Apple Inc. is looking for an Interaction Designer in Cupertino, CA.

Morgan Stanley is looking for an Information Architect in New York, NY or London, UK.

Getty Images is looking for a Senior Software Engineer in Seattle, WA.

Trek Bicycle Corporation is looking for a PHP/Java Web Developer in Waterloo, WI.

Felissimo is looking for a Webmaster/Technical Project Manager in New York, NY.

CACI is looking for a Web Production Manager in Washington, DC.

Millikin University is looking for a Webmaster in Decatur, IL.

AARP is looking for a Design Director in Washington, DC.

RBM Technologies is looking for a Web Developer/Engineer in Cambridge, MA.

Trabian is looking for a Rails developer in Indianapolis, IN.

Assembla is looking for a Web Designer located anywhere.

The Integer Group – Midwest is looking for a Web Developer in Des Moines, IA.

Find a job or put your design or programming in job in front of the best on the Job Board.

Eric Schmidt on enterprise customers vs. consumers

“We used to think that the enterprise was the hardest customer to satisfy, but we were wrong. It turns out, consumers are harder than the enterprise because the consumer will not give you a second chance. And by the way, I would argue that we in the industry forgot this. We became as a group – certainly I did – consumed with the complexity of the systems that we were building for powerful corporations, and we forgot that there’s a much larger market around consumers for simple solutions.”

How We Learn

According to William Glasser, we learn “10% of what we read, 20% of what we hear, 30% of what we see, 50% of what we see and hear, 70% of what is discussed with others, 80% of what is experienced personally, and 95% of what we teach to someone else.”

Participation isn't huge on web 2.0

“Only .16% of visits to YouTube, .2% of visits to Flickr and 4.59% of visits to Wikipedia are ‘participation visits’. Wikipedia numbers break down to show that older users are the ones doing the editing…There is one new blog being created every second somewhere in the world. Posting volume has also gone way up with 1.5 million posts per day. Dave said that 21% of tracked blogs are active down from 36% in May of last year. He gave us a rundown of things the top bloggers do: Post frequently, stay at it and don’t be intimidated. Japanese is the largest language in the blogosphere with 37% of posts in Japanese.”

Play-Doh interface

“As I twist the Play-Doh and take bits away, the film reacts accordingly in real-time. Add too much Play-Doh and the film rapidly speeds up. An intimate connection is made between the user and the media. Every action has a reaction in the digital space. No scary buttons to press. No instructions to read. It’s just Play-Doh.”

Coda integrates file browser, text editor, terminal, etc. into “a single, elegant window”

“While you can certainly pair up your favorite text editor with Transmit today, and then maybe have Safari open for previews, and maybe use Terminal for running queries directly or a CSS editor for editing your style sheets, we dreamed of a place where all of that can happen in one place.So, that’s what we’ve built. Coda has a complete file browser (and the ability to work locally or remotely), publishing, a full-featured text editor, a WebKit-based preview, a CSS editor with visual tools, a full-featured terminal, built-in reference material, and much more.”

How to price a project

“I’ll say, ‘we worked on a project similar to yours and the final cost was [blank]’ I’ve had clients reply ‘that is [blank] times more than it would cost to do [blank]!’ The final blank often being some completely unrelated product relevant only to their business and impossible to compare other than on a pure cost basis. While other clients have said, ‘I don’t think you understand my project, because you are estimating far less than [blank].’ While this is very awkward part of the discussion it is almost always followed by candor. It’s as if once someone starts telling the truth, it opens a door that can’t be closed.”

Is there a secret that sets Stradivarius violins apart from the best instruments made today?

“Science has not provided any convincing evidence for the existence or otherwise of any measurable property that would set the Cremonese instruments apart from the finest violins made by skilled craftsman today. Indeed, some leading soloists do occasionally play on modern instruments. However, the really top soloists – and, not surprisingly, violin dealers, who have a vested interest in maintaining the Cremonese legend of intrinsic superiority – remain utterly unconvinced.”

John Lane: We have lost contact with the beautiful and our society is suffering as a result

“Why is so much modern architecture so nerve-janglingly awful, or just plain dull? What effect does this have on us? We live lives surrounded by functional objects bereft of beauty – when did you last see a house built by a mainstream construction company that was so beautiful that it took your breath away? Have you ever seen a mobile phone so exquisite that you will always treasure it? We have lost our way, and the effects of this separation are all too clear.”

Photos of breast-clouds (SFW)

“Mammatus Clouds, or ‘breast-clouds’, are fascinating formations in the sky, made mostly from the cumulus cloud base. Although they are not a sign that a tornado is about to form, they often accompany tornado-producing storms, or even may be direct byproduct of tornado activity – an aftermath of severe thunderstorms.”

Tim Gunn compares academia to working at Liz Claiborne

“I’ve been living in a rarefied bubble, really, for a total of 29 years. Because we were dealing with theory, we could write our own scenarios, where nothing ever fails and nothing is ever lost in the shipping process. It’s a very different universe.”

Simplicity: “The Ultimate Sophistication”

“Instead of focusing on adding features, design teams should focus on helping users find out what they really need before they purchase. When design teams understand that buyers want to avoid trade-offs, they can use this insight to their advantage…simplicity goes beyond the interface of the product to the decision process surrounding it. We want simple decisions as much as simple products.”

The cult of transparency and why secrecy is dying

“Radical forms of transparency are now the norm at startups – and even some Fortune 500 companies. It is a strange and abrupt reversal of corporate values. Not long ago, the only public statements a company ever made were professionally written press releases and the rare, stage-managed speech by the CEO. Now firms spill information in torrents, posting internal memos and strategy goals, letting everyone from the top dog to shop-floor workers blog publicly about what their firm is doing right – and wrong.” [via BF]

Logos that look different each time you see them

“Saks’s chopped-up logo is the latest and most visible example of what graphic designers call a dynamic visual identity. That’s design-speak for a logo that looks different each time you see it — like MTV’s graffiti-esque initials or the customized symbols with which Google celebrates Thanksgiving and Valentine’s Day — as opposed to the old-fashioned corporate ones, which always look the same.”

Call for a Blogger's Code of Conduct

“There’s an attitude among many bloggers that deleting inflammatory comments is censorship. I think that needs to change. I’m not suggesting that every blog will want to delete such comments, but I am suggesting that blogs that do want to keep the level of dialog at a higher level not be censured for doing so.”

Why do icon designers deliver icons individually sized in PNG or GIF files instead of a single vector file?

“When you take a vector image, originally sized at 24×24 and scale it down to 16×16, the relative proportions do not match. There’s no way you can evenly distribute 24 pixels of information into 16 pixels of space (remember, there’s no such thing as half a pixel). So the image blurs…Now this is fine if you want Fisher Price icons, but not desirable if you’re looking for crisp and clean.”

Using blocks of color to create a grid in Photoshop

“Instead, I create blocks of solid color — usually in Web-safe #FF0000 red — to represent my grid, group them together in a layer folder ordered at the top of my layers palette, and set each of them at roughly 40% transparency. This allows me to toggle the grid on and off, and also to swap variants on the grid — different combinations of units and columns — at will. Much, much easier than using Photoshop’s guides.”

Some recent postings on the 37signals Gig Board:

GE Healthcare is looking for a Web app visual designer with CSS/ASP.NET experience in Boston, MA.

Grockit is looking for a RoR Developer located anywhere (SF/LA preferred).

GrossLog is looking for a designer to create the UI for a killer web app located anywhere.

Housing Works Thrift Shops is looking for an individual or company to Finalize Ruby on Rails Point of Sale System in New York, NY.

Berlin Cameron is looking for a Flash designer in New York, NY.

Souliss is looking for a Web Developer located anywhere (UK/EU preferable).

Find your next gig or find your next contractor on the 37signals Gig Board.

Talkers vs. listeners

“A few years ago I attended a meeting of the Association of Humanistic Psychology. One of the seminars was led by two eminent therapists. One was charismatic and engaging. The other was soft spoken and quietly confident. During the question and answer period, I realized that the “boring” therapist was a master at active listening. The charismatic therapist was performing.”

Sidestep premature optimization

“Sidestepping premature optimization turns out to be good general wisdom for life: Don’t get obsessed with a potential problem until it actually becomes a problem. The implicit suggestion here is that life’s curveballs often come from places where you least expect them, so it’s a waste of time and energy to focus too much on hypotheticals.”

Experts: Multitasking slows you down and increases the chance of mistakes

“Check e-mail messages once an hour, at most. Listening to soothing background music while studying may improve concentration. But other distractions — most songs with lyrics, instant messaging, television shows — hamper performance. Driving while talking on a cellphone, even with a hands-free headset, is a bad idea. In short, the answer appears to lie in managing the technology, instead of merely yielding to its incessant tug.”

Profile of Edward Tufte

”’I don’t want to sound too majestic, but my books are forever knowledge. People will be reading them a long time from now.’ By ‘forever knowledge’ Tufte means his principles ‘are indifferent’ to culture, gender, nationality or history. They apply to a 6,000-year-old cave etching, to the latest web design, to every map, chart and graph in between.” [via JK]

Look ma, no mouse!

Thinkmetric
From: Eli Duke

i live in seattle and recently drove up to vancouver (bc) for a friend’s bday. there was a long line at the border check, so i got out of the car and took a few pictures. i thought that you guys might appreciate this one:

it’s simple, effective, and clever; and just the right amount of each.

—

Tax Preparation Software Pricing Comparison
From: Samuel Peery

I recently posted a tax software provider pricing comparison with some interesting results. I calculated and compared “out-the-door” pricing including both state and federal tax-prep and e-filing. I think you’ll find the results very interesting.

—

Talk to Wesabe
From: Siddharta Govindaraj

“Talk to Jason” at Wesabe

Hi! I’m Jason Knight, the CEO and co-founder of Wesabe. Every afternoon, from 12 to 4 p.m. PST, you can reach me directly at (800) 511-8544. If you have comments about our product, questions about how it works, or just want to chat a bit about what inspired us to create Wesabe, please give me a call. Sure, I could have an intern man the phones, but I can’t think of any job more important at Wesabe right now than talking to our new members and people who are thinking of signing up.

Very cool that you can talk directly to the CEO.

—

VC Failures
From: Ed Raynham

Thought you may find this interesting..

Venture Capitalists are usually quick to tell you about their successes but Bessemer Venture’s anti-portfolio tells you about the companies they turned down…apple, google, intel, paypal, ebay to name a few.

Refreshing to see a large company telling you about their failures rather than covering them up.

Are designers the enemy of design?

“Business men and women don’t like the term ‘design.’ I think they think it implies drapes or dresses. Even top CEOs who embrace design don’t want to call it that. They want to call it ‘Innovation.’ That has a manly right to it. It’s strong, techie. These folks are perfectly willing to use the word ‘vision,’ whatever the heck ‘vision’ is. They like ‘Imagination,’ whatever the heck that is. But they don’t like ‘design.’ Go figure.”

Typography in music notation

“Layout should be pretty, not only for its own sake, but especially because it helps the reader in his task. For performance material like sheet music, this is doubly important: musicians have a limited amount of attention. The less attention they need for reading, the more they can focus on playing itself. In other words, better typography translates to better performances.” [tx ML]

Southwest Airlines' chief apology officer

“He composes about 180 letters a year explaining what went wrong on particular flights and, with about 110 passengers per flight, he mails off roughly 20,000 mea culpas. Each one bears his direct phone line…[Years ago, the President of Southwest] learned that a law client who was promised something in two weeks but received it in one was vastly happier than a client who was promised something in one day but received it in four. ‘Under-promise, over-deliver’ became her mantra.”

Learning interaction design from Las Vegas

“Looking at the casino experience in particular you have the idea of tiered functionality. Anyone can slide a quarter into a slot machine and play without any knowledge or training. From there to the high-stakes poker game every level of the experience is really good and readily available. Each tier is its own rich experience. Yes, the high-stakes poker game is given special treatment, but the slot machine is the bread and butter of the casino.”

“Facebook Sneak Preview” will show upcoming feature additions and changes before they go live

“My bet is that this is their response to the user backlash and protests last year after after Facebook made some fairly dramatic changes to the site. With the new group, Facebook can ease users into the new stuff, and also get their feedback before it goes live. It’s an easy way to build consensus and dissolve criticism before it gains any steam.”

Get-organized-now hysteria

“In the electronic, gadgetized age of e-mail, BlackBerrys and ever-more-sophisticated desktop software—all designed theoretically to manage digital information efficiently—we’ve become overwhelmed. That’s where the productivity industry comes in. The question is, however, whether this newfound emphasis on productivity is helping—or just making us crazier.”

Detect available fonts using JavaScript and CSS

“I wrote a JavaScript code which can be used to guess if a particular font is present in a machine. This may be help of desktop-like web application developers when they want to provide different skins or fonts preferences to their users.”

Tim Cook on Apple, iPhone, Apple TV

“I can’t stress this enough, the thing separates Apple from others is that we have this very simple culture. Our company revolves around product and we focus on making the very best…We believe in giving people great value. Many companies put a computer out and its not what the customer really wants, so they have to add this and that (wireless, video camera). The customer winds up having to jump through many hoops before they finally get something that they think they want and it, unfortunately, doesn’t really work that well, then. We don’t do that.”

The graphic design of Idiocracy

“The movie spares no detail in the satire of branding and graphic design, turning every logo, sign and poster into a dumbed-down, Web 2.0-ish, futuristic-looking style that may come sooner than 500 years from now…Idiocracy displays some of the best graphic humor to appear in a feature film. Here are some of my favorite screen-captured moments.”

A "bedouin" is someone who transforms a laptop, cell phone and coffeehouse into an office

“A new breed of worker, fueled by caffeine and using the tools of modern technology, is flourishing in the coffeehouses of San Francisco. Roaming from cafe to cafe and borrowing a name from the nomadic Arabs who wandered freely in the desert, they’ve come to be known as “bedouins.” San Francisco’s modern-day bedouins are typically armed with laptops and cell phones, paying for their office space and Internet access by buying coffee and muffins.”