We didn’t want this to be the authoritative version of the play to be admired or read in solitude; we want it to be a generative version of the play, one which sparks innovation and creates new knowledge. – Prof Elliot Visconsi, talking about his new iPad app supporting a social reading and learning experience of …
How universality benefits the web profession
We’ve spent two decades talking about a web that’s inclusive and flexible. We’ve devoted countless hours to creating spaces where conversations and relationships can thrive. The longer we tolerate a community that excludes others, the more we, as an industry, are defined by exclusion—and the further away we remain from the universality we’ve worked so …
Becoming better communicators
We want people to care about design as much as we do, but how can they if we speak to them in a foreign language? It’s important that, as we do with any user, we find a shared vocabulary and empower everyone else to become evangelists for our cause. — Inayaili de Leon in A …
Why 90% is not enough
Don’t do something 90 percent well and hope that it’ll slide through. Don’t rely on luck. You have to make your own luck. The only thing you can do is try your absolute best to do the right thing. And then if it doesn’t work out, you know there’s nothing else you can do –New …
Closing statement in the trial of Russian punk band Pussy Riot
It is the entire state system of the Russian Federation which is on trial and which, unfortunately for itself, thoroughly enjoys quoting its cruelty towards human beings, its indifference to their honour and dignity, the very worst that has happened in Russian history to date. Nadezhda Tolokonnikova’s closing statement in the trial of Russian punk …
Personas for a 21st century media environment
Conjure me up a guy who talks science winningly, who shows you that everything is transparent, and does it in a self-help-y spirit,” Gitlin said. “In our age, a guy who looks cute and wonky is better positioned to get away with this than others. Todd Gitlin, a professor of journalism and sociology at Columbia, …
Is technology ruining language?
Many a linguistic commentator would have us (misleadingly) believe that technology is ruining language. Every mangled text message and misspelled Facebook status update, they cry, is a dagger through the heart of proper usage. But such grousing ignores increasingly symbiotic ties between linguistics and technology: Some of the most exciting developments in the use and …
Rusbridger on open journalism
How can we harness this digital revolution we’re living through to provide a better account of the world around us? Alan Rusbridger, editor of The Guardian speaking last night on open journalism at the 2012 Goldsmith Awards. See also their contemporary take on the Three Little Pigs…