IDEO launches a new site. Interesting use of Javascript. (via ChangeTheThought)

So I have a new girlfriend, her name is Leighton Meester. I’ve told my wife about her, and she’s totally cool with it (She’s been seeing David Beckham for a few years now anyway).

So Khoi Vihn, over on his blog, Subtraction, has a post about design magazines and how he perceives – and inevitably handles them differently than the beat-up copy of the New Yorker in his bag.
With regard to publications such as Eye and Print:

It’s taken me years of subscribing to these magazines or buying them on newsstands to finally admit to myself that, more often than not, they sit on my desk upon arrival and don’t get read. Whether consciously or subconsciously, I consider them to be objects to be stored and protected from the ravages of reading.

This calls to mind one of my favorite quotes, from the book, The Picture of Dorian Gray:

We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he
does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless
thing is that one admires it intensely.
All art is quite useless.

My advice to Mr. Vihn is to do his best to get over his phobia of using magazines. I’m not saying he needs to go as far as to dog ear the pages, but use them, break them in like a good baseball mitt. Believe it or not, the books and magazines I’ve knocked around a bit tend gain more value to me than the museum pieces I haven’t touched for years.
I feel the same way about electronics. The more you try to keep them scratch-free and perfect, the more upset you’ll be when they get scratches, nicks and dings (I’ve written about this before).

I’m surprised how many designers (web or otherwise) that don’t know the term vernacular design. Considering how much vernacular design is out there, I can guess a lot of people don’t know that they’re even engaging in it.
Vernacular design refers to a style, not to a methodology. A common example would be the vintage/retro style this site uses. I love old car manuals, diagrams and typographic styles from the 1950’s & 1960’s. I could use a similar style on any site if I chose to – what gives the style meaning is underlying metaphor from my studio – The Combustion Chamber, and the extension of this ‘brand’ into this blog, Daily Exhaust.
Many designers don’t reach out at all in order to marry a vernacular design style with a concept, they just do it because it looks good and many can make a good living designing by style and not by meaning derived from the content of the project. This doesn’t make it right.
Which brings me to a great example of vernacular design I found today – Field Notes.

This site is beautiful in and of itself (both the design and the HTML code).
…but once we dig deeper, we find a wonderful concept to support this stylistic approach:

INSPIRED BY the vanishing subgenre of agricultural memo books, ornate pocket ledgers and the simple, unassuming beauty of a well-crafted grocery list, the Draplin Design Company, Portland, Oregon in conjunction with Coudal Partners of Chicago, Illinois bring you “FIELD NOTES” in hopes of offering, “An honest memo book, worth fillin’ up with GOOD INFORMATION

Every project has a concept – find it and exploit it.
It’s only going to make your work stronger.

It’s a trivial feature, but the fact the I can screengrab anything on my iPhone is great.

Continue…

The CNN ‘Breaking Alerts’ are starting to read like Twitter messages:
CNN.com:

Twitter:

No context, no supporting link to more info.
No who, what, why, where or how.

So I’ve got a new favorite t-shirt brand:

They’re called Barking Irons on the Bowery.
From their Wikipedia page:

The name “Barking Irons” comes from a 19th century slang term for pistols. The term was created by gangs of youths that haunted New York’s infamous Bowery. The Bowery, a theatre district for much of the century, was a critical proving ground for indigenous American culture in the 19th century. Uniquely American art forms such as tap-dancing, minstrel shows, and vaudeville theatre all gained popularity in the Bowery theatres of the time.

Over the last 10 years or so, I’ve become more and more interested in the history of New York. It began in earnest after seeing Gangs of New York and realizing my Irish ancestors on my father’s side came to to New York not long after that film takes place. Since then I’ve read books and watched documentaries on the city – most recently Secrets of New York on NYC TV.
These shirts are fueling my continued curiosity of the city.

What’s great about these shirts is each of the collections they’ve put out are themed on a particular aspect of New York history.
barkingirons.com

Advertising sure has come along way since the Mad Men days. (via BuzzFeed)

nuclear weaponry, of course, would be the be-all, end-all of just too many people and too many parts of our planet.

and

a two-state solution, building our embassy also in Jerusalem, those things that we look forward to being able to accomplish with this peace-seeking nation.

• Governor Sarah Palin, The Vice Presidential Debate, 3 October, 2008
  source: NY Times: The Vice-Presidential Debate (thanks Bryan)

Researchers work to turn car’s exhaust into power
The Combustion Chamber rejoices.

For those of you who remember the movie Dumb & Dumber, this current economic crisis calls to mind a particular scene:
audio version (WAV)
Nicholas Andre: Where’s all the money?
Lloyd: That’s as good as money sir, those are IOUs. Go ahead and add it up every cents accounted for. Look, see this that’s a car, 275 thou might want to hang on to that one.