April 2013
3 posts
“Telling the news on Twitter is different than telling the news in a magazine or...”
– Nick Kallen, on Mat Honan’s desire for the ability to edit tweets
“Whimsy is not a quality we usually associate with computer programs. We tend to...”
– Jacob Harris on the quirky yet delightful Times Haiku
March 2013
3 posts
February 2013
3 posts
“Listen to your users more than the press. Don’t get sucked into the...”
– Josh Williams, on his experience taking Gowalla off the ground, and eventually setting it back down
“That’s how My Bloody Valentine’s deeply destabilizing queasiness,...”
– Mark Richardson, on the new My Bloody Valentine album, mbv
“Writing a novel is like writing a computer program. The goal of this program is...”
– An update from Jack Cheng about his experience of writing his first novel, These Days. I suspect it will be wonderful, but that really won’t matter because it’s been worth it just to follow along with him in the process.
January 2013
3 posts
I'm smitten with Vine
Bernal fireworks vine.co/v/bJh0qUdKF1x— Bill Couch (@couch) January 27, 2013
“It was while standing at the Embarcadero a few years ago, imagining concrete...”
– From Marcin Wichary’s beautiful and eloquent piece on why he chose to become a Code for America fellow this year.
December 2012
6 posts
Solve your first-world problem →
I’m generally quite bothered/fatigued by people using reductive phrases like “first-world problem,” “humblebrag,” and “white people,” but there are some truly abhorrent sites featured in this, many of which I had never heard. Pitchbox and Sparkology are especially grating, and generally represent much of what I hate about Silicon Valley. When motives are rooted in status and wealth and not...
“There is a digital noise surrounding us, invisible chatter, and we spend time...”
– Nate Larson, who, together with Marni Shindelman, looks at tweets from trending topics, finds the physical location from where the tweet was posted, and photographs the space.
“There’s a whole class of human communication that happens through decorational...”
– Paul Ford
“If I look at everyone I’m following on Twitter, by and large they are peers I’ve...”
– Matt Haughey, highlight the key difference between Twitter and Facebook
November 2012
7 posts
“Places mean much more than their locations on a map. Places are the ways we...”
– Karina van Schaardenburg
“In times of hypergrowth, people tend not to document; they just build. They make...”
– Patrick Ewing, from a discussion he and I had about cultures and historians
A Real San Francisco Tech Dude
In many ways, I feel at home in San Francisco, but I still sometimes feel alienated among my friends and peers. Here are the ways in which I’m not A Real San Francisco Tech Dude:
I am not skinny
I can’t grow a beard
I ride a bike with gears
I ride Uber only if absolutely necessary
I have more than 50 co-workers
I am comfortable working with more than 50 co-workers
I have worked...
“Glass has always been identified as a New York City composer, and his music has...”
– Mike Powell, on Philip Glass’ new album, REWORK_
October 2012
5 posts
September 2012
5 posts
“Regret, I think, is part of your life when you’re introverted.”
– Jason Kottke
a new endeavor
couch: i am starting a podcast with a friend
brittany: I KNEW IT FROM THE WINE BOTTLE MICS
August 2012
7 posts
“A city speaks to you mostly by accident—in things you see through windows, in...”
– Paul Graham
GUYS I DIDNT MEAN HIM I MEANT MY COUCH IM SCREAMING twitter.com/asdfghiall/sta…— hailey lln (@asdfghiall) August 18, 2012
This may be my best troll ever.
“…here is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately: how the only real...”
– My friend, Erin Watson, has written a series of poems, lightly inspired by @horse_ebooks and she wants to turn it into a proper chapbook. Erin’s writing is beautiful and eloquent, as evidenced by this bit from her, so I’d encourage you to take a look.
“At this moment I don’t have anything smart to say, because my feelings are...”
– Ira Glass, on the passing of David Rankoff
July 2012
1 post
June 2012
1 post
May 2012
4 posts
“If you’re in the Valley for any amount of time, you’ll have missed...”
– Robert Cezar Matei, who declined an offer to work at Instagram
“Last summer there was one listing in a really hip, desirable part of the...”
– Sheri Castilyn, a leasing agent with Rentals in SF, on San Francisco’s absurd housing market right now
April 2012
4 posts
“But one day, you’ll get out of school and go somewhere besides the small...”
– Joe Peacock
This is what it has felt like to move to San Francisco.
Introducing Ospriet
About a month ago, I launched http://designfromthegut.com for our SXSW session to allow audience members to submit and vote on questions/comments for our panel through Twitter. The site was powered by an app I wrote with Dustin Senos called Osprey, which I wrote a bit more about here. I was hoping to open source it but didn’t have time to before SXSW even though others started asking to use...
