2,005 karma · joined March 28, 2007
Maybe browsers should restrict the :visited attribute to one domain. Or maybe just base it on a daily history instead of your all-inclusive one.
Maybe browsers themselves could determine users' cognitive style over time and send that info when you visit a site.
I would agree that Vista is an upgrade in the same way XP was: moderate improvements with new UI things to learn. And I think you're very right to refer back to XP's launch and how the same complaining was made then.
But I don't see who you can call Vista's launch a success. This would probably be better debated with empirical data about sales and time on the market and stuff, but just the general vibe about Vista is so horribly negative in ways I don't remember XP's ever being.
You say this is because more people are making their negative reactions known this time around, and we should ignore them because people like to bitch. But I don't think it's a forgone conclusion that their reactions would be negative -- they could've reacted positively.
I doubt Microsoft is proud of Vista's launch.
The actual issue is that the music industry realizes how powerful the iTunes Store has become and they feel threatened, so they'll give anyone a deal who says they'll compete with Apple.
What's with seeking averages for everything? When you have completely different situations the average is not useful information:
When I go to a book store I pick up a lot of books, skim them, and put them back because they are boring or not what I wanted. Eventually I will find an interesting one, find a hidden courtesy chair, and read 50 pages. You could study this information and say on average I read 3 pages of all books. That's correct, but it's wrong and misleading.
It's not really worth critiquing the rest of the study since it's just not rigorous enough from the outset, but a couple more points:
1. He threw out visits lasting longer than ten minutes. Obviously that's going to affect his conclusion.
2. They have no idea what percentage of the text on a page was actual content. I'd guess 25% of the words on any newspaper site page are not the actual article. He should correct for this.
3. He tacks it on the end, but it seriously challenges the usefulness of this entire study: the content matters. People will read what appears interesting to them and ignore what doesn't.
† Surely knowing their behavior is being monitored alters their behavior. If these are work computers then they're probably wary of spending too much time on the internet if it isn't directly related to their work. Maybe they bookmarked articles to read at home. Or maybe they altered their browsing because they're worried about being judged.
Where are you worried the edits changed what you said?
I can understand wanting higher quality entertainment than South Park, but don't fool yourself into thinking an NPR podcast is a better use of time if it is likewise distracting you from things you need to do.
You don't think the time spent on entries simply reflects the prize money involved? How much time would groups be putting into Netflix's contest if it was for a $250 prize?
Also notice how both Google and Netflix pay contestants along the way (Google giving $25,000 to fifty groups for completing the first phase, Netflix giving $50,000 each year to the group that makes the best improvement).
Those contests are legitimate contests. They are truly seeking creative and valuable entries. And they reward the winners with millions of dollars.
The "contests" at 99designs are just regular contract work where companies are trying to get as much labor for as little as possible.
Try inserting another profession into your sentence and see if it still sounds reasonable.
Your argument doesn't really sway me: I'm judging the program based on something real; you're judging it based on what must obviously be the case.
I don't completely write-off a YC-clone just because they put zero thought into the application form. But it does alter my impression.
I disagree with your static typing argument too. "Mountain out of a molehill" means making a bigger deal out of something than it is. Which means both things could be class Mound, just with different values. So in this case static typing wouldn't have saved the day ;-)
How is it possible that PG nailed down exactly what every seed investor would ever want to know about startup founders seeking funding? Don't these investors have any other questions? Do they actually call people hackers in real life? Is a couple sentences about each founder the maximum all investors are capable of reading?
So I'm left wondering if the lack of thought that went into the application carries over into the rest of the program.
Using Black & White gets me results much closer to what you've made.
Thanks for criticizing my graphics and putting up improved ones. (The second one isn't working, but I understand your point about the green – again, Desaturate convinced me they were all the same value.)
It's really hard to isolate and demonstrate one property of color at a time.
Do we know Apple has said anything to Pystar about EULA violations? I would guess that if Apple has shutdown Pystar it is because they are violating Apple's trademark by selling a product called OpenMac.
If Pystar was selling a computer called OpenDell they'd get a call from Dell.
And if she did she would make a note saying so.
"Just the act of contemplating morality eliminated cheating," Ariely explains.
This conclusion seems like one someone wanted to make, not one that makes sense.
Couldn't it just be that people know the ten commandments are easily checked, so it's silly to try to make some up?
And I don't understand how they know people cheated on the books question. How can you possibly find out what books someone read while in high school? Unless they mean specifically which ones were assigned (which still seems hard to verify).
And if people listed some titles they hadn't read it doesn't imply cheating: they could simply be remembering incorrectly.
If you convert the red-orange scheme to grayscale you'll see that both the ugly and nice schemes have the same value contrast. If you convert the green-blue scheme to grayscale you'll see that the ugly combination has more value contrast.
See: http://img357.imageshack.us/img357/9127/grayfx0.png
The issue isn't contrast, it's hue.
The author uses the Müller Formula to explain it, but I'm not convinced about the "follow the natural brightness" argument – does that explanation still make sense if you reorder the colors in the scheme?
I learned this stuff in color theory without this formula. It's simply this: combinations of colors with similar hues don't look good together.
I hope this picture helps explain it: http://img181.imageshack.us/img181/3797/vomitev5.png
Obviously the left scheme doesn't look great in that graphic because all the colors have the same value. But you can see that it looks better than a scheme with colors of similar hue.
They opened it up to the public after the iPhone came out. so you can use this address to signup: savings@sprintemi.com
I pay about $34 a month for 500 anytime, unlimited n/w (nights start at 7pm), unlimited data, and unlimited texts.
Unlimited texts aren't part of the plan, but if you ask for it after signing up they should give it to you.
I've never had a problem with Sprint's network.
When Boost got Loopt they created an entire ad campaign about it. Sprint got Loopt almost a year ago and the only mention on their site is a paragraph in a Word document.
I'd also love to know how long it took Loopt to convince Verizon to let them in. Or maybe I'd hate to know.
There's one big usability problem that I encountered: You start with one marker (showing the address the user entered), but it isn't used in calculating the area at all. It's especially confusing because the initial directions bubble is coming from it, which for me implied that it was the marking the first corner of my shape.
I think you should either not show the address marker, or (since it's draggable) use it in calculating the area. I haven't used the Google Maps api before, so I don't know how possible those suggestions are.
Double clicking markers zoomed the map in and didn't remove them.
On the directions:
I think you should move the last bullet point to a persistent place above the iframe code. It shortens the directions and keeps the information available in case the user forgets or skips them.
You should clarify the "toggle filling" option. I was expecting a color change, not a fill or no fill. In fact, I would drop this option and just default to fill.
So I'd reword the directions as:
* Click the map to create markers.
* Drag markers around to define your area.
* Double click a marker to remove it.
Thinking about the fill or no fill thing, I can see how it could help differentiate between an area and a route. But a route doesn't have to connect. Maybe you could add the ability to make routes?
Edit 2:
It doesn't seem like you can specify markers exactly. What's the point of using this instead of marking up a screenshot in Photoshop?