SIGNAL VS. NOISE

You know, just in case...

Cassini -- the craft on the way to Saturn -- "carries a DVD record of 616,400 handwritten signatures from 81 countries around the globe, including the mission's namesakes, Jean-Dominique Cassini and Christiaan Huygens, lifted from 17th-century letters."

Building of Basecamp: Recap and New Session

So the first Building of Basecamp workshop has come and gone. If you'd like some details on what was covered and how it went, you can read Deane's thorough and thoughtful review. Here's another review (sandwiched inside a great first-person account of his visit to Chicago -- including two great shots of the new Frank Ghery bandshell in Millennium Park).

Special thanks to the folks who made the trek out from London and Hawaii to attend. Maybe next time we can come to you! And for the visually inclined, here are some photos of the event: David looking tough, Ryan looking out on the crowd, Ryan admiring the Project Overview screen, Me (Jason) demonstrating how tall I'd like to be, the crew (minus Matt, the photographer) and the space, David, Jason, and a piece of Ryan, and sucking up the knowledge. If you took some photos that you want us to share, please send them along.

Speaking of next time, how's September 17 sound? Yep, we'll be holding another Building of Basecamp Workshop on September 17th, here in Chicago. Only 40 seats are available, and the last workshop sold out, so make sure you sign up before you miss this one.

Building of Basecamp in your city?
Also... We'd like to bring the Building of Basecamp workshop to your city. If you're interested in lending a hand with scouting out a venue and promotion, let's chat. We've also had a lot of interest from Europe. We're considering London, Barcelona, and Rome. If you're interested in helping make this happen, please drop us a line at workshop at 37signals.com. Thanks.

BTW: Here are a couple of other comments we've received so far:

"This workshop has changed the way I think, design and develop web applications. Amazing, truly amazing." -Aaron Post

"Building Basecamp was the bomb -- I got so much out of the day I feel full. I know a seminar's great when I can feel still feel the energy buzz afterwards, and can transfer that excitement to my designer. We were talking about it all morning long! Great job, and much thanks to you, David, Matt, and Ryan for hosting such a great event." -Nicholas Gracilla

"I know I said this to all of you several times but I wanted to thank you all again for putting on such a great show. I was actually surprised at a lot of the philosophical ideas and plans of attack that seemed to be a slap in the face of most of the joints I've worked with. Efficiency at it's best! I figured I would learn how to make more effective online applications. I left with a lot more. Seeing how you work together and how important an understanding and respecting team was to accomplishing goals helped me tremendously." -Dan Ritz

"The Building of Basecamp Workshop followed 37signals' sensibilities: clear, straightforward and effective; it was conversational, engaging and changed as needed to address the interests of the workshop's participants. The techniques and philosophy that the guys presented jump-started my own mind in terms of how they could be incorporated into my company's environment. Worth every penny." -Gregg Hartling

"I am a senior in the columbia college chicago interactive multimedia department who attended your Building of Basecamp workshop last Friday. I just wanted to drop you an email to let you know what a valuable experience your seminar was. I am especially grateful that the workshop focused such an ample amount of time on the business aspects of the production of Basecamp. This critical element is something that teachers and textbooks cannot convey well." -Walker Hamilton

So, thanks again and we look forward to doing it all over again on September 17th! We've even extended the day an hour so we we have ample time for even more questions and material.

Coudal: We're jealous

Our friends, officemates, purveyors of Jewelboxing, and rent collectors at Coudal Partners have launched their long awaited redesign (known as "4"). And it's a beauty. Big headlines (I see a trend coming -- of course its already been there in print), "widescreen" photos, color schemes and link colors that change based on the primary image palette, and a calming balance of black and white. And don't forget the real key -- the great copywriting and engaging links. Yes, we're jealous. Well done fellas.

Features on demand

I love this. TreoCentral, a community site built around the Palm One Treo Smartphone series, needs a driver so the Treo 600 can use standard bluetooth cards:

We want Bluetooth on our Treo 600 and we're willing to pay for it. Sure, we could wait for the "next generation" Treo, which will have built in Bluetooth, but we don't want to have to upgrade our Treos just to add Bluetooth functionality.

So, instead of just complaining, they are asking their members to put their money where their collective mouths are. They've started a donation-driven Bluetooth Bounty to raise the necessary development funds to make this happen. The first person to develop a working bluetooth driver for the Treo 600 wins the pot (over $3900 at last count).

This is the free market system at its best. Got any other examples of sites/companies raising money on a build-this-feature basis?

Grant Lee Phillips: Virginia Creeper

Grant Lee Phillips' new record, Virginia Creeper, is a really beautiful record. If you're looking for rootsy, folksy, loose, acoustic, and laid back "Americana" songs that take their time, get it at Amazon or the Apple iTunes Music Store. You can also read some reviews if you'd like.

CRM: What does it mean to you?

CRM is all the rage these days. From Salesforce.com to Peoplesoft, CRM applications sound like they are must haves for growing businesses. But are they? I keep hearing about CRM-this, CRM-that, but I still don't know how 37signals would use a CRM tool. Plus, I feel like CRM tools are tailored towards the big guys, not small business. Do you think CRM can help the small guys? Are you using CRM software to manage your business? What does CRM mean for you? Or, better yet, what does it do for you?

While we wait...

We're gathering feedback from the Building of Basecamp workshop we had on Friday. We'll be posting some notes shorty. But, in the meantime, here's a list of "Rejected Names for Basecamp" from the blackboard in the bathroom. Special thanks for Jim Coudal and Dave Reidy for getting this started.

Update: A workshop attendee took this cool photo (much bigger version) from the top of the Sears Tower. Why would you want to be anywhere else besides Chicago?

Chicago news: A gold mine

Cold Stone Creamery is moving into Bucktown where Sorbino Men's Wear was (which is next to Cheetah Gym and across from Piece). Can you say gold mine?

Sapien Bookcase: Good design stands out

Design Within Reach just started selling the Sapien Bookcase -- a new twist on the old bookcase. Instead of standing your books upright on their spines, the Sapien encourages you to stack the books as you might on a coffee table. The simple execution and new way of thinking leads to an efficient and space saving design (don't you just love how the bookcase itself virtually vanishes?). Further, it's just interesting to look at the spines this way instead of in the traditional vertical orientation. It's really a great spin on the played-out standard bookcase design. I like it a lot.

From the Back of the Room

As some of you might know, 37signals shares a big, lofty studio space just west of the Loop in Chicago with Coudal Partners. Today that space is filled with folding chairs for The Building of Basecamp Workshop. For some of the CP crew, that means a nice, breezy, well-deserved summer day off. For others, it's a chance to watch the guys in action and maybe sneak into the lunch-line too. For Jason, Matt, Ryan and David, it means a day full of PowerPoint Keynote slides and no time to post to SvN, so I thought I'd chime in.

Time permitting, I'll see if I can get few candid snaps or bits of video of the 37s crew doing their thing to post here later. Meanwhile, what should we chat about? After Basecamp, the most talked about thing in the city today is the weekend series between the Cubs and the beloved White Sox, starting this afternoon at The Cell. If the Sox can get to Prior this afternoon, the whole weekend ought to fall right into place...

An almost great idea: Perforated Pizza

Ok, almost great idea #2... Perforated Pizza. Ever watch people share a large pizza? Some people want a huge slice, others just a little sliver. But, we're all at the whim of how the pie was cut up. Unless the pizza is perforated.

Yeah, imagine a perforated pizza with 36 wedges (NY style wedges, not square style) -- each 10 degrees of the full 360 degree circle. So, if you want a small piece, you pull/tear out a 10 degree slice. If you want a bigger slice, maybe tear out 20 degrees. Want a full quarter? Pull out 90 degrees. You get the drift.

But here's where the almost comes in: Cheese. Curse that oozy, melting, "enemy of perforations" cheese.

An almost great idea: Strike-Anywhere Cigarettes

I'm always watching people do things, struggle with things, and get things. And, from time to time an idea pops into my head that I think would solve a common problem (although I know I'll never do anything with most of them). Truth is, most of them are almost great ideas -- there's usually one flaw that takes them down. But, who knows... So, in the spirit of sharing, here's an almost great idea:

Strike-Anywhere Cigarettes. I see people asking for a light all the time. "Got a light?" "Anyone got a light?" "Hey, babe, got fire?" Etc. Well, who needs a light when you have a strike-anywhere cigatette? Think strike-anywhere matches. Just strike the end of the cig against a rough surface, and it would ignite. Then take a drag and the burn begins.

Yes, there are flaws (namely that the cigarette would probably snap on the strike, but that could be solved by supplying a hard tube in the package that you insert the cig into prior to striking it). But, hey, I thought I'd throw it out there. Any comments?

New Sedaris Story

"Us and Them," the first story in David Sedaris' new book "Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim." (NY Times)

Buying and Selling Tickets Online

StubHub.com is a site where you can buy or sell tickets to sporting events, concerts and theater (100% guaranteed). Unlike eBay, StubHub.com handles all the payment processing and shipping details, tracks your tickets at every point in the transaction process, and offers live customer service 7 days a week.

Proud of Nothing

Steve Jobs: "I'm as proud of the products that we have not done as I am of the ones we have done." [in WSJ interview, via Kottke]

On Principle: Standing up for your rights

We recently won our biggest job of the year (money-wise). However, during the contract negotiations (in which they required us to use their contract), we ran into a snag regarding when ownership rights to the work would be transferred from us to them. They say that they own the rights to the work even before they pay for it and we say they have to pay for the work in full before they own it. Our view is that it's like a car loan or a home mortgage -- the bank still owns the title to the property until you're all paid up. We think that's fair and reasonable.

Their language read:

Except as provided below, all tangible and intangible material and work product delivered under the Statement of Work and any additional statements of work that become part of this Agreement (including any source code and object code) (collectively, the "Deliverables") will become the property of Company... Consultant hereby grants Company, a royalty-free, irrevocable, fully paid up, worldwide, non-exclusive, sublicensable right and license to use, reproduce, publish and modify any Consultant Property contained in any Deliverable.

Our terms read:

Prior to payment of all amounts due under this Agreement, Developer shall solely and exclusively own any and all rights materials designed, developed, created, and/or completed by Developer for Client under this Agreement... Upon payment of all amounts due under this Agreement, Client solely and exclusively owns any and all deliverables developed by Developer for Client pursuant to this Agreement.

That was the sticking point. They said no. We said no. Their corporate legal team wouldn't budge. Finally, after some hardball, they came back with this revision:

Rights to the work are not transferred until payment is received, except for amounts disputed in good faith.

That was basically the last straw for me. What does "except for amounts disputed in good faith" mean? And what's so unreasonable about this clear and reasonable concept: You don't own it until it's all paid up. Period. And, if you really want to own it immediately, you can always pay the full amount up front.

So, even though this was a sizable amount of money, I respectfully turned it down. Here is a copy of the email I sent (names removed). Note that there are some additional details in this letter that were not discussed in the message above, but also played a part in turning down the work:

Given everything that's transpired, the only language we can accept is "Rights are not transfered until payment is made in full."

And, frankly, I'm starting to wonder if COMPANY is the type of company we want to do work for. We completely enjoyed working with you on the original redesign. Just loved it. But, the new corporate mentality -- especially from legal -- it has me questioning if this is a good fit for us.

We feel taken advantage of (we have to use your contract even though we're doing the work, we have to abide by your payment terms even though we're the ones submitting the invoices, we have to abide by your promotion restrictions even though you wouldn't have found us originally if all our other clients also prevented us from using their name in our client list, etc).

We've always stood for fairness -- and we demand this from our clients as well. It's nothing personal, but I'm not feeling good about this and think we're going to have to turn down this project at this time. It's a big project to walk away from, but we have to stand up for what we believe in. I'm sorry.

I felt we had to take a stand. We had to do what was right -- not what was easy (it would be easy to take the money and agree to the unreasonable terms). Our work should remain our work until a client pays for it. Period. If firms like us give in then terms like these will become an accepted part of the landscape. We shouldn't allow ourselves to be pushed around and made to agree to unreasonable demands. And that's why I said no.

The computer's hidden history

It's common knowledge that the origin of computers was in mathematics, but what's less commonly known is that the computer was invented to shed light on a philosophical crisis in the foundations of pure mathematics. Here's a summary of what happened, with Wikipedia links a'plenty for your perusal.

In the late 19th century, Georg Cantor freaked everyone out with his (theologically inspired) work on infinite sets. Set theory kicked mathematics further up the ladder of abstraction and put its very foundations into question.

In his 2000 talk at Carnegie-Mellon on this subject, G. J. Chaitin said:

[Some people said] Cantor wrecked and ruined mathematics by taking it from being concrete and making it wishy-washy, for example, from hard analysis to abstract analysis. Other people loved this. It was very controversial.

Set theory turned things upside-down, but it also had problems. Bertrand Russell found a paradox, which put the already shaking foundation into a crisis. What if everything's wrong?!

So David Hilbert came along and suggested that all of mathematics should be expressed in a code with rules -- a formalism -- to avoid the messy pronouns and ambiguities of normal language. Proofs should be expressed in terms of a formal system, and then one can just go down the line applying rules to see if the proof comes out true or not, like a formula. This was the zenith of the idea that mathematics is black-or-white, and that its truths are absolute.

For thirty years everything seemed to be just fine, but then Kurt Gdel had to rain on the formalism parade by doing one of the most incredible things in the history of ideas. He took Hilbert's formal system and showed that if the system were to make statements about itself, it would break down. It's like saying:

This statement is false.

Is it true or false? Hmph. Gdel, with his vastly clever Gdel Numbering, was able to trick Hilbert's formal system into saying:

This statement is unprovable.

Chaitin said:

Well, if it's provable, and it says it's unprovable, we're proving something that's false. So that's not very nice. And if it's unprovable and it says it's unprovable, well then, what it states is true, it's unprovable, and we have a hole. Instead of proving something false we have incompleteness, we have a true statement that our formalization has not succeeded in capturing.

So the idea is that either we're proving false statements, which is terrifying, or we get something which is not as bad, but is still awful, which is that our formal axiomatic system is incomplete -- there's something that's true but we can't prove it within our system. And therefore the goal of formalizing once and for all all of mathematics ends up on the floor!

... You read essays by Hermann Weyl or John von Neumann saying things like this: I became a mathematician because this was my religion, I believed in absolute truth, here was beauty, the real world was awful, but I took refuge in number theory. And all of a sudden Gdel comes and ruins everything, and I want to kill myself!

Ack! This stuff is known as Gdel's Incompleteness Theorem, and the point is that mathematics isn't black-or-white. There's some stuff about which math just can't make up its mind.

This was devastating in its way, but there was no need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Hilbert's idea that proofs could be mechanized into a formal language was still waiting to be tested, and Alan Turing was the man to do it.

Chaitin again:

Turing has to invent the computer, because Hilbert says that there should be a mechanical procedure to decide if a proof is correct or not. Turing says what Hilbert really means is that there should be a computer program for checking proofs. But first Turing has to say what a computer is, it's a Turing machine, and all of this is in a paper of Turing's in 1936, when there were no computers.

So Turing actually invented the computer, on paper, to show that Hilbert's formalization was still useful. The computer proved that Hilbert's sytem, though incomplete, was decidable. In other words, if there's an answer to be found, a decision-making procedure can find it.

For perspective, when Turing wrote a program to play chess 16 years later in 1952, he still had to simulate the computer. It took him half an hour to calculate each move while his colleague played (and beat) his "program".

A cool story in itself, the computer's history in pure mathematics is also a lesson to all of us to remember that the most abstract and seemingly impractical ideas can change everyone's lives.

Last week, the 50th anniversary of Turing's death was recognized. We owe him one.

Strict Father vs. Nurturant Parent

What's the best approach to raising children: strict-father discipline or nurturant affection? Your answer just may be the deciding factor in your political affiliation according to "Moral Politics: What Conservatives Know That Liberals Don't" by Santa Fe Institute Science Board Member George Lakoff (for conservatives, political metaphors evolve from a strict-father family model...for liberals, a nurturant-parent model). In this interview, Lakoff, a liberal, explains how he uncovered his family-based metaphors through his study of linguistics and cognitive science.

What the strict-father model attempts to accomplish is this: it is assumed children have to learn self-discipline and self-reliance and respect for authority. Now another important part of this model, in America but not in other countries, has to do with what happens when such children mature. The slogan, "eighteen and out," is common. The mature children are supposed to be off on their own as soon as possible. Good parents don't interfere in their lives. If the nation is the family and the government is the parent, in the strict-family model, the government shouldn't meddle in their lives.

When I looked at the liberal model of the family, I found it a very different model. It assumes the main thing a parent has to do is care for and care about his child. It is through being cared for and cared about that children become responsible, self-disciplined and self-reliant. The purpose is to make children become nurturers, too. Obedience for children comes out of love and respect for parents, not out of fear of punishment. Instead of punishment, you have restitution.

One interesting part of the interview mentions that developmental psychology research on strict and nurturant child-rearing methods has shown that nurturant family values are empirically superior.

People who have done work in different, unrelated traditions of research have all come to the same conclusion. Namely, the strict-father model is dysfunctional.

If we buy all this so far, does this mean that liberals are empirically superior to conservatives?

All hours are not created equal

We could all learn a thing or two from Carlos Segura (original 37signals co-founder, principal of Segura, the man behind 5inch and T.26, and one of century's top 100 designers). This weekend we shared a good laugh over his new rate card... Gotta love this:

• $150/hr Standard Rate
• $200/hr if you want it NOW
• $250/hr if you want to watch over my shoulder while I work
• $300/hr if you want to help
• $400/hr if you worked on it first

So true, isn't it?

Ouch

I need to call someone. I pick up their business card, a piece of their stationary or I look at the contact section of their site and I dial the phone. Screeeeech, I've connected to their fax machine. In a listing of contact information, the fax number is often listed last (a position of prominence) and almost always has an equal visual weight as the phone number and email. I don't know how many calls and emails I initiate each week but I know it's a ton more than the number of faxes I send. In fact, weeks go by without me sending or receiving a fax. I'll bet that I reach more fax machines mistakenly, because of this faulty design convention, than I do intentionally. Then again, it could just be that I'm not paying attention.

Shopping Cart Icon With Number of Items Displayed

Ro London collects shopping cart icons and says GUESS? is the only online retailer to try this nifty idea of incorporating the number of items in the cart into the actual shopping cart image. [From his collection of 300 of "the most interesting, unique, and beautiful formations of pixels to display."]

Instant Comment Preview and Contingency Design

I'm digging the way sites like shauninman.com and andybudd.com are now offering instant previews for comments. As you type you can see, right underneath the text area, exactly how your message will appear. Sweet. Came across Andy's while reading his nice review of "Defensive Design for the Web."

You'd be forgiven for imagining that a book about error messages and 404 pages would be dull. Well, in this case you'd be wrong. While contingency design isn't the sexiest of subjects, this book does an excellent job of bringing a rather prosaic subject to life.

At another blog, D. Keith Robinson also gives the book a plug and then goes on to rant about an attempted online purchase and how frustrating it is when site builders forget to design defensively.

The last time I clicked their back button, again after a vague error. I lost everything and had to start over yet againonly to get another vague error. Thats when I just gave up. I mean Id entered my credit card info and everything else three damn times! Did they not want my money? You should have heard the F-bombs I was dropping. Everyone in my office did.

TiVo Heads For the Net

Things are heating up in the TV biz world (NY Times): DirecTV is rumored to be moving toward developing its own digital video recorder. TiVo is moving toward Internet downloading to defend itself against the potential competition. Meanwhile, Netflix, RealNetworks and Blockbuster are also working on delivering feature-length movies via the Internet to users for viewing later. The catch is today's DSL speeds are too slow (sending the data stored on a DVD disk over the Internet at today's usual DSL speeds can take up to several days).

Blogger's Back

Now that Google's put its two cents in, what do you think of the new Blogger? vs. Typepad?

The power of photography

God
Country
History
Love
Loyalty
Life
Death
A man and his wife

Airport Express from Apple

Apple intros the Airport Express that lets you connect to the net wirelessly (via Ethernet), print wirelessly (via USB), and even stream iTunes to your home stereo wirelessly. Plus, since it's so portable, it's a great way to go wireless in your hotel room on biz trips. Finally, it just plugs into the wall -- no extra cables, no extra power supply, nothing. Only $129. Apple, how do you do it?

Kids, Computers, and Cognition

From a CNN article about the benefits of kids using computers:

Some earlier studies have found computer use improves children's fine motor skills and improves recognition of numbers and letters.

But other research has found no relationship between computer use and children's knowledge or language capability, and some experts believe computer use displaces essential childhood experiences such as playing with toys or with peers.

Sure, better motor skills and number/letter recognition might follow from using computers, but these observations seem a bit superficial. I can't think of a physical situation that involves the kind of abstract relations common to everyday computer use. Maybe the real benefits of introducing kids to computers are deeper and more cognitive.

Computer interfaces are very cognitively complex. Even a simple menu bar is built out of hierarchical relationships, and the effects caused by the menu items are often abstracted by the concept of a "selection". Kids of course aren't aware of these things, but they use them nonetheless -- and I think it's worth considering that the intuition they develop of these abstract ideas might do them a great intellectual service down the road.

What do you think?

[In] Repose

The definition.

It's what's inside the box that counts

So, today is the day that I finally get the iPod Mini I ordered about 6 weeks ago. I got an email from CDW with my tracking number and a link back to the order status page so I can track the progress of my order. The CDW order tracking page is just like every other order tracking page I've seen, except for this little link that says "View Box". When you click it, you see this:

Yep, that's my box. I'm not sure how much actual value this feature adds, but it does help set my expectations and make the entire transaction feel a bit more real. Pretty cool I think. You?

Syndication and its Discontents

Were getting ready to launch a fairly major redesign of our studio site and were trying to decide what is the right thing to do relative to providing a syndicated feed via Atom and/or RSS. Lets use our site as an example for this discussion but we really want to know what SvN people think about the issue because there are also many decisions to be made relative to the work we do for clients.

First, our audience (at least some of them) wants the feed. We get emails about it all the time. Specifically they want our daily link list Fresh Signals syndicated. Were glad for the interest and in general were disposed to give our audience what they want, but were more than a little conflicted here.

We publish Fresh Signals for good reasons. We have found over time that the stuff we find interesting, other people find interesting too. Primarily, it's fun to share and satisfying to be able to bring attention to projects and people that deserve it. But, we also publish Fresh Signals because it gives our readers a reason to visit our site regularly. And when they do, hopefully, theyll take a peek at some of our other projects and features like Western State, the video series we host in collaboration with Slowtron, or the Museum of Online Museums, or links to whats happening with our other business, Jewelboxing. If people are reading Fresh Signals via a feed, that all goes out the window.

Plus, were designers and control freaks. Weve worked hard on developing a look and feel for the site. The voice of Coudal Partners is found not just in the copy we write, but importantly, in the context in which its presented. In a feed, everything carries the same weight. Its as if every word spoken on a radio station was in the same bland monotone voice. No, its worse that that. Its as if every word spoken on every radio station was spoken with that same voice.

For client work the stakes are higher. Were just getting to a point where we can create an accurate profile of our clients visitors. (Who they are. Where they came from. How they use the site. Etc.) We can customize their experience and serve them information based on those profiles. Now were supposed to forget about all that in favor of reducing traffic and replacing it with traffic that we cant easily identify or even accurately measure? I dunno. Its a hot topic and maybe Im missing something but when a client says to me that we are not sure what RSS is but we know we want it, I get worried. What say you?

Drew Deering: What is good restaurant design?

Drew Deering, architect and long-time SvN reader, wants you to know something and wants to know something from you. This is posted on his behalf:

Little dosome of you Chicagoans probably know, over the next month Chicago is going to be invaded by designers of the built environment. The American Institute of Architects is having it's National Conventionnext week, June 10-12.Necon, a huge trade show is held annually at the Merchandise Martfor the Interior Designerson June 14-16. Then June 24-27; a mixed group of planners, architects, government officials, and developers will be in Chicago for The Congress for theNew Urbanism convention. I find it strange that they are all happening the same month, but since Chicago is the center of modern design the location is a good choice.

So Metropolis Magazine is doing their annual "Eat Here" for Chicago, mostly for Neocon. It is a list ofplaces to eat in Chicago recommended by designers and architects from Chicago. Not beingin Chicago, do you guys agree with list? For all of you people not in Chicago, I ask you this. What makes a restaurant good design? Is it the architecture of the room? The graphic design of the menu? The preparation ofthe food? The design as a whole?Can a locally owned "hole-in-the-wall" be good design, in its own vernacular way? Is there a nation chain that does good design? Me personally, I kind of like Chipotle.

Textareas Suck

Why the Lucky Stiff, in another fit of off-the-wall anthropomorphization, says Textarea, You Are A Sunken Nothing and I agree wholeheartedly.

Note: If you're using Mozilla or Firebird on Windows or *nix (no Mac yet), you can install Mozex to edit textareas with your favorite text editor.

Basecamp: Quicker than two rabbits humping

Lots of people have been sending in comments about Basecamp. While many of them are worth sharing, we're especially fond of this one:

"...Basecamp is nothing short of amazing. The sign-up was short, sweet, and to the point; in fact, it was so simple we were sure we must have screwed the pooch somewhere along the line, and spent several minutes feeling our heart flutter, our bowels loosen, and shrieks of terror hauln ass up our spinal cord, slapping our wet-matter about after they had already kicked down the door and changed the television channel without asking. But, no. Thats all there was to it: no scripts, no installations, no archaic documentation that requires months of mind numbing translation to comprehend. Same goes for the rest of the interface: everythings tweakable, looks nice, and most importantly, just makes sense. And quicker than two rabbits humping, to boot..."

We're glad ya like it! If you're up for it, you can read the rest at Bits of Decay.

Rolling Rock Poem

"All of the Words on a Bottle of Rolling Rock Beer in a Different Order" by Demetri Martin.