#readlastweek

Privacy Is Personal

Notable conclusion: if the product is free, you are the product. Meaning, your data is being mined and sold elsewhere to pay for the service. So where do you draw the line? It varies from person to person, but perhaps there will be lines that will solidify in the years to come

Nobody Wants To Use Your Product

Developer, designers, and entrepreneurs all want to believe their products are awesome and customers want to use them non-stop. But the reality is that consumers care less about what it does, compared to what the end result is. For example, I don't care about using Google Hangouts vs Skype to video chat. But I do care if Hangouts lags or Skype doesn't pick up my microphone. End results matter and products should be designed to get out of our way instead of fancy animations we don't care about.

Is Lyft the Bing to Uber’s Google?

Platform businesses inherently yield monopolistic positions. But certain platforms leave room for duopolies or oligopolies. The question is whether or not the market leaves enough sustainable room for more than one player.

Why Media Titans Would Be Wise Not to Overlook Netflix

"What if Netflix is the Amazon of the entertainment industry — the embodiment of a slow, expensive, high-risk effort to consume the entirety of [the media] business?"

ProPublica heads to the Dark Web so that its readers aren’t spied on

Stay Focused on Your Goals Not Your Critics

Inspiration. Courtesy of Ricky Gervais:

Remember, it's better to create something and be criticised than to create nothing and criticise others.

— Ricky Gervais (@rickygervais)

November 22, 2015

  Blank’s Rule – To predict the future 1/3 of you need to be crazy

33% insiders who know the processes and politics +

33% outsiders who represent “brand-name wisdom” +

17% crazy insiders +

17% crazy outsiders = 100% reason to remember the name

Looking back on 2015: six exciting web technologies

Electron,

React Native, more: why React matters (it’s not because of web) also: check out NativeScript,

Progressive web apps, more: …and another perspective,

VS Code,

Rollup: more: github also: tree-shaking,

Web Assembly

Supporting People

The author asks the question about supporting legacy software, but he is really asking about accessibility and the responsibility as makers to hold to a standard of universal compatibility.

Brave New War

“Now the informational element appears to be as important as, if not more important than, the physical dimension.”

“It’s a brave new war without beginning or end, where the borders of peace and war, serviceman and civilian have become utterly blurred—and where you and I are both a target and a weapon.”

What Twitter Can Be.

Perhaps 2016 will be the year I return to my Twitter feed. But definitely see the need for improvements to make it less "lonely". Unlike Slack and Gitter, the sense of community and dialgue is not immediately apparent and thus the network effects aren't fully captured. Very good read--and hope that I would get drawn back!

Envisioning the Perfect Design App

With web technologies moving faster than ever and rapidly changing practices, apps like Photoshop and Illustrator seem like relics in comparison to some of the new tools out there. Highlights: reponsive design, ease of collaboration, user flow controls, and componentization of elements for object reuse that make designing and gathering feedback a joy rather than a chore. Aside: I need to revisite framer.js and Project Comet looks amazing...

Sitting on an Ocean of Talent

Super interesting take on opening up borders and allowing for a much more fluid immigration policy. Got to revisit this another time with a more comprehensive post ;)

Unicorns and Other Things We Must Stop Talking About in 2016

My guesses for topics in 2016 that will result in the new buzz: virtual/augmented reality, interoperablilty of IoT, info security, value-driven startups

Artificial Intelligence Finally Entered Our Everyday World