—Aldous Huxley

Cory Doctorow on the future of the Web as we know it:

Try as I might, I can’t shake the feeling that 2014 is the year we lose the Web. The W3C push for DRM in all browsers is going to ensure that all interfaces built in HTML5 (which will be pretty much everything) will be opaque to users, and it will be illegal to report on security flaws in them (because reporting a security flaw in DRM exposes you to risk of prosecution for making a circumvention device), so they will be riddled with holes that creeps, RATters, spooks, authoritarians and crooks will be able to use to take over your computer and fuck you in every possible way.
Scary shit.

Interesting data from Next Big Sound on Artist Distribution:

Wells Baum says it’s not your fault:

91% of artists remain undiscovered. It’s not your fault, it’s the algorithms.
Algorithms play a part in this, but so does the basic distribution of talent among humans. As George Carlin said:
Not all children are smart and clever, got that? Kids are like any other group of people: a few winners…a whole lot of losers.
When I taught at Rutgers and FIT, I found this to be the case as well. I naively expected every kid in my classes to be a passionate, talented and curious designer.
Not so. I quickly discovered I was lucky if I had 1 or 2 talented—and more importantly, hungry—students in a class of 15-20.

via Bombtune

People are all up in arms about Google buying Nest and knowing even MORE about you, but don’t forget about Amazon:

Drawing on its massive store of customer data, Amazon plans on shipping you items it thinks you’ll like before you click the purchase button. The company today gained a new patent for “anticipatory shipping,” a system that allows Amazon to send items to shipping hubs in areas where it believes said item will sell well. This new scheme will potentially cut delivery times down, and put the online vendor ahead of its real-world counterparts.
Hey, Amazon, I do want that Rancilio Espresso Machine, but I can’t afford it, so don’t you dare ship it to me.

BGR on iOS 7.1:

Additionally, iOS 7.1 should help unify iOS 7 better graphically, with various user interface updates across the entire system and in apps for a more cohesive feel.
Please fix this stuff.
And this stuff.
And this stuff too.
(If you didn’t know, the title of this post is a great Beatles tune)

via NOS

Drake Baer, for Fast Company, on how the brains of creative people work (via Bombtune):

While most have us have a fair amount of latent inhibition helping us to filter out irrelevant data, creative (and maybe also psychotic) people aren’t quite so ordered, making for what Harvard psychologist Shelley Carson calls cognitive disinhibition. She defines it as “the failure to ignore information that is irrelevant to current goals or to survival.” In other words, it’s allowing for more info to come in than seems immediately beneficial.

For example:

A person with low latent inhibitions would not only see a yellow desk lamp, they may also think of bananas, Spongebob Squarepants, or Spongebob Squarepants eating a banana, or possibly concoct a whole dissertation in their head about whether or not Spongebob likes to eat bananas, or how he could get them down in the ocean
Weird? Weird like how?
Like screen-printing a poster of George Carlin’s Seven Words You Can’t Say On Television?
That’s completely normal.
What?

Links, links, links. Life is a series of links. Shit happened this week. Here’s a few things that caught my eye:
Tobias Frere-Jones is suing Jonathan Hoefler (via everywhere). The typography duo that brought you THE typeface of the 2000s—Gotham—is in court. This should remind you never to be envious of a perfect company or perfect marriage. They don’t exist.
DENHAM PSYCHO (via Quipsologies). Well-executed (no pun intended) hipster remake of the business card and axe scenes in American Psycho (It’s incredible how many guys in San Francisco look exactly like the ones depicted in this video).
Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee with Jay Leno. This episode is great. Most of em are. I’m happy Jerry is back with a new season.
MAMP. It let’s you use your Mac as a server for local testing. I’m using it to work on a new WordPress site. It’s been around a while, but it’s new to me (Hey, cut me some slack, I’m a designer, not a dev).
One-third of the 8,500 or so taxi drivers in San Francisco … have ditched driving a registered cab in the last 12 months to drive for a private transportation startup like Uber, Lyft, or Sidecar instead. Woah.
The Bacon Method. Set oven to 400 degrees. Toss in tray of bacon. Set timer for 20 minutes. Then you have perfectly cooked bacon.

Image taken from The New York Times
via Twitter

…of Common UI Symbols

2014 Porsche 911 Targa

via Wired