and there on how I might automate it, though it all looks a bit daunting. I hadn't heard of OpenCV, and I will definitely explore this further. Thank you so much!

Foodspotting has helped me discover a ton of great places. #1) it's completely user-driven #2) it focuses on local, what's around you, and #3) most important of all, your primary way of browsing is through pictures of actual food, taken by the users themselves.

Screw Yelp and their reviews. You'll have to invest at least 5 minutes actually reading through paragraphs and paragraphs of people's ramblings.

With foodspotting, I just let me eyes do the discovering. And because it's user-driven, it's assumed that if someone took the time to take a photo and post it that they thoroughly enjoyed it. Also, because you're looking at photos of food, you're seeing actual dishes being served, and the most popular ones at that. On Yelp, you're browsing by food type (Mexican, italian etc), and maybe you can click to their website to view the menu. On Foodspotting, you skip all that and see the food you'll actually get.

Sorry if I've rambled a bit, but I'm just a huge fan of their app.

For anyone Angelenos, there's a restaurant called Stacked in the South Bay near the Del Amo mall that dors ordering and purchases at all tables and bar seats through iPads. I happened upon it purely by chance and it was just awesome, and their app design and ux alone is worth a look.

Thanks for the feedback! Yes I'm manually entering the frames. With the variety of comic styles and the way the frames are bordered, I'm not sure there would be any easy way to write an algorithm that automates this task. But I'm pretty darn fast at Photoshop and it takes me about 15 seconds in all to copy the url, note the number of frames, and crop out/export the first frame.

Regarding a user account system, that's definitely on my feature list. This site is just the result of a weekend of coding, so I just wanted to see if it would garner interest first before investing more time to add more robust functionality.

Clickable link: http://www.justthefirstframe.com

Man, this is gonna be a really tough sell.

The computer is where people do their real work.

The iPad is where people do casual consumption, games, or yes, perhaps some photography, but mostly instagram-level, meant for casual sharing. Instagram is perfect for this device. Quick, easy, looks good, simple to share.

This tablet version of Photoshop is both wayyyyyyy more complicated than instagram and wayyyyyyy less useful than the full Photoshop application.

As a power Photoshop user, I have no need nor desire for this product. I simply cannot imagine my wife, who has no image-editing skills, using this over instagram or an instagram-type app. So who is this for exactly?

I don't think there are any hard and fast rules, but I think a simple question that will give you an immediate sense on whether a designer knows their sh*t (pardon my French) is to ask them what their design process is. If there's any hesitation, or if there's a pause and you can tell they're trying to make something up as they go along, they don't have one. Move on. But just pay attention to what they're saying and you'll likely be able to tell how experienced they are and how confident they are of their skills.

Edited to add: this is where you'll find out if UX is part of their process. If they begin with things like mood boards, font selections, color palettes, look & feel, no, no and no. It needs to begin with some form of audience/customer, business goals, content strategy, user flows, functionality. Those other things come after, not first.

I think the first part of "looking for a designer" is the hardest and most important part. As with any profession, not all designers are created equal. I would look for a designer who emphasizes user experience, not just someone who makes pretty pictures. I would make that the first topic in any discussion with a potential designer. If they have no experience or regards to UX, then keep looking.

Just launched this last night. I did both design and development, and worked pretty hard to refine the touch and swipe gestures so it feels very close to the actual iPhone home screen interface. It's meant to be installed on an iPhone in order to fool someone to think they're using an actual iPhone, but when you try to open an app, depending on which one you select, you'll get exploding app icons, loss of gravity, cute kittens, or a scary zombie.

I'd love some feedback, and I'd actually love for you to try it on a friend or family member and let me know their reaction.

Thanks much!

I had this happen to me as well. I gave them a call and they redacted it and refunded me the money. I consider it pretty suspicious activity, considering every email I got from them was telling me it would expire. But just give them a call and they'll set it straight.

Reeder. But here's the one feature I'd kill for.

There will always be duplicate links fr different news sources, like Techmeme, Techcrunch, Hacker News and such pointing to the same article source. All if want is for those to be grouped together so I don't have to be exposed to the same article multiple times while scrolling through the feed.

Perhaps a feature like this could bring the best of all worlds. The ability for anyone to change the view to fit how they want to browse.

http://i.imgur.com/KdOR5.jpg

I use an app called Divvy. I don't think I could ever go back to life without it.