http://www.gaussianblur.org Blurring the line between media and design Thu, 24 Jul 2008 15:38:43 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en What if fonts were people? This particularly good video from the guys over at CollegeHumor.com answers that question... don't watch if you loathe Comic Sans. You have been warned. http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/07/if-fonts-were-people As a disproportionate amount of my time and energy this weekend has gone to procuring an iPhone 3G (and no, I was not one of those crazed fans who stood in line for one for any length of time), I have to admit that I'm extremely disappointed with the way ... http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/07/artificial-scarcity Now that I've been done with school for several months, I've been in the process of trying to determine what, exactly, will come "next" for me in professional, academic and personal terms.  I've been doing a significant amount of work for my clients as a freelancer, but I've also picked ... http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/07/creative-prioritization As I was reviewing my checking account statement the other day, I discovered two charges that I didn't recognize, both from the same business and for the same dollar amount.  I did a Google search to see if perhaps I was just forgetting a transaction or two, which happens from ... http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/07/biometrics-and-fraud I was watching American Gladiators the other day (cut me some slack, it's a guilty pleasure--I used to watch it when I was younger and was very excited to hear that NBC was bringing it back) when I noticed some "liberal editing" that seems to have been going on for ... http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/06/misunderstanding-media-consumption-modes A few weeks ago I received a BuzzFeed newsletter (it's really great, and I'd recommend that you sign up for it if you haven't already) that featured a "brand timeline " that had been created by an advertising account executive.  It was surprisingly revealing, and it made me realize that ... http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/06/brands-and-the-subconscious I'm at the HOW Design Conference in Boston for the first part of this week, thanks to the generous support of my employers, who like to send me on little adventures like this every now and then so that I can keep myself sharp, learn new things that might benefit ... http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/05/the-lazy-designer-and-the-herd-mentality Over the weekend I submitted my thesis to the Media Studies department at The New School.  Barring any unforeseen circumstances, all that's left for me to do is to graduate in two weeks. The past five months' worth of work have been difficult and challenging, but I'm pleased with the outcome ... http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/05/from-stovetop-to-screen-a-cultural-history-of-food-television While browsing through the New York Times today I found an article that pointed out something that hadn't occurred to me (not consciously, anyway)--there is no legal equivalent to medical information sites like WebMD or general knowledge sites like Wikipedia or MSN's Encarta.  Of course, there are plenty of legal ... http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/04/opening-a-closed-system-of-information As a designer that works full-time on a high-traffic website, I understand perfectly that without ample user testing it's impossible to know exactly how users will interact with your designs. I've watched agape when, in testing sessions, users seem unable to decode new features that I've developed that made ... http://www.gaussianblur.org/2008/04/when-to-stop-coddling-the-user