I really enjoyed this short animated film on the pencil. In fact, I, Pencil is a series of movies made by the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
It is rather amazing that all of these things came together on their own to create what we think of as a simple object.
via Devour
If your not using markdown to write, you’re doing it wrong. This is a pretty extensive list of Mac apps that let you preview, compose, and/or publish rich content with ease.
via Harry Marks
Matt Alexander reflects on the lessons he learned during the past year of writing at OneThirtySeven. It’s a fantastic look back on his work and great advice for everyone – for writing or life. I think one of my favorite lessons is this:
The lesson is that pursuing things you are passionate about and enjoy will inevitably benefit you in an astounding manner. But, if you choose to pre-define the shape of these gains, you will find yourself disappointed and disillusioned.
In this context he’s talking about making money off the writing he does – which he admits isn’t a whole lot. But the takeaway is that by doing something you enjoy doing, you’ll be successful and that being successful has different meanings.
It’s no secret that Ben Brooks (among many others) has been an inspiration for the content, format, and even aesthetics of my own site. Even though John Gruber gets credit for the “linked list” blog style, it was Ben who got me thinking about converting my site into, what he calls, a traditional DF style linked list.
Before that, I mostly posted like Jason Kottke where I’d have some content in the body, a link somewhere in the post, and my own commentary towards the end. The RSS title link pointed to my own site. Readers would have to then click on the link I placed in the post to read more than what I wrote about. The DF style has the RSS link directly to the source content. You read Gruber’s thoughts first, then read the source article and make some conclusions. This is the method that Brooks used since I remember finding his site.
Ben’s thoughts on blogging styles got me thinking about what I value the most for my site. I don’t get much traffic. I probably send even less. Yet it was Ben who convinced me I shouldn’t care about my traffic – or the traffic of others. I should just care about spreading content I appreciated. So that what I try to do today. However, I never went full DF style like Ben and others did. My RSS links point to my own site and I sometimes paraphrase for the title; John Gruber does this – he doesn’t use the source’s title like Ben used to do. But like The Loop, Daring Fireball, and The Brooks Review, if you visited my site directly, the title would point to the source and there was a permalink close by for my own commentary.
Now Ben is moving towards a Kottke-style blog. Each post is an article with links and commentary. It’s exactly what I moved away from after being convinced the DF-style that he used before was the right way to go. He says:
I vowed to stop linking to things with trivial commentary such as, “cool”, when I erected the paywall. Therefore I believe that when I link to something, my commentary is almost as important as the item I am linking to — certainly an egotistical view, but in line with my goal to only put smart and lasting commentary on this site.
Given that, then, it seems like there is a direct conflict with the traditional linked list and The Brooks Review, as I desire to have all my readers read my commentary (and want to read it) but the linked list model pushes those readers away from my commentary. I’ve thought about, and talked about, killing the linked list on this site for over a year to friends — always encouraged not to do so and I have let it go for a few weeks, only to then be nagged by the idea of killing my linked list yet again.
I don’t really care whether his blog is a DF or Kottke-style of a blog. I’ve always appreciated both the link and the commentary. Without either of them, there wouldn’t be a reason to subscribe. And while I don’t feel as if a DF-style blog with a paywall is in conflict, I see Ben’s point. It’s about the content… his content that he wants to showcase. And the style of blog doesn’t change that for me.
The important thing I took away from his about-face is that quality content – link and commentary – are key. And he’s always delivered in my opinion. I expect nothing to change because of the switch. And I don’t think I’ll revert back to Kottke style. Because for me, It’s about sharing something I find interesting or worthy of sharing. How the reader gets there is almost irrelevant. So long as I link to the source and credit how I found it, I don’t care if a reader has to click the title or click a link in the post to get there… they’ll get there.
A a person who just picked up an iPad mini let me hold it for a minute and browse the web to test it out. In my quest to decide what iPad is best for me, I wanted to run it through a few tests.
I compared the screen the the 3rd Gen iPad I use and, like reviewers say, there is a noticeable difference in the screen. It’s not like the iPad 2 but the text is less crisp. This might be a bigger issue for me than it is for others. The Retina Display is so sharp that you can quickly feel the strain after looking at a pixelated tablet like the mini. The size of the screen was ok. Not too small but small enough to make some things a little harder to use. Watching movies might not be as enjoyable, though. Not sure if prolonged use would just get me used to the change or if this is another issue for me. It doesn’t seem to be a big deal to most from what I’ve read.
As for speed, no issues at all. Refreshing and scrolling up and down a website was snappy and felt pretty quick to me. I doubt I’ll do any more than play Letterpress on it so I’m sure it can handle the games I have.
Weight is the only thing I don’t like about my iPad. The mini is so light, I could probably read for hours and never feel strain holding it. Overall size is nice, too. It will fit in my back pocket and the pockets of the coats I wear. That’s a big plus.
I’m still not convinced the mini will have a place in my arsenal of gadgets. I think it will depend on what my next laptop purchase will be and whether Apple makes an iPad mini with a Retina Display. If I go 11″ MacBook Air, I’ll probably go iPad mini. If I got with a 13″ screen, I’ll stick with the larger iPad. My iPhone will do if size and weight are a limiting factor when I travel.
But I’m still impressed with what Apple has created. The weight, form factor, overall size is certainly compelling and it’s the tablet I’d recommend to anyone who will be doing a lot of reading. Once I hook up an Apple keyboard to a mini, I’ll know for sure if I can scale my writing activities to it. One thing is for sure, though, no matter that version I get, it will be the best tablet I could want.