Brian Armstrong

Simone Weil

Donald A. Norman (The Design of Everyday Things, p. XII)

Reichenstein talks about how living in Japan changed the way he looks at the world, the design of iA Writer, and mobile operating systems. This is spot on: > iOS is the Windows XP for mobile devices. It looks a lot like Windows XP, if feels like Windows XP, and it is loved like Windows XP. It doesn’t have the same market share Windows XP had back in the day, but Windows XP was liked so much that Microsoft had a really hard time replacing it. Sooner or later Apple will have to radically evolve its UI paradigm.

 Somebody hire this guy. There's some great thinking in this look at what the Microsoft brand should today. The presentation of the redesign is just as impressive as the work itself.

# Twitter's new brand Pretty baller move to join the few companies recognizable enough to go without any accompanying text. Twitter's creative director: "There’s no longer a need for text, bubbled typefaces, or a lowercase ‘t’ to represent Twitter." Check out their new [brand guide](https://twitter.com/about/logos). Also the video really nicely shows how the shape was geometrically created. [via [Daring Fireball](http://daringfireball.net/2011/12/new_twitter) and [Brand New](http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/twitter_gives_you_the_bird.php)]

# Beautiful sites with full-bleed hero photography Just came across Paper's site today and thought I'd make note of this pattern. Each one of these sites is truly stunning so check them out. - [Paper](http://madewithpaper.fiftythree.com/) (also just won an Apple Developer Award) - [Rdio](http://www.rdio.com/), which is like Spotify, but better - [Push Pop Press](http://pushpoppress.com/about/), which Apple ripped off for their iPad textbooks

Stupid games, on the other hand, are rarely occasions in themselves. They are designed to push their way through the cracks of other occasions. We play them incidentally, ambivalently, compulsively, almost accidentally. They’re less an activity in our day than a blank space in our day; less a pursuit than a distraction from other pursuits.

# Project Glass Incredibly simple and beautiful design. This is exactly the kind of stuff Google needs to be doing.

Today Google released a doodle honoring Akira Yoshizawa, who Wikipedia refers to as "the grandmaster of origami," on what would have been his 101st birthday. This is particularly exciting for me because I was in the right place at the right time and was recruited to photograph the doodle. I worked with a member of the Doodle team to arrange and photograph the piece designed and folded by Robert Lang, a California-based origami artist. You can read more about the process on Google's Official Blog, and check out the folding pattern, below.

If you don't have 30 minutes to spare check out (kony2012.com)[http://www.kony2012.com/] to learn what's going on (and watch the video later).

Bret Victor demonstrates his fundamental, guiding insight: that creators should have tools that allow them to interact immediately and directly with their creations. Truly a game-changing perspective.

(Skin Type via Swiss-miss)

So there they were: one young person who had lost the capacity for solitude and another who couldn’t see the point of it. There’s been much talk of late about the loss of privacy, but equally calamitous is its corollary, the loss of solitude.

CSS-Tricks' Chris Coyier doesn't discuss Closure Stylesheets, but for devs outside of Google, this is a great overview.

LeRoy Polluck

After an elephant hunt and a flip-flop on SOPA, I've finally done it. I'm back up and running, completely GoDaddy free. Feels good.