December 2011
4 posts
Give Me Something To Read’s 2011 Highlights →
A wonderful collection of some of the best stories of the year. Looking forward to digging into these over some time off work at Christmas.
Domain Name Theft
It’s one of those things that you never really even consider possible, until it happens to you. I found out last week that someone had “hijacked” the domain name of one of the sites I manage - Design Shack.
I’ve published a short post that outlines all the details surrounding the situation. Needless to say, it isn’t the most pleasant start to a month filled with...
November 2011
4 posts
The All-New Tuts+ Premium
We’ve completely re-launched the Premium version of our Tuts+ blogs with a fresh design, far more content, courses, eBooks, forums, and a much simpler way to navigate your way around all our archived tutorials.
I’m incredibly proud to be a (small) part of the team behind such a fantastic educational resource!
Pretty Little Pixels
Having completed several mini-projects to design a new “blog” for myself online, I’ve come to realise that the motivation boost from launching a design refresh isn’t sufficient to encourage me to get back into writing and linking every day. The surge of new blogging energy usually only lasts a week at most…
Despite this, I still feel that it’s important to...
Elizabeth Gilbert on Nurturing Creativity
Although I don’t consider my profession to necessarily centre around creativity in the same way that Elizabeth’s does, I still felt that this video resonated with me. It’s a completely different take on what you might consider “creative block”, and goes a long way toward explaining why the creative profession can be so challenging and frustrating at times.
Watch the...
June 2011
1 post
April 2011
3 posts
“And, tomorrow morning, unlike last Saturday morning and countless other days...”
– Hands down one of the most heartfelt, inspiring and wonderful things I’ve read. Merlin gets it.
Coffee Joulies →
These are definitely going on my “coffee gadget” shopping list…
March 2011
9 posts
“Let’s be honest, Katherine. You didn’t seriously consider the features of the...”
– The Noyes Machine - One of the most entertaining “debunks” I’ve read in a while.
Meet the Chef: Jamie Oliver →
A fantastic interview with a very interesting personality. Never expected Jamie Oliver to know so much about apps, or be such a geek when it comes to video and filming…
“…one customer returned his iPad 2 for a different reason: his wife...”
– Apple Says Yes
Read & Trust Newsletter →
A great idea. $5/month for quality, regular articles from your favourite writers. The perfect way to support these fantastic blogs.
“iTunes presumably sells a good volume of HD movie rentals, and there’s very...”
– Marco Arment on whether Blu-ray will ever be included in the Mac lineup. I cast my vote in agreement - It’s unlikely we’ll ever see it, and I don’t think that’s a bad thing.
Thoughts and Reflections on Apple’s Product... →
It’s been a while since I published my own opinion piece on AppStorm, and I’m quite happy with how this one turned out.
Moleskine Notebooks, Sketchbooks, and Journal... →
If you love notebooks as much as I do, you’ll love this…
October 2010
2 posts
“What if we’re also settled on the current handful dominant OSes, mobile...”
– What technologies are geeks pioneering today? - Marco Arment
For me, my days of tinkering and messing with computer hardware ended when I bought my first Mac Mini.
There was a wave of realisation that actually using a computer to create things was actually a lot more interesting.
I felt like...
September 2010
2 posts
The Cult of Busy →
People who truly have control over time have some in their pocket to give to someone in need. They have a sense of priorities that drives their use of time and can shift away from the specific ordinary work that’s easy to justify, in favor of the more ethereal, deeper things that are harder to justify. They protect their time from trivia and idiocy. These people are time rich.
July 2010
2 posts
“The only thing worse than not reading a book in the last ninety days is not...”
– Jim Rohn, quoted by Barbara J. Winter in Making a Living Without a Job. It’s a great read for anyone who is remotely entrepreneurially minded, and I couldn’t agree more with the above advice.
Thanks to Patrick Rhone for indirectly recommending this at some point (I can’t remember...
June 2010
2 posts
Future of Web Design 2010
After attending DIBI a few weeks ago, I felt like I wasn’t really ready for another design conference just yet. I love meeting like minded people, and watching great speakers, but at the end of the day it’s important not do to indulge in these at the expense of actual work.
I’ve attended Carsonified events in London before, and have always found them to be enjoyable. This year,...
May 2010
4 posts
“Microsoft spent seven times as much as Apple on R&D over the past four...”
– (via Gruber)
It just goes to show that piling an endless stream of money into a problem isn’t necessarily the way to develop something innovative.
“We may have a dozen or more things we have in our queue to do at the moment, but...”
– Entrepreneurial Seduction: Indie Multitasking
I recently took the step of hiring my first full-time employee, and it has been one of the best decisions I have made in my career so far. I feel like I’ve received a new lease of life now that I’m sharing my workload with an incredibly...
“Your company’s story, product descriptions, history, personality — these are the...”
– Why is Business Writing So Awful? - Jason Fried on the problems inherent in business writing. A great read.
April 2010
9 posts
“Only iPhone developers can advertise on the touch network. There’s only one ad...”
– Chris and Michael launch the latest phase of Fusion Ads, with an incredibly well thought-out model.
My Thoughts on DIBI 2010
Conferences - whether design, development, or anything else - are difficult to get right.
I’ve attended a few Carsonified events over the past two years; both their larger FOWA London/Dublin conferences, and a smaller FOWD Tour in Leeds. Judged purely on the quality of the speakers and content taught, these were all excellent events. But it’s not all about the content.
After...
Use it or not. That's up to you. But you pay me. →
I asked him if he would come up with a few options. And he said, “No. I will solve your problem for you. And you will pay me. And you don’t have to use the solution. If you want options, go talk to other people. But I’ll solve your problem for you the best way I know how. And you use it or not. That’s up to you. You’re the client. But you pay me.” And there was a clarity about the relationship...
“Silicon Valley police are investigating what appears to be a lost Apple iPhone...”
– Lost iPhone prototype spurs police probe | Apple - CNET News
Fantastic - I hope Apple takes this as far as possible. Everything I’ve ever heard about Gizmodo is that they’re generally a distasteful, unsavoury bunch of writers. I’m proud to say that I’ve never subscribed to...
Creating a Tumblr Bookmarklet for the iPad →
After discovering that my existing bookmarklet didn’t work on the iPad, this did the trick perfectly.
March 2010
2 posts
“In the course of a year, registered Twitter accounts have grown more than 1,500%...”
– In terms of scalability, that’s nothing to be proud of.
February 2010
4 posts
“To be honest, it all started very unexpectedly for me. From a very early age I...”
– My in-depth interview with Vitaly Friedman, posted on Design Shack.
“So, for me, it’s not a case of ‘yes’ or ‘no’. More like ‘it depends’. It depends...”
– Mark Boulton has the final say in the ongoing debate about whether web designers should also be proficient at coding.
January 2010
19 posts
In Response to the iPad Criticism
Yesterday, I posted an in-depth look at Apple’s latest creation - the iPad - over at Mac.AppStorm. That article has since been commented on by almost one hundred people, with a surprisingly large majority voicing criticism over the device.
I wanted to voice my own opinion and write a response to some of the criticism hurtling around the web at the moment. First of all, my response is...
