Bob's stuff

Consuming and transforming

Sat, 04 Feb 2012 18:41:32 +0000

“Consumer” is one of those words I’ve never been comfortable with. Along with “user”, it refers to real people as simply receptacles for whatever companies churn out for them. It’s a lazy, impersonal, demeaning, and ultimately unhelpful word. Alex Bogusky thinks that as consumption is inevitable, people just need to be better consumers. I agree [...]

Got salt?

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 06:59:37 -0800

bob posted a photo:

What most of Zurich's pavement looks like after refusing to accept the 3cm of snow we got.

Quantum-sized quantum researchers

Sat, 04 Feb 2012 12:36:08 +0000

Jonathan Keats continues to blow my mind: “Until today science has been completely dominated by one species,” says Keats, an experimental philosopher and former director of the Local Air & Space Administration…”People may not be biologically equipped to understand the universe at a fundamental level, he contends. “Other species might be better adapted to the [...]

Everyone gets what they vote for

Sat, 04 Feb 2012 09:50:26 +0000

An interesting idea: Thanks to the competitive nature of electoral democracies, many – often most – citizens end up being governed by a party they didn’t vote for. But there is a way to ensure that every single voter is satisfied by the results of an election: simply have each voter governed by the political [...]

Frozen fountain

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 03:09:17 -0800

bob posted a photo:

Nothing an ice pick can't fix.

My team

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 09:43:05 -0800

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3 steps to great product design

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 09:27:41 +0000

Step 1: Find the best, most experienced, most professional product designer you can. Step 2: Ask them what to do. Step 3: Do what they say. Profit! Ok, maybe a little more detail would help. For Step 1, your goal is to find the person with the most experience designing products that will work with [...]

Poor things

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 22:20:14 -0800

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Joe for Congress

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 09:44:03 -0800

bob posted a photo:

A college friend enters the family business.

Or a few of them

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 12:50:23 -0800

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Alone together

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 08:10:00 +0000

“Users of social networking services are 30% less likely to know their neighbors.” – PEW Internet survey

5 minutes of sun

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 13:36:45 -0800

bob posted a photo:

At this point, I'll take what I can get.

On knowing

Sun, 22 Jan 2012 11:15:59 +0000

When I was a senior in high school, a teacher asked me to join the impromtou speaking team. In this competitive speech event, you received a question from a predefined category–for the category “transportation”, it might be something like “Should seatbelts be mandatory?”–and had just 6 minutes to prepare and deliver a speech on it. [...]

Barcelona-Madrid

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 11:13:32 -0800

bob posted a photo:

At a huge bar in Paris where no one was even drinking.

Gare de Lyon

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 11:12:14 -0800

bob posted a photo:

The new TGV departure for Swiss-bound trains.

315 kph!

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 11:10:57 -0800

bob posted a photo:

On the TGV from Paris to Zurich.

This store is open

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 11:10:06 -0800

bob posted a photo:

Despite appearances... the army surplus store in Zürich.

Scale Zurich tram

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 09:31:19 -0800

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An addition to our Swiss set!

Sunset over Lago di Como

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 08:43:01 -0800

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Chapel of the Madonna del Ghissallo

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 08:20:15 -0800

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The patron saint of cycling.

Power lunch

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 08:19:06 -0800

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Waiting for the ferry to Belaggio

Razor roof

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 09:13:11 -0800

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Luzern Hof cathedral

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 09:12:53 -0800

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So many uses

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 07:43:29 -0800

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Cafe Schober lunch

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 07:42:51 -0800

bob posted a photo:

Dolder skating in the snow

nobody@flickr.com (bob) — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 07:41:37 -0800

bob posted a photo:

Highlights from Andy Kaufman's wrestling career - a truly epic...

Sat, 14 Mar 2009 11:03:57 -0800

Highlights from Andy Kaufman's wrestling career - a truly epic stunt.

YouTube - Amazing Indoor Skydiving - I tried this once...wasn't...

Tue, 10 Mar 2009 14:27:49 -0800

YouTube - Amazing Indoor Skydiving - I tried this once...wasn't quite this good.

Calligraphy in light - beautiful....

Mon, 09 Mar 2009 14:25:35 -0800

Calligraphy in light - beautiful.

The history of the Earth in 60 seconds - to...

Sun, 08 Mar 2009 18:32:16 -0800

The history of the Earth in 60 seconds - to scale, natch!

The Homer Simpson metric: "Homer is not going to use...

Sun, 08 Mar 2009 18:11:34 -0800

The Homer Simpson metric: "Homer is not going to use his body for anything. ThatÂs the American value system in a nutshell. And thatÂs what we who are trying to design alternative transportation are fighting against. We've got to make something that's clean, cheap and mechanically efficient without the individual feeling the physical consequences. ThatÂs tough."

I'm late to view the Siftables demo, but it really...

Tue, 03 Mar 2009 12:15:52 -0800

I'm late to view the Siftables demo, but it really is inspiring.

First-person video of a bike race finish - can't believe...

Mon, 02 Mar 2009 10:55:29 -0800

First-person video of a bike race finish - can't believe I never thought to do this (the filming, not the near-crash).

Flow chart of where our emissions are really coming from...

Mon, 02 Mar 2009 10:41:07 -0800

Flow chart of where our emissions are really coming from - interesting that land use change (deforestation, etc) is as significant as transportation.

The Long Now Foundation - Store - Books - great...

Sun, 01 Mar 2009 14:48:54 -0800

The Long Now Foundation - Store - Books - great book recommendations from the Long Now Foundation. Love the <10-word reviews; I should try that.

"The gospel is not primarily a set of facts but...

Sun, 01 Mar 2009 14:32:37 -0800

"The gospel is not primarily a set of facts but a way of seeing and a way of being in the world because of God." - Richard Rohr

YouTube - Are Violent Video Games Preparing Kids For The...

Sun, 01 Mar 2009 13:51:03 -0800

YouTube - Are Violent Video Games Preparing Kids For The Apocalypse? - I'm pretty sure this was what Kenneth Boulding was talking about.

"The future will always surprise us, but we must not...

Fri, 27 Feb 2009 12:20:17 -0800

"The future will always surprise us, but we must not let it dumbfound us." - Kenneth Boulding

"The vice president began to tremble with rage. He shouted,...

Fri, 27 Feb 2009 10:41:32 -0800

"The vice president began to tremble with rage. He shouted, 'The telephone system was destroyed last night and you had better believe it. If you don't by noon, you'll be fired.'" - Idealized Design: How Bell Labs Imagined -- and Created -- the Telephone System of the Future. Great example of prototyping future experiences to inspire innovation.

Google finally solves the age-old question of the ideal crank...

Wed, 25 Feb 2009 12:09:35 -0800

Google finally solves the age-old question of the ideal crank length: 87 minutes

"In his first week in office, President Obama requested that...

Tue, 24 Feb 2009 15:16:25 -0800

"In his first week in office, President Obama requested that he see 10 letters a day 'representative of people's concerns, from people writing into the president,' recalls Gibbs, 'to help get him outside of the bubble, to get more than just the information you get as an elected official." - ABC News. Very cool way of tapping into real people's needs.

Coolest commute ever - kids in Colombia riding a zip...

Tue, 24 Feb 2009 12:24:32 -0800

Coolest commute ever - kids in Colombia riding a zip line over a 1200-foot valley to get to school.

"If called, I will certainly serve," he said. "But if...

Mon, 23 Feb 2009 14:41:29 -0800

"If called, I will certainly serve," he said. "But if not called, I will probably serve anyway." - Carl Malamud, who works to make government documents easily available. Love the attitude.

For all those times you've said "I wish I could...

Tue, 17 Feb 2009 22:49:50 -0800

For all those times you've said "I wish I could invest in that person": Swayam: Education Funding, people investing in people - "We offer ordinary people the opportunity to become angel investors in the education of talented students, in exchange for a share of their future income."

Informing Ourselves To Death - a good counterpoint to the...

Tue, 17 Feb 2009 9:34:09 -0800

Informing Ourselves To Death - a good counterpoint to the "inforevolution": "I believe you will have to concede that what ails us, what causes us the most misery and pain -- at both cultural and personal levels -- has nothing to do with the sort of information made accessible by computers. The computer and its information cannot answer any of the fundamental questions we need to address to make our lives more meaningful and humane."

Christopher Columbus @ All About Explorers - Librarians sabotage the...

Mon, 16 Feb 2009 9:32:55 -0800

Christopher Columbus @ All About Explorers - Librarians sabotage the internet to teach kids that you can't trust online information. Great.

Kevin Kelly reports on Amish technology adoption - "One Amish-man...

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 19:47:16 -0800

Kevin Kelly reports on Amish technology adoption - "One Amish-man told me that the problem with phones, pagers, and PDAs (yes he knew about them) was that 'you got messages rather than conversations.'"

Imagining the Internet - good list of books and resources...

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 18:46:20 -0800

Imagining the Internet - good list of books and resources for forecasting and concept design

Saul Griffith expands on his previous analysis of the energy...

Mon, 09 Feb 2009 21:40:31 -0800

Saul Griffith expands on his previous analysis of the energy we need and use as a planet. Really compelling stuff; who wants to start an energy company?

"It's not bad to own fine things that you like....

Fri, 06 Feb 2009 19:44:06 -0800

"It's not bad to own fine things that you like. What you need are things that you GENUINELY like. Things that you cherish, that enhance your existence in the world. The rest is dross." - Bruce Sterling