Fast Company gives props to our blog at Core77, although they describe us as “A random group of industrial designers and design fans” (random? us?) but refer to the content as “The quick-hit, often photo-laden entries offer a comprehensive view of what’s hot and hip.” which frankly disappoints me because I think if you spend more than 30 seconds on the site, you’ll see it’s about something a little deeper.

Though I did find a lot of the content of the special issue on design to be rather glib, at least in tone, if not in fact (as this example is).

Technorati: fast+company, core77, blogs, blogging, design

You’ll probably need to click on this picture to make it large enough to read it. It’s a detail of the invoice from my recent stay at a Hilton. As usual, they encourage the rapid check-out where you leave the keys in the room, take this document with you, and don’t even bother to stop at the front desk.
In this case, however, they’ve added a “violator” - a gold sticker with a bunch of extra info. Looks like they are planning to send out mail surveys, and it’s opt-out, not opt-in. To opt-out, I’d have to stop by the front desk on my way out, exactly what the Zip-Out Check-Out (R) is designed to avoid.
I did not bother, and I guess maybe I’ll actually complete the survey since that will be my chance to tell them i) how crappy the room was (the desk lamp was broken - I mean badly broken, with the bulb-assembly bent over at 90 degrees, the power plug didn’t work)
ii) how crappy the food was (my chicken wrap was made with chicken that was grilled, then frozen, then thawed to assemble the sandwhich - partially thawed - nothing like chicken icicles in your dinner
iii) how crappy the service was (what kind of business hotel - and this place was in an office park, business accomodation is the only reason is exists - doesn’t offer a breakfast-room-service-hang-tag deal where you can order your breakfast before you go to bed and it’ll arrive at the time you specify)

As far as i) I guess I get some lame points myself for not telling them about it, so the next visitor will have the same discovery. When you arrive at 9:15 pm and you have to eat and get work done, it’s not like you want to be dealing with workers in your work or the frustration of the whole repair/request process. Clearly they don’t check out stuff that is broken that badly and they (ineffectively) rely on the guests to take care of the notification.

Technorati: hilton, service, hotel, travel, room+service, survey, opt+out

Two articles in today’s NYT deal with attempts to rethink minor but impactful elements of the travelling experience - the hotel check-in kiosk and the middle seat on a commuter train. Seems that they can’t build/install/maintain a working kiosk (more a comment on industry culture than technology) and that we may see more trains without the (socially) uncomfortable middle seat.

Technorati: trains, commuting, seating, design, kiosk, hotel, check+in, hospitality

This article will no doubt be heavily blogged because it describes some innovative electronic acoustic privacy technology, but I thought the latter half of the piece, dealing with the relationship between innovative consultant and innovative manufacturer was extremely provocative.

Herman Miller has a long history of exploring the leading edges of office furniture and computer technology. The company worked with the computer scientist Douglas C. Engelbart during the 1960’s to design furniture and office systems that would help workers collaborate more effectively.

In fact, a walk through Applied Minds’ warehouses reveals many projects that seem to adopt the Engelbart approach of looking for ways to harness machines to augment human intelligence. With Northrop Grumman, the design firm is experimenting with teleconferencing, looking for ways to build systems that are useful for colleagues who work far apart from one another.

Mr. Ferren is particularly interested in finding novel solutions to design problems. All the bookshelves in the company’s offices, for example, are tilted 15 degrees to one side as a way to keep books neatly stacked.

In forming an alliance with Herman Miller, Mr. Hillis proposed a yearlong experiment period, which would allow the two companies to work together on broad ideas. After that, they could either commit to a product development project or go separate ways.

Categories: herman+miller, applied+minds, babble, consulting, design, technology, innovation

Fast Company, always more of an idea than an actual magazine, is probably gone for good warns this column about the shifting, and indeed fading, fortunes of business magazines. Interesting timing, given the increasing focus on design in these magazines (links ripped from LukeW)

Technorati: business, magazines, design, writing, Fast+Company

The colloquial definition is absolutely Not Safe For Work (NSFW), but “Indeed, bukkake is more commonly used in Japan to describe a type of dish where the toppings are poured on top of noodles, as in bukkake-udon and bukkake-soba.”

I certainly was surprised to go to a noodle house in Mountain View recently (on Castro St. - some relatively new place) and see that on the menu, having only heard the term used in the pr0n sense. Imagine trying to explain your reaction to a dining companion who wasn’t familiar with the term!

Technorati: food, colloquial, dirty+words, Japan, Japanese, cultural, translation

Game controller family tree via Waxy

Technorati: design, history, family+tree, videogame, gaming, controller

The Evolution of the American Front Porch
In recent times, new emphasis has been given to the cultural history and significance of the American front porch. In an effort to complement and to elaborate this emphasis, this project will attempt to define and distinguish the American front porch as an American cultural object. By exploring its evolution, from its origins to its decline, this project will not merely tell the story of the porch, but will also tell a limited story of America itself. While to many the front porch is unfamiliar, to the rest it must bring to mind a memory, experience, or actual place. This project may help to connect these cultural memories of the front porch to an understanding of the important role it has played in the national experience.

via MeFi

Technorati: deisgn, history, artifact, Americana, cultural+object

Haven’t we had 1-hour photo service for a very very long time? How is this a useful name? Or a useful offering? Now, slower than ever!

Technorati: service, branding, naming, signs, New+York, NYC, 7+hour, 1+hour

Two experiences of note with audio

i) Continental Airlines shows ads on their flights, before they begin the in-flight programming. In other words, through the regular audio system, not the headphone systems. The ads are very very loud. Painfully loud. You’re strapped into your seat and you can’t get away. The screens drop down, the audio starts. You have nowhere else to look and even with my fingers in my ears I could hear every damn noise in the Verizon and Are We There Yet? ads. Blecchgh.

ii) Walking through Midtown Manhattan this morning, I saw the all-too-familiar emergency-vehicle-gridlock scenario. An ambulance or fire truck is rushing somewhere, sirens wailing, but there’s nowhere for them to go - the lanes in front of them are blocked, so they sound the air horn, over and over again, to very little avail. Only this time it was slightly different - the ambulance in question had a modified type of siren, akin to the “wheep-WHEEP” they sometimes use as a honk, but it was almost verbal in its wide range of fluctuations. There was a large “vocabulary” if you will, and it seemed to convey more urgency, rather than rote pressure. I’m sure there is a human-factors alarm attendance specialist who designed this stuff (or at least who has written about it somewhere), but I’d never heard of it or heard it. I’m sure that eventually people will become used to it and tune it out, but since it was new to me, it caught my attention.

Technorati: audio, continental, flying, airlines, flight, advertising, ambulance, emergency, alarm, human+factors

A variety of 3D portraits, made from bent wire, in a restaurant window (Sushi Ann) in NYC. They are about the size of a sheet of paper. Nice stuff.

Technorati: sushiann, advertising, window, art, wire, bent

Here’s a picture I snapped in the Newark airport earlier this week. Perhaps this woman likes looking like a cyborg; I find it strange, but that’s maybe just me being judgemental.

Technorati: bluetooth, headset, newark, observation

Today I received this email

From: “Nichole Asher” nichole.xxx at xxx.com
To: steve at portigal dot com
Subject: Hefty Serve ‘n Store blog media outreach!

Hi Steve,

Let me start off by saying that I work for an agency that works for Pactiv, the maker of the new Hefty Serve ‘n Store interlocking plates & bowls. We are doing online outreach for the product through influential folks like yourself and would like to know if you’d be interested in participating in the product launch.

The company I work for is one of the world’s largest PR firms, called MS&L; we’re a subsidiary in Ann Arbor, MI called Hass MS&L. My full contact information is at the bottom of this e-mail.

I understand if you are skeptical, so I’m offering to send you links to web sites of other product launches that we’ve done and the responses showing this is legit. In fact, if you search Google using my company name (Hass MS&L) and the name of one of my co-workers (David.Binkowski@hassmsl.com) you’ll find reviews of similar product
launches where these names are referenced.

So let me cut to the chase: Noise Between Stations is *the* place to hear about new products and such, and I think your readers would find the technology behind the interlocking plates interesting. I’m wondering if I can send you information and a sample so you can try the Hefty Serve ‘n Store products. They’re not on the market yet, but I have an order coming in pre-launch.

The plates and bowls are absolutely free, and in return the only thing my client has asked is that you post a review of the product on your blog.

Please let me know if this is something you’re interested in and I will add your name to the fulfillment list today.

Thanks,
Nichole

[contact info deleted]

Now what was that? “Noise Between Stations is *the* place to hear about new products and such” - but this isn’t Noise Between Stations, it’s my blog, All This ChittahChattah. Pretty hilarious - she could have written “…is a great source of good information” or anything more general, but she had to say that it was “*the* place” - of course, then she was caught sending obvious form letters to different people, and oops, forgetting to change the contact info. We’ve all sent out dozens of resumes or whatever and we always hope that we make sure to change the info in our form letter, right? It would be a pleasure to work with you at MICROSOFT CORPORATION in REDMOND, WA. Etc.

But this person has it as their job, and they are trying to win over cynical bloggers (hey, by assuming that we’re already cynical, right?) so you’d think they’d be able to do a little better than that?

I called her on it and got this

apologize for that, I was reading the wrong blog name due to having multiple windows, so this was actually meant for you @ All This Chittah-Chattah if you are interested.

Anyway, I’m not proud. I’ll take the damn Hefty-whatsit and I’ll write about it. But I thought the poor PR effort was also blogworthy.

Technorati: Hefty, pactiv, PR, blogging, Hass+MS&L, Noise+Between+Stations

Here are some of the recent search phrases that led people to this blog:

free daily short SMS collection
brian rossiter
Keith Richards T-shirts
cell phone glue clip
steve portigal
torrentspycom
rejection hotlines in texas
oan nationwide conn
cellphones under 20.00 dollars
EMAIL ABOUT HUSBAND TYPING PENIS FOR PASS WORD
ipod rhinestones
Stereotypes Canadians
Message T-shirts, rhinestones
www.ebpp.wellsfargo.com/mortgagepay
truth behind the gates of Auschwitz
rhinestones on phones
where to send latino short stories to be published
vw beetle toddler bed
check invisible status skype
chattah
nasalguard blog
comcast autopay

Technorati: keywords, searching, popularity

I’m off to New Jersey/New York this week. I’ll be doing some meetings in NJ to kick off an exciting new project, and then hanging for a couple of days in NYC (staying at the W Hotel) to see some friends. It’s been nearly a year since I’ve been out there; looking forward to it!

Technorati: NYC, NJ, Manhattan, W+hotel, New+York, New+York+City, travel, friends, New+Jersey

Doesn’t the core of Lego’s brand reside in the physical meatspace interaction with the bricks themselves? The tactile, the auditory snik? But this Star Wars Videogame recasts Lego as an aesthetic (granted, something the underground has done for many years), a style of animation, and a proxy for kid-friendly. Sure, it’ll sell a jillion units (as will anything Anakin-tastic these days) but is this good for Lego in the long, long run?

Technorati: lego, star+wars, videogame, games, gamers, gaming, brand, design

I survive a violent assault

Forty-five minutes ago I was fortunate to survive a violent, deliberate attempt to cause me harm. I took the dog for a walk, and just around the corner - less than 3 minutes from our house, on foot - a man in a pickup truck drove directly at me.

There are no sidewalks in Montara. Pedestrians must walk on the road. The road in this case was more than wide enough for two vehicles. There was no car behind us. It was full daylight out, but not bright enough to be shining the driver’s eyes.

This was not a deserted area; in my walk I saw probably 15 other dogs (with many people), kids being dropped off, joggers, etc.

I was not invisible - I was wearing light jeans, a bright red shirt, white shoes.

There’s just no way to explain away the other person’s behavior except to identify it as vicious, deliberate, and hurtful.

The older white Mazda pickup came towards us at fairly high speed. He was driving close to the edge of the road (unusual when the whole road is open). I stopped walking and looked up at him, as if to make eye contact. He did not waver. I did the only thing I could do, I jumped off the road into the grass/ditch, at the last moment. He didn’t waver; I saw his fairly young face and sunglasses as he sped past.

In some ways, thank goodness the only choice I had was to get out of the way. Had I been holding a gun, or been ensonced in my own shell of steel and rubber, I might have given into the anger and indignation than this intent-to-harm engendered. As it is, I’m shocked and hurt, and helpless. But safe.

Technorati: Montara, community, road+rage, assault

And it was all yellow

The SFChron reports on the man who provided the chili fingertip. The whole affair has been handled by the press about as lamely as you’d expect (hype, sensationalization, etc.) - probably not as bad as Chadra Levy, Laci Peterson, et. al, but still pretty bad. But the Chron takes it way into yellow journalism, like something out of 40s-era scandal sheets about Hollywood starts caught in love-nests, etc. Here’s some of the story that seemed most egregious (and let’s start with the photo, above), making the dude out to be as much of a low-life as they can. For no reason, except, hey, it sells papers. This was a front-page story today, BTW.

Las Vegas — After days of hiding, the man whose infamous fingertip ended up in the middle of the Wendy’s chili scandal said Thursday night that his life had been thrown into a tailspin by the case.

“It’s been hell — you don’t even know!” Brian Rossiter, 36, bellowed from behind the door to his apartment at Thrift Suites, where residents pay by the week. He slammed his fists on the door and yelled obscenities as two reporters stood outside.

Rossiter said he had done nothing wrong but refused to discuss the case. He also said he was tired of the media attention and at one point shoved a television reporter before retreating behind the door.

…

Although Rossiter was terse Thursday night, he held court the day before at his favorite watering hole, the Sporting Chance Saloon, where his bar buddies refer to him by his nickname, “Fudge.”

Rossiter showed off his mangled hand, patrons said Thursday, and asked people if they wanted “to shake the most famous hand in America.”

Bar buddies bought him shots of his favorite drink, a cinnamon-flavored schnapps with gold flecks called Goldschlager.

Bartenders said he had gotten belligerent and then cursed his mother, who lives in Pennsylvania and told The Chronicle on Tuesday that her son had given away his fingertip to get out of a $50 gambling debt he had with Plascencia. A friend at the bar had to drive Rossiter home, about 5 miles away.

Ira Byrd, who lives in an apartment below Rossiter, saw him come home around 4 p.m. Wednesday. Rossiter confided in Byrd that he was having a bad day.

“I asked him why his day was bad, and he asked me if I had heard the Wendy’s chili story,” Byrd said. “Then he held up his hand and showed me it was him.”

Rick Fuller, a maintenance worker at Thrift Suites, said he believed that Rossiter would sell his fingertip for money. Rossiter was three days behind in his $175 weekly rent Thursday, said Thrift Suites chief engineer Alan Sneddon.

“Most people come in here with a story, like they lost their wallet,” Fuller said. “Rossiter just said he spent his paycheck gambling. At least he told the truth — that’s unusual around here.”
…

Technorati: journalism, yellow+journalism, media, San+Francisco+Chronicle, scandal, Wendy’s, chili, finger

A simple DIY ring

Here’s an easy DIY ring that looks cool and takes seconds to make. In this era of ReadyMade magazine and being green and beauty is where you find it, why not, I ask you? Why not, indeed?

Take an ordinary unopened carton of some beverage. We used Chocolate Silk because it’s made with Real Soy and therefore must be good for you. Open up the screw-top lid.

The freshness seal is what you want. There’s our quarry!

Take the freshness seal off. You just might want to drink some of the soymilk at this point.

Voila!

Lovely. Oops, time for a manicure!

Technorati: DIY, jewelry, groceries, chocolate, soymilk

(click on pic to enlarge)
Here’s an interesting one - spam that uses the Amazon look to lend an air of legitimacy. I hadn’t seen this before.

Technorati: spam, amazon, look+and+feel, interface, aesthetic

Skype status overload

Skype is a computer program that enables voice conversation through the Internet. It works somewhat like a Instant Message program where you have a list of contacts (i.e., buddies) and you can see if they are around or available in case you want to chat with them (in fact, Skype also has a text chat capability). It’s interesting to think about the telephone with enhanced privacy controls and status information - you know before you try to reach someone what is going on with them. I don’t know if it’s my introverted aversion to the phone or if it’s a general thing, but the lack of information before dialing (what are they doing? is it a good time to talk? can’t we pre-negotiate the conversation?) is something I don’t like about POTS (Plain Old Telephone System).

Skype has offered up way too many choices, though. I imagine they have functional differences, and those may even be documented somewhere, but on their face, they are totally confusing, especially if you build on the IM model that has offline, online, online (but invisible), online (but away).

What is the difference between Online and SkypeMe?
What is the difference between Not Available, Do Not Disturb, and Away?

It’d be very interesting to find out how people understand and use these status indicators - both as explicit choices that people make about their own status, and of course on the other end, how other people interpret the status indicators about their contacts and how they interpret that.

I’ve noted that I can still receive chat messages in some states, and it is a surprise to me, since I’m sort of hoping to be left alone when I set that state. But I haven’t figured out all the variations and all the differences within those. I’m sure it’s been analyzed somewhere, but a quick Google search didn’t help me out very much.

Technorati: skype, status, communication, VOIP

Epson tolerates grey market goods

I recently tried to order some replacement ink for my printer (an Epson 820). I placed an order online with the same place I had used before, DataBazaar. Here’s a picture of what I have always ordered, ink refill part # T026201

Here’s a picture of what they sent me, ink refill part # T026. Notice that absolutely does not say my printer model number on the package.

I contacted Epson support by email and explained what I ordered and what I got, and asked “Is there a difference in spec between the two inks? Will this work with my printer?”

First response

Thank you for contacting the Epson Connection.

Epson recommends that you use only genuine Epson ink cartridges which have
been manufactured by Epson using the most advanced quality processes and
inks specifically formulated for your Epson printer. The use of non-Epson
ink cartridges or ink refill may cause damage to your printer. These
products may also reduce the quality of your printer output.

Which of course is no answer at all. What I got was an actual Epson product. But a foreign package that conspicuously omits my printer’s model number. I asked again and was told

There should be no spec. difference. Most packaging will not have the full serial number for the cartridges. Thank you for your patience.

Isn’t that totally ridiculous? What does that mean that they don’t have the full serial number? This person is just making up answers.

DataBazaar is selling grey market ink. And Epson’s support is too lame to understand or care.

I contacted DataBazaar via their “24/7″ email contact, but 48 hours later they have yet to respond. I then called them and they claim never to have received my email because of some “spam blocking.” Further, they told me the ink was fine, and when I explained that it did NOT have my printer model number on it, they explained that there wasn’t enough room on the packaging to list all the model numbers.

Okay, so I’m aggravated because I am dealing with a range of people that communicate badly, that cause extra work on my end, and that basically lie to me, but if I could step away from myself (believe me, it’s hard) and think about this from the manufacturer’s point of view - this is terrible for them. Printers and ink is a complete mess - there are so many different kinds of ink, so many supported printer models, lack of clarity around the quality issues of branded ink, paper, refillable stuff, and even more issues about hardware lockouts of generic ink without proprietary chips to enable them, etc. etc. Customers are not comfortable with the purchase, with so much mythology and misinformation flying. Shouldn’t buying new ink be as easy as filling up your car with gas? Annoyingly expensive, but pretty damn easy in terms of compatability.

And now, the manufacturer and the retailer themselves - the ones that sell the Epson product - are creating confusion and mistrust. It’s bad enough to fend off misinformation from the competition, but even your own supply chain is filled with crap.

I feel bad for Epson.

Update: I opened the package and the actual product itself looked identical to North American version I took out of the printer.

Technorati: epson, databazaar, mythology, printer, ink+jet, gray+market, grey+market

‘88 Dodge Aries is a fake TV ad for what was my first car. I can’t remember what year it was, but I bought it used. It had a really really awful smell in it, like an animal had died in it, but it took 3 months for the dealership perfume to wear off and for me to notice the smell. It needed a new radiator, but I had no idea; I just knew that even with the heat off, in the dead of winter, I couldn’t wear a jacket while I drove on the highway or I’d be just too hot.

I put a lot of miles on it, and then eventually it died - I think right around the time we traded it in for something else.

Categories: ad, advertising, parody, humor, humour, K+car, Dodge+Aries, nostalgia, auto, automotive, car

The finger that a woman said she found in a bowl of Wendy’s chili came from an associate of her husband who lost the digit in an industrial accident, police said Friday.

The man is from Nevada and lost a part of his finger in an accident last December, Davis said. His identity was traced through a tip made to Wendy’s hot line, he said. He said authorities ‘positively confirmed that this subject was in fact the source of the fingertip.’

And now we know.

Categories: mystery, finger, Wendy’s, Anna+Ayala

Yahoo is the latest incompetent organization for support.

I’m having very frustrating problems with my Yahoo email account - not the free stuff some people have; SBCGlobal/Yahoo is my ISP, I pay for ‘em.

I really only use that account for Undercover, the Rolling Stones mailing list I run. The problems became much clearer when list traffic picked up dramatically over the last few days. Email from sbcglobal.net members - myself included - was taking hours to get to the distribution list. I went through a process to “whitelist” under-cover.net with Yahoo, but they rejected us, since it’s a mailing list, not an ISP (or something? I don’t quite understand what the problem was - they want it all to trace back to a unique IP address - ironically I’m having almost the opposte problem with AOL, but that’s a separate post).

Here’s what they told me

Since your emails are not sent from a dedicated IP address used solely for your mailings, we cannot systematically exempt your email from our SpamGuard technology.

Please be aware that Yahoo! Mail users are able to set their own preferences for the manner in which they receive your mailings. If the recipients of your messages want to ensure they receive your emails in their Inbox, you may want to ask them to set up a filter in Yahoo! Mail specifically for your emails, or have them add your email address(es) to their Yahoo! Address Book.

The problem goes back; I actually had problems with all the admin messages the list software generates being tagged as “bulk” by Yahoo and no matter how many times I tagged them as “not spam” they’d still end up as bulk. I finally gave up on their filtering software and had them just deliver all the bulk email to me. I couldn’t override their insistence that it was all bulk. Nothing like having something like that out of your own control.

But anyway now my own messages are ending up in the bulk folder. When I post to my own list, it ends up as bulk, and all the other SBCglobal.net subscribers are finding the same thing.

I put my own address in my Yahoo address book. Which makes no sense, but okay. When I send email from my client software (i.e., I use Eudora, but the same idea as using Outlook) it ends up as Bulk. When I sent it from their web interface, it doesn’t. That seems totally weird.

I responded to the whitelist rejection with this info. Today I got this response.

Subject: Re: Customer Support Request Site Change
From: billing@ameritech.net

Dear SBC Internet Customer,
Our Support Request site has recently changed.
Please submit your question or comment via our new online form available at
>.
Thank you for contacting SBC Yahoo!

Why the heck am I getting email from Ameritech, a company I’ve never done business with? I clicked on their link and am given an opportunity to contact support. And then it asks for my password. I get really nervous - isn’t this a standard phishing technique? I spend a few minutes convincing myself the site is legit, and go through the process of entering all my contact info and then typing up the problem in detail, and I hit submit.

“We’re sorry; there’s been a techincal problem. Please wait a few minutes and try again.”

!!!

And when I hit “back” on the browser, all the data I’ve typed in is gone.

This is so incredibly frustrating. Really hair-tearing out stuff. Argh. Yahoo, you sux!

Update: Maybe they did process my response (after that billing@ameritech message telling me they didn’t) because I just received this

Hello,

Thank you for contacting Yahoo! Customer Care.

We appreciate the information you have provided and are looking into the
delivery issue you reported. Please be assured that we’re continuing to
take steps to make Yahoo! Mail the best email service on the planet.

Thank you again for contacting Yahoo! Customer Care.

Update: Seems that my emails getting flagged as spam may have stopped as of May 16, 3 days after I first posted this? I never heard back about any resolution, but I notice that was the point at which the symptoms ceased. Who knows?

Technorati: yahoo, customer+service, sbcglobal, phishing, tech+support, email, bulk, whitelist

Here’s what I need - a good search engine for blogs (and technorati and blogdex are useless, so don’t even go the