April 2007 Archives

• 30 Apr 2007

  Coffee + News = Nerdery

  News Brews is Benjamin Brown's ITP master's thesis. It's a device that uses news feeds as a data source and produces a proportionate blend of coffees from the news origin. You can view the ITP thesis page or his thesis documentation, Beverage Informatics, for more information. Oh, and he's working on a java applet. So geeky. (How about one in Cocoa?)

• 30 Apr 2007

  Chopstick Meets the Fork

  Another one to add to my ongoing fascination with chopstick design -- The Chork is a cross between a fork and a chopstick.

• 30 Apr 2007

  ITP Thesis Presentations; Spring Show 2007

  ITP thesis presentations are available via streaming video beginning Monday, April 30 through Friday May 4. (UPDATE: I've been encountering problems viewing the video stream from Firefox but it launched without problems on Safari. Also, I haven't been able to join the chat -- seems to be at capacity. ) CNET's recent profile of NYU's ITP describes the program as an "unusual physical specimen." Also, mark your calendars for the ITP Spring Show, Tuesday, May 8 and Wednesday, May 9 from 5-9pm.

• 29 Apr 2007

  Stapler that doesn't use metal staples

  If you're stapling just a few sheets of paper, consider using the Staple Free Stapler. Really nice design staples sheets by tucking the paper into itself. No more prying off staples with your fingernails or choking the shredder by accidentally feeding it metal staples.

• 29 Apr 2007

  Tracking Viralness -- Literally

  Are you sick? If so, you may just want to visit Who is Sick as you recuperate. Just enter your illness info and you can get a summary of sickness trends in your area as well as other things that any hypochondriac would love.

• 29 Apr 2007

  Org Charts in the Age of Web 2.0

  I love Forbes' new *experiment* -- tapping into the knowledge of Web users to help construct org charts for various companies wiki-style: Forbes: Org Chart WIki. Reminds me of They Rule.

• 29 Apr 2007

  Comprehensive Table of Visualization Methods

  Not sure why the author(s) decided to present these as a pseudo periodic table (there's no connection with the logic behind how chemical elements are arranged in periodic tables) but it's a handy collection of useful visualization types, nonetheless -- and it makes impressive cocktail napkin sketches! A Periodic Table of Visualization Methods

• 9 Apr 2007

  The Civil Web

  Sparked in part by recent death threats to Kathy Sierra, Tim O'Reilly and Jimmy Wales are "proposing a blogger code of conduct to clean up the quality of online discourse" based on community guidelines drafted by BlogHer for its community. A Call for Manners in the World of Nasty Blogs. Yes, count me in. And yes, too bad we even need something like this.