At some point, yes, there will be an iPhone app for everything.
Add Exit Strategy to the list of ‘Things People Used to Do With Their Own Brains’.

Makes me think about all the things I use to rely on myself for – remembering peoples’ phone numbers, knowing the order of songs on CDs (and playing CDs through), and soon, where to best position myself on subway cars.
I can’t say my life is simpler or more complex with technology. Nor can I say it’s better or worse.
Just thinking out loud.
Exit Strategy via kottke

Pano is one of my new favorite iPhone apps. It’s super-easy to use and does a great job of stitching together all your shots, although a steady hand and far away subject matter definitely help.
As great as the app is, it still has room for improvement on the user interface. Like when you want to switch from portrait mode to landscape, you need to hit ‘Cancel’. Huh? The ‘Cancel’ button is actually the default button through the application experience.
After you’ve taken your photo series and need Pano to stitch them together, you hit ‘Cancel’ to bring up the options to: ‘Start Over’, ‘Make my panorama now!’, or ‘Resume shooting’. It makes no sense. There’s other options for button labeling to make the process less confusing, as well as plenty of real estate on the bottom nav bar if additional buttons were necessary (but I don’t think they are). Hell, even changing the button to read ‘Options’ would help out.
Here’s some shots I took up at the reservoir at Central Park today:



Pano for iPhone

You don’t differentiate by copying the most attractive brand you can find. … No, you have to isolate that which is uniquely yours and amplify it compellingly.

Eric Karjaluoto shares an experience I think a lot of us designers have had as well and offers some sound advice. (via We are all Analogue)

This made my morning:

via Design You Trust

The Tarantino Mixtape from Eclectic Method on Vimeo.

I can’t fight the urge. I keep relapsing. Photo blogs are too powerful for me to resist. Here are a few of the regular spots I’m getting my daily fix:

Yimmy’s Yayo

this isn’t happiness

HotWheels (brother of this isn’t happiness)

FFFFOUND!

Dropular

Cheers to my boys up north at Analogue for the relaunch of their company blog.

*I think they’re using a little too much sIFR sauce, but it looks lovely.

Yes, you’re gonna lose.
In fact, you’ve been losing for a long time.
And I know you won’t go down quietly. You’ll continue to kick and scream until you hit the canvas.

seat, originally uploaded by combustionchamber.

Mr. Orange in shades, originally uploaded by combustionchamber.

legs for days, originally uploaded by combustionchamber.

hood, originally uploaded by combustionchamber.

Amazon releasing a Kindle application for the iPhone was a very smart move. Like a lot of the news I’m reading today, I’m happy to see Amazon make this move and not try to wall off other devices. While it’s not going to replace the Kindle 1.0 my wife bought me for Christmas, there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to read e-books I bought from Amazon on my iPhone.

Now some of you are thinking right now, ‘But Mike – you don’t seem to have any problem with your beloved Apple and their gated community of iPhone applications? Why aren’t you demanding the same openness Amazon is showing with its Kindle app from Apple and its iPhone?”. Ah – but I’m a proponent of the content being open, not the platform. Amazon is selling media files for the Kindle (books, magazines), the same way Apple is selling media files in iTunes (music), and if you remember, Apple didn’t want DRM on their music, the record executives insisted on it because we’re all nasty little thieves. Google made the same move with Google Docs publishing out to standard (albeit Microsoft proprietary) formats like .doc and .ppt instead of inventing its own.

With each succeeding year, it becomes more and more clear why Amazon isn’t just a website that sells stuff, they’re clearly a company focused on innovation.

Fort Totten, originally uploaded by combustionchamber.