I remember when Wilson Miner’s talk When We Build first hit the web with a bang — for days you couldn’t open Twitter without seeing a link to it. I don’t know why, but I just never got around to watching it until today. It is, in a word, extraordinary. I generally don’t want to post things that you’ve likely seen before, but I need to make an exception on this one, just in case some of you procrastinated like I did.

It’s not really possible to summarize, but if I had to, I’d say that the talk is loosely based on John Ruskin’s words from his 1849 book The Seven Lamps of Architecture:

When we build, let us think that we build forever. Let it not be for present delight nor for present use alone. Let it be such work as our descendants will thank us for; and let us think, as we lay stone on stone, that a time is to come when those stones will be held sacred because our hands have touched them, and that men will say, as they look upon the labor and wrought substance of them, “See! This our father did for us.”

If you can make 40 minutes to watch this, you won’t regret it.

Jim Dalrymple in The Surface and the iPad:

From what I’ve seen, it seems to me that Microsoft is trying to do a similar type of dance with the Surface that it did with previous tablets. The company is trying to convince consumers that this device can be a computer and a tablet at the same time. Based on the sales of the iPad, I’m not sure that’s what consumers really want.

Exactly. This is the core of the problem with Microsoft’s “no compromise” strategy. As Kieran Healy pointed out in his response to that approach:

Uncompromising designers make products that will not appeal to everyone, or be of equal use to everyone, or do everything equally well. On the other hand, IT products advertised to consumers as having “no compromises” try to please everyone all of the time. From the perspective of the Dieter Ramses of this world, Sinofsky’s repeated use of the phrase “no compromises” means exactly the opposite of what it says — and more or less guarantees that the product will actually be riddled with design compromises, all made in an ultimately futile effort to keep everyone happy.

Or to summarize using John Gruber’s words:

[C]ompromises enforce simplicity and obviousness in design.

Maybe we’ll all be proved wrong about this. But I just don’t see how a tablet that doesn’t know if it’s a tablet or a computer won’t be confusing to users.

(By the way, speaking of Jim Dalrymple — you have to check out this Tumblr site dedicated to his awesome beard)

Despite the fact that we have no details on the price, the ship date, or the battery life, Dan Frommer takes a positive stance on the new Microsoft tablet. From Microsoft Finally Has A Tablet Business Model With Surface:

But give Microsoft credit for evolving with the times, both in terms of product design and business model. It may fail, but it’s at least learning to play the right game.

Ok — good on you, Microsoft. But there’s also a counter-argument. In the words of John Gruber talking about the Samsung Chromebook:

F*** that. This is the big leagues. There is no credit for trying.

Andre Torrez decided that enough is enough — he will stop getting caught up in the endless complaining and criticizing whenever any new technology is released. From I give up:

But somewhere in between that new iPad, the unserviceable laptop non-story, and that idiotic comment about the new Retina displays something in my brain snapped. I give up. I surrender. The war is over. I can’t care about this stuff anymore. Getting annoyed at the pace of technology is fruitless for me. Being cynical about any new bit of technology that doesn’t fit into my view of how stuff should work has been a dragging anchor in my life.

For some reason, after reading his post I can’t get this related philosophy out of my head:

Jack Cheng takes a shot at defining The Slow Web:

Timely not real-time. Rhythm not random. Moderation not excess. Knowledge not information. These are a few of the many characteristics of the Slow Web. It’s not so much a checklist as a feeling, one of being at greater ease for the web-enabled products and services in our lives.

It’s a very interesting post where he also describes some of the web sites and apps that exemplify this movement. It reminds me of Clay Johnson’s call for healthier information diets.

(link via @retinart)

In Technology as Savior, J. D. Bentley tells a great story about flossing (yep, FLOSSING), and technology’s impact on our ability to take responsibility for our actions:

We eschew per­sonal respon­si­bil­ity out of lazi­ness with the expec­ta­tion that, some­how, “tech­nol­ogy” and “sci­ence” has — or will find — a way out, what­ever the cost.

The pull quote doesn’t do it justice, this is a post you have to read in its entirety.

This Skype Advertising Update reads like satire:

While on a 1:1 audio call, users will see content that could spark additional topics of conversation that are relevant to Skype users and highlight unique and local brand experiences. So, you should think of Conversation Ads as a way for Skype to generate fun interactivity between your circle of friends and family and the brands you care about. Ultimately, we believe this will help make Skype a more engaging and useful place to have your conversations each and every day.

So, let me make sure I understand. Skype is worried that my conversations might not be “engaging” enough. So, instead of my daughter doing funny dances for her grandparents in the US, Skype will “generate fun interactivity” by prompting us to talk about “the brands that we care about”? Like, “Hey, how about that new Magnum ice cream flavor, eh?”

I don’t know how an idea like this manages to make it through even the mildest of corporate sanity checks.

Kyle Baxter has a very interesting viewpoint on yesterday’s WWDC announcements in Apple Bets it All On Siri and iCloud. He argues that this is all part of the continuing building blocks in Apple’s larger vision:

The new MacBook Pro really is the best notebook Appl’s ever shipped, but her’s the thing: their line-up as of 9:59 AM this morning was really, really good too. Appl’s hardware is getting to the point where it’s so good that it’s good enough for nearly everyone, so dramatic improvements like a retina display for Macs is a relatively minor improvement for users.

In the words of Clayton Christensen, these improvements are sustaining innovations, rather than disruptive. They’re filling in the holes in a very grand and mostly realized vision. iPhone, iPad and MacBook hardware are solid and so is iOS. What I think this tells us is that Siri and iCloud are integral to Appl’s future. If they don’t hit a grand slam with them, it’s going to be difficult to maintain their level of growth going into the future.

I fully agree with Kyle’s view on how important Siri and iCloud are to Apple (read the full post for his reasoning), but I would add a third product to that list: Passbook. Dan Frommer summed it up nicely:

On one hand, right now, it’s just an aggregation of your boarding passes, movie tickets, payment credentials, and loyalty cards. But it’s easy to see how Apple could go much deeper into payments and transactions in the future, if it wants to. With or without NFC.

I do have one semantic quibble with Kyle’s piece. He calls iCloud “disruptive technology”. I would argue that Dropbox is disruptive technology (“an innovation that helps create a new market and value network, and eventually goes on to disrupt an existing market and value network, displacing an earlier technology”), whereas iCloud builds on that as sustaining technology (“[it] does not create new markets or value networks but rather only evolves existing ones with better value, allowing the firms within to compete against each other’s sustaining improvements”).

But whatever you call it, the conclusion remains the same: iCloud, Siri, and Passbook are Apple’s bets to ensure a long and prosperous reign at the top of computing.

Towards the end of Android Fragmentation Visualized, an article by OpenSignalMaps that analyzes 3,997 (!) distinct Android devices across different dimensions, comes this attempt at setting the world record for Silver-Lining Hunting:

One of the joys of developing for Android is you have no idea who’ll end up using your app.

Pardon my lack of eloquence, but, LOL! First, there’s the obvious logical fallacy: no-one knows who will end up using their apps, no matter what phone/platform they develop for1. Second, not knowing who will end up using your app is a bad thing. Most apps fail because they are unable to reach product/market fit. And one of the major reasons for not reaching product/market fit is not understanding your market — the people who will end up using your app.

The variety of resolutions visualized in the OpenSignalMaps post is staggering, and trying to spin it as anything but a nightmare for developers is commendable but misguided.

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1. User and market research can help you make educated guesses, but will only take you so far until you have a real product in the wild. ↩

In The Great Big Opportunity Matt Salisbury talks about subsidiarity — the idea that decisions are better made where they have immediate effect:

There has been a lot of talk about the advent of the “information age.” For the first time since the industrial revolution, we have experienced a real disruptive change in business context. The age of communication is now, but if you pay too much attention to the technology, you’ll miss what’s really happening.

What’s “really happening” is that we now have the chance to work like humans instead of machines.  Communication and information’s advance is restoring subsidiarity to our brave new world.

I like his conclusion:

Ultimately, the information age is not about the information. It’s about human dignity and happiness informing how, where, and why we work.