SIGNAL VS. NOISE

Thank you, 37

Well, my month as Guest Poster here is just about over. Big thanks for spot! I'd be a fool not to throw out a general "Request For Ideas" to the fine readers of this site for improvements to Meetup.com (or my side-site, Fotolog.net).... Fire away!

Friendster & TMI

Co-Workers on Friendster: TMI
Don`t really want to know that much about them.
They said that the Internet would allow you to maintain multiple personas & aliases.
Instead, blogs, Friendster, and Google force you to maintain a single persona to all the disparate people in your world (current and past friends, family, co-workers, etc).
That`s big.

Sorry Kids

Santa Claus Found Dead In Mundelein Home. He was 59.

A New Server

Announcement: Over the next 10 days or so, we'll be moving the 37signals' sites (including Signal vs. Noise, eNormicom, Design Not Found) to a brand new, fast dedicated server. So, please bear with us during the transition. We apologize in advance for any downtime.

Bare Necessities

The 'O' Tissue Ring is a great example of how something must be deeply understood before it can be simplified. Its designer rethought the tissue box and decided just to keep the hole.

He says simplicity is "so rare and precious and so easily destroyed by good intentions that it takes a constant effort to keep the clutter from creeping in."

A Simpler Time

Some incredible, uplifting automobile/lifestyle images from EphemeraNow. And be sure to check out these old ads too (including this one by DuPont for Cellophane, and this one for asparagus by Campbell's and this one for New York Air Brake). [original link credit: Coudal].

Shovellog

Brilliant: This guy seems to have coded a webpage to pull random excerpts from random LiveJournals and put them into a newspaper front-page format: LJ Times. Pointless and ugly, but is somehow a glimpse into some part of the future.

Seeking Beta Testers for Misto

For the past few months we've been hard at work on something we've been calling Misto. We're about ready to enter the beta stages and are seeking a few good folks to put it through its paces.

I can't say much about Misto right now, but the type of people we're looking for are freelance web developers/designers and small web firms (5 people max). Firms/teams with remote workers would also be good candidates. Beta testers will receive one year free upon release. Misto will be a web-based application/service.

If you are interested, email misto [at] 37signals.com. I can't guarantee I'll be able to get back to everyone, but those who are chosen will know shortly. Thank you.

Somethin' for Nothin'

According to a new Billboard Poll, 61% of people polled said that the base price at such online outlets as Apple's iTunes is too expensive for them.

The largest group, 32%, said 99 cents was simply too much for just one song. Another 29% preferred a less legal approach, agreeing with the statement "Why pay for it when I can download it elsewhere online for free?"

"Why pay for it when I can download it elsewhere online for free." Unbelievable. You know, this somethin' for nothin' culture is digging a deep hole. Deep. It's a part of the landscape now. This is going to hurt everyone in the long run.

The Good Worm

There's a new worm in town called "Welchia" or "Nachi," but unlike Blaster, "it purports to patch the hole Blaster exploited to enter into computers in the first place and tries to clean up after Blaster if the computer is infected with it."

A good worm. A good virus. A vaccine. Interesting. Are there any good applications for such a thing? Is the "good virus" model worth considering for software patch distribution or transparent bug fixes?

Post-Blackout Sushi

The lights went out, there was no refrigeration for a day or so. Yet, mysteriously, a day later, city shelves were filled with "fresh" milk, meat, fish, produce, etc.... Where did it come from? Would you eat post-blackout sushi? I said no, and my girlfriend called me a wuss. You?

Quick BloggingWorks Update

UPDATE: The September BloggingWorks Workshop is full. There are still spots available for the October 3rd workshop. Check out the agenda and sign up before this one fills up too.

Desks For The Real World

Designer's dream desk for i-things is an article about another one of these newfangled desks with arms for every purpose. I don't know... Maybe it's just me, but I'd prefer a clean flat surface. These ergonomic octopus desks sound great in theory, but they don't seem to live up to the hype in the real world. For example, what if I want to write something down on a piece of paper? Where is the empty piece of paper shelf? Or what about a desk lamp (or desk phone)? Or where does a book go? Or, what if I want to toss an unpaid bill on my desk so I don't forget to pay it. Or, what about my mail? Where does that go? I feel like a flat open surface is infinitely more customizable than one of these desks that promise customization. Perhaps these desks are more for highly specialized tasks, and not meant for every day use, but I'm not sure they're being marketed that way.

I do agree that the cable management aspect is a powerful selling point, but with the advent of wireless peripherals, I think wires are going to become less of an issue in the (near) future for the type of people who would purchase such a hi-tech desk.

Has anyone used one of these sorts of desks for an extended period of time?

Verizon Push To Talk

Looks like Verizon is going after Nextel with their new Push To Talk service. I'm surprised it's taken this long for another cell provider to offer walkie-talkie like service. What's most interesting about the new Verizon service is the buddy-list-like functionality:

Icons appear directly on the handset, indicating which users are available to participate in a walkie-talkie call so the customer doesnt waste valuable time attempting to identify which contact is available.

Is this the beginning of the merging of phones and instant messaging? This convergence is the first one that really makes sense to me. Computer and TV? Nope. Internet and refrigerator? No. Cars and the Internet? Maybe. Phone and instant messaging? Yes. You know, some sort of device that would allow me to call people with numbers, or two-way audio-chat (ala iChat AV which uses CDMA technology) with people on my AOL IM buddy list.

Eureka

We're not designers, or programmers, or information architects, or copywriters, or customer experience consultants, or whatever else people want to call themselves these days... Bottom line: We're risk managers. Designers who sell "design," programmers who sell "code," information architects who sell "diagrams" are selling the wrong thing. The thing to sell is reduced risk for the client. That's what people want.

Selecting the Right Moving Van

So I'm preparing to move across town and was curious how much it might cost to rent a truck for the day. After Googling up a crop of truck rental services, I visited Budget and Ryder. Both sites have their downsides (poor Javascript error checking on Budget being one glaring problem), but what struck me immediately was how differently both companies approached truck selection.

If you look at Ryder, for example, they give you 3 initial radio buttons to choose between the big classes of trucks they rent. Then, however, they place the burden on you to figure out the difference between "Parcel Van" and "Panel Van."

There's a better way, as Budget illustrates:

Instead of making you choose based on truck names the company understands, Budget provides photos of each option as well as helpful measurements. They then detail how many bedrooms you can expect to fit inside each of the trucks they rent. Very smart.

BloggingWorks for Press Pages

Hey Jason, if you're looking for a good BloggingWorks case study, check out the masterful work of our communications guy, Myles Weissleder, at press.meetup.com. Less interesting is how he catalogs media coverage as a weblog. More interesting is the left-side nav of "Internal Info" and "External Info" -- including one-click searches of Google News and blog-watch sites for mentions of Meetup. So obvious, yet so innovative.

What's your "Hot Donuts Now " sign?

Fortune Magazine: "Everybody knows that when a Krispy Kreme store flips on its neon hot doughnuts now sign, the doughnuts are coming right off the line. Around 1980 the folks in Winston noticed sales at the Chattanooga store were going through the roof. HQ decided to send a man up to Chattanooga for a look-see. Turns out the store manager, Bob Glidden, had printed up an ordinary block sign that read hot doughnuts now. But his customers complained that he kept the sign up all the time, even when his doughnuts weren't hot. So Glidden went down to J.C. Penney and bought a window shade. When he wasn't making doughnuts he pulled the shade closed; when he was cooking, he pulled open the blind and customers streamed in."

Apple Xserve

We're considering moving our web server platform over to OS X Server and the Apple Xserve. Has anyone had any experience with the Xserve (as a web/mail server) or remote management of the Xserve (we'd be colocating it)? Any comments, opinions, thoughts, or concerns they want to share? Anything would be appreciated. And, if anyone is looking to sell one (or knows where we could get a really good deal on one), let me know too. Thanks.

"Save" Buttons on the Web and Desktop

Traditional web-based interfaces for editing documents (like blogging tools, database front ends, and Secret Projects) have a "Save" or "Update" button at the bottom of the page below the form elements. What happened to the toolbar from our desktop apps? Is it strange that we don't see a group of options like "New", "Save", "Delete", etc. in a group above our forms?

Maybe the current trend stems from the fact that toolbars in desktop apps don't scroll with the document and buttons on web apps do. This makes sense, but is it also sensible to assume that the editing process is linear, and the editor will be at the bottom of the page when s/he's through?

What do you think?

A Few Unrelated Thoughts

This can't be good for property value in and around Seattle (especially Orting).

And, completely unrelated, if you haven't seen the photos over at Quarlo yet, you really should.

Senator Bob Graham calls himself the "original blogger" on his official weblog.

Names Labels Titles Roles Whatever

Mark Hurst's latest column, Usability Professionals Must Disappear, is fresh fresh air.

Somehow "user experience practitioner" doesn't roll off the tongue so easily. Hence the inevitable effort for UX-types to name what it is they do: at conferences and in newsletters, for years, I've seen the endless discussions. Should it be "usability professional"? "Information designer"? "Interaction architect"? Some other permutation?... Here's my proposal - easy to pronounce, easy to understand, just two easy words: "Who cares?"

Thank you Mark.

Mark goes on to explain how these endless, self-indulgent "what should we call ourselves" discussions may serve the people in the profession well, but it only serves to confuse co-workers and clients -- the very people the "user-centered interaction usability architects" need to work with in order to achieve true success.

Mark's article reminds me of companies that are obsessed with process, not the end product. In the end, it doesn't matter what you call yourself, what other people call you, or how detailed and meticulous the prescribed proprietary process is. What really matters is achieving the desired results. Yes, a solid, proven process can help get you there, but going through the pre-defined paces is not how you should judge the success of a project.

BTW... For more job title masturbation, see this page from the original 37signals Manifesto. Yes, those are all real job titles from our competitors back in 1999.

Glossary Anxiety

We take it for granted that we can track packages over the web. UPS takes us for granted when they use industry lingo that their customers aren't familiar with. This lingo was originally developed for internal use, but now that the internal stuff is public stuff, they really should make it easier for their consumer customers to find out what it all means.

In order to find out what these different "scans" mean, I have to click on the help link in the left sidebar then find "What events are recorded about packages?" inside the "Tracking Number FAQ" which is listed among a sea of links.

Now, I realize that some of activity descriptions aren't that hard to figure out, but if they do define the terms elsewhere, why not make it easier for their customers to find them?

We recommend three simple solutions:

1. If you must use unfamilar lingo, define the lingo ("Activity" terms in the case of UPS) on the same page where I can track the package
2. Again, if you must use lingo, provide a direct link on the tracking page to the part of the FAQ where the terms are defined.
3. Don't use lingo. Replace the lingo with terms or phrases we can understand. For example, instead of "PICKUP SCAN" say "We've picked up the package from the shipper." Or, for "ARRIVAL SCAN" say "The package has arrived at our Chicago-area hub." Each item should be linked to a "more info" page where detailed descriptions of what proceeded and follows a particular step can be explained.

And, finally, why isn't "Destination Scan" defined anywhere?

Where's The Beef?

Bootstrapping the Net revolution

Now that Internet hype and disaster have long since faded from the headlines, its interesting to watch the pattern of businesses making a play for the Web. You probably wont see it on the cover of Fortune or Business 2.0, but theres a surprisingly consistent profile of small businesses that are quietly picking up the pieces of the dot-com wreck.

I've been waiting for mainstream media to pick up on this. But... Why no mention of a single company in the article? Not a name, not a link, not a description of what they do or who they serve, not a quote about why they've chosen to bootstrap, nothing. I want to know more about what makes the small companies tick, what keeps them going, their secrets to success. But, instead, I run into a dead-end. This article reads like the dot-com-bomb devoid of substance fluff he's railing against.

Damage From Emissions Control Testing?

A friend of mine has been posting this message on a few different car sites, and he asked me to post it here too. Hopefully someone can offer some legal insight.

Up until 1999, the State of Illinois let the owner drive the car during the stationary emissions test, but now the state mandates that the emissions test workers must drive the car. The main issue my friend has is that his car has a manual transmission and the test requires the tester to go through the gears to achieve a certain speed and RPM reading. Problem is that the car's transmission can be damaged by someone who doesn't shift correctly or by the stationary test itself, and making a damage/liability claim against the State is virtually impossible.

Here's the gist of the post:

"...I do not dispute the environmental objectives but definitiely question the IM240/dynanometer tests. There have been numerous documented and certainly many unreported incidents of damage to brakes, transmissions and engines directly related to testing procedures. It was my understanding that several states, responding to public outcry and damage claims, ceased dynamometer testing. Why should the IEPA require someone other than the vehicle's owner to take control during testing? This was not the case prior to 1999 (intro of IM240/dynamometer), and, in my opinion, violates personal property rights."

Does he have a case or is he out of luck? My friend's point is that his car is his own personal property and the state doesn't have the right to force him to give up control so someone else can drive it (even if it's for a test). Just as the state needs a warrant to enter your home, they shouldn't be able to enter your car and control it for a test -- especially when the acceleration test can be performed by the owner as it was up until 1999 (and is still in other states). Is there any hope here?

Smart Product and Smart Packaging

SendStation recently announced the PocketDock which "lets you connect the new iPods docking port to a standard 6-pin FireWire cable, thus delivering on the iPods promise of freedom and independence." Great product, great design, great presentation, etc. Good stuff. But, what I really liked was this packaging option on their order page:

What a great idea. Everyone wins: They save money on shipping and packaging, less packaging saves the environment, and you get that all day fresh, environmentally responsible feeling. I hope more companies follow their lead. And, in related news, Irish take lead with plastic bag levy.

Monarch in Chicago

Snapped some shots of a Monarch Butterfly outside my window this morning.

Sam Phillips, Platform-maker

Sam Phillips died Wednesday. He discovered Elvis and was a key inventor of rock & roll. A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure taking the public tour of his Sun Studio in Memphis, and it was awesome. Couple notes:
1. Most of the tour is spent standing in the actual studio while listening to audio that was recorded in that room. You stand in the room where Johnny Cash sang "I Walk The Line" into a microphone. And you listen to that recording. Whooosh! Just try not to get goose bumps. No kiosks, DVDs, or fancy tour schmaltz. Simple experience design at its finest.
2. Elvis came in off the street and paid $4 to record a song at Sun Studio. Photoblogger David Gallagher says "self-publishing is the best thing about the Web" and I agree. Self-publishing didn't begin with the web. One could argue that Elvis may not have changed the world (and affected the culture that we all live in) if Sam Phillips didn't make a self-publishing platform.

A Bit About Scott Heiferman, August's Guest Poster

A little something about Scott Heiferman, our guest poster for August. Scott is the co-founder and CEO of Meetup, as well as the co-creator of Fotolog (here's Scott's Fotolog). Scott also founded itraffic, first ad agency dedicated to online media, which he sold to Agency.com back in 1999. And, in the middle of all this activity, Scott worked at McDonald's. For more background, here's a recent MSNBC article about Scott and Meetup. Yes, Scott's been busy.

I first met Scott when he came to Chicago to meet the crew at 37signals back in 2000. I remember getting a call from him asking if he could fly out to meet with us for a few hours. He didn't really give a reason, and he didn't come with an agenda. He just wanted to chat. And chat we did. And then a year or so later, we met up again at SxSW over some coffee. He told me about this idea he had called Meetup. And he asked us if we wanted to design it. After he washed away my natural skepticism, I agreed and we got started a few months later. We've since completed three projects for Meetup. I've always found that the best business relationships start by sitting around a table with no expectations or agendas. Just some friendly words, mutual respect, and a shared vision to do good work.

It's been a real pleasure watching Meetup grow into a force that is changing America's political landscape. Plus, who can't get behind an idea that uses the internet to get people away from the internet? It's so simple. The whole Meetup phenomenon is really fascinating.

Scott is a true visionary and a hell of a nice guy. I think his best strength is that he's a great listener. And, now, at SvN, we get to listen to him. It's a real pleasure to have him here. Take it away Scott.