David Herrold

BMW concept car with cloth skin

Posted by Dave | Filed under Design, Science, Technology

Video link

GINA Light Visionary Model BMW concept car makes me appreciate design even more. Imagine how light and fuel efficient a car could be made without the additional weight of a steel skin wrapped around it.

The headlights make it look almost alive.

Seen on Neat-o-rama.

Tags: bmw, car, concept, Design, gina

Dropbox - remote backup with version control

Posted by Dave | Filed under Apple, Productivity, Software, Technology

Dropbox is a remote back-up service that provides a very simple way to store files in a version-controlled environment. I’ve been using Dropbox to synch and provide back-ups for some test files on several computers at home.

How does it work?

Click here to read more…

Tags: Apple, back-up, backup, dropbox, pc, remote, version, versioning

Decentralize me, please.

Posted by Dave | Filed under Communication, Social Networking, Technology, Usability

Our content is becoming decentralized…and we love it.

Most bloggers I know are tangled up in multiple social networks, photo sharing sites, messaging services, networking sites, bookmarking platforms and a plethora of addictive attention-grabbing web services.

The concept of a “web presence” has changed so drastically over the last several years it’s become difficult to tell people “where” you are online. Blogs or personal home pages used to be our single point of existence online. These were the places we could refer colleagues, friends, family, etc if they wanted to see “our website.”

That’s not the case today.

Our lives are now split into dozens of different networks and spread across the internet like strategically placed digital confetti. We are on Facebook to connect with old friends and meet new ones. We are on LinkedIn to find jobs and stay connected to our business contacts. We are on Flickr to share our lives in photos. We are on Twitter because we have five spare seconds in line at the grocery store and saw something funny we need to share with the world. We are on Del.icio.us to keep track of all the amazing links we find and StumbleUpon to share them with the world.

Like a cheesy Zen proverb, we’re everywhere.

This is both frustrating and fantastic at the same time.

The fantastic part can be found in the amazing services we have access to for free. These services have connected old friends, gotten people out of foreign jails and made grandparents smile at newborn baby photos.

The frustrating part is trying to pull it all together. Some sites are friendly and speak to other sites; but most don’t. More often than not, our collection of platforms and services float like little islands unconnected in any meaningful way. We are forced to keep asking the same friends to connect with us on multiple services.

Some very smart people are working on pulling it all back together, but it still appears to be stuff of dreams at this point.

For now, many of us simply link all our networks, sites and services somewhere on our blog (as I’m doing in the right sidebar of this site). It’s not ideal, but until someone figures out how to bridge our isolated islands in a meaningful way, it’s what we’re forced to do.

What do you think? Will we end up with connected islands?

Photo by Harris Graber

Tags: Blogging, del.icio.us, facebook, flickr, linkedin, open social, openid, social networks

Mars Phoenix has landed!

Posted by Dave | Filed under Science, Technology

I’ve been following the progress of the Mars Phoenix lander for a few days as is got closer and closer to Mars. I’m happy to report that is has landed safely on the north pole of Mars. It will eventually send photos, and data from ice core samples in an attempt to learn more about our mysterious red planet.

Congratulations to the ground crew and everyone involved. Nice work.

Learn more here:

UPDATE: Images from the lander here.
UPDATE 2: According to a NYTimes article Twitter’s @MarsPhoenixe is actually Veronica McGregor, news services managers at NASA’s JPL facility in CA.

Of course, the messages are not coming from Mars. Instead, Veronica McGregor, the news services manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., has been playing the part of Phoenix each night after she gets home from work, forwarding questions to the science team and then posting answers.

NASA mission site
Follow mission updates on Twitter
Wikipedia entry on the Mars Phoenix

Tags: jpl, mars phoenix, marsphoenix, nasa

Blackberry Bold (9000) preview

Posted by Dave | Filed under Communication, Hardware, Mobile, Technology

Video link

The Blackberry 9000 Bold previewed in the video above features several useful upgrades (like wifi and video recording) that may create even more competition for the iPhone in the coming months.

According to the video, it will also feature some interface and application upgrades. I like the upgrades to the clock/alarm application and the ability to delete apps from the home screen makes that process MUCH easier.

The OS seemed very responsive and quick to open and close applications as well as saving data.

Looks like a great phone. I can’t wait to see the final release.

Tags: Blackberry, blackberry 9000, blackberry bold, bold, rim

Microsoft still single and seeking hot, young wife

Posted by Dave | Filed under Business, Technology

Microsoft ended it’s aggressive courtship for Yahoo today. According to the New York Times, a $4 dollar difference in stock price was the sticking point. Yahoo wanted $37 and Microsoft wanted $33. You can read the story here.

Microsoft’s decision to walk away is the latest chapter in a three-month-old standoff that began when Microsoft made an unsolicited offer to acquire Yahoo in an effort to compete more effectively with Google in Web search, advertising and services.

Yahoo rejected Microsoft’s offer repeatedly, saying it undervalued the company. Microsoft at times threatened to lower its offer, originally valued at $44.6 billion, or $31 a share.

In a letter to Mr. Yang that Microsoft released Saturday evening, Mr. Ballmer said that it would not make sense for Microsoft to pursue a lengthy proxy fight. “Our discussions with you have led us to conclude that, in the interim, you would take steps that would make Yahoo undesirable as an acquisition for Microsoft,” he wrote.

I can’t say I’m disappointed in the outcome. I was a little pessimistic about old media meeting new media and the potential impact of Microsoft owning properties like Del.icio.us and Flickr. I use both sites pretty frequently and wouldn’t want to see them squandered or misused by Microsoft in any way.

That might sound pessimistic, but I still view Microsoft as mainly an old media company and Yahoo and a new media company. One existed before the birth of the internet, the came after.

Hopefully this is put to rest so I can get back to posting cat photos on Flickr.

Tags: microsoft, yahoo

An Event Apart 2008 - New Orleans

Posted by Dave | Filed under Browsers, Design, Development, Technology, Usability, Web design

Wow. I have been drinking from the fire hose of information for the past two days here in New Orleans at An Event Apart. The conference was organized by Jeffery Zeldman and Eric Meyer and according to the website:

“Their new conference wouldn’t be just for designers. It wouldn’t be just for coders. Attendees would gain a deeper understanding of web standards, of course. But they would also encounter a world of emerging best practices and inspiring new ideas.”

I didn’t know what to expect. Would the code be over my head? Would the design be beyond my skills? Would I be able to grasp the conceptual nuggets they would throw? I mean, these people are the best in the industry.

They’re internet famous, right?

As it turned out, each presentation was amazingly clear, surprisingly understandable and completely worth the price of admission. The difference between the presenters at An Event Apart and your run-of-the-mill web experts is an overwhelming sense of passion for their craft. Some of the highlights for me were:

Andy Clarke’s astute observation about how comic book design can be transferred to the web to control pace and user engagement was refreshing, if not brilliant. It was one of those ideas that made me whack my forehead and wonder why I hadn’t thought of that. Andy’s a smart fellow. I added his blog to my feed reader immediately.

Brian Oberkirch, beyond being an extraordinarily nice guy, has an uncanny grasp on what humanizes the web. His talk Thursday afternoon was a lot like eating really good dim sum. I was filled with delicious savory tidbits about how sites can create human connections and positive social interaction with their users. Not shallow marketing, but real connections. The web would be a better place if more people listened to Brian.

I thought Eric Meyer’s CSS presentation, if any, would be the one that stumped me. I am, by no means, a CSS expert; and I feared his material would be tailored for people with more experience. However, Eric did such a good job of presenting his material in a way that made it easily digestible. I took away some very useful tidbits about how to use CSS to debug your markup. Very handy stuff.

I had never paid much attention to how beautiful data & information design could be until Jeff Veen spoke on Friday. His slide showing Google searches throughout the world as pinpoints of light on a globe was amazing. He spoke about data like some artists speak about color or texture. Data is simply another artistic medium.

Robert Hoekman Jr switched things up a bit. He did live usability assessments for people in the audience who needed some help with their sites. Usability issues fascinate me and Robert was very good at recognizing usability issues with a short glance at the site in question. I plan on checking out his book.

What can be said about Jeffery Zeldman that hasn’t already been said? Jeffery is the patriarch of web standards and has been fighting the good fight to make the web a better place for designers, programmers and users alike. He addressed a room full of designers as Yoda addressed his Jedi. Use your powers for good He was also very humble and approachable, something I hadn’t expected.

Here is some additional information about the speakers at An Even Apart 2008 in New Orleans:

Andy Clarke - Author, Transcending CSS
Dave Shea - Co-author, Zen of CSS Design
Cameron Moll - Author, Mobile Web Design
Jeff Veen - Design manager, Google
Brian Oberkirch - Publisher, Like It Matters
Aaron Gustafson - Co-author, AdvancED DOM Scripting
Stephanie Sullivan - Co-author, Mastering CSS with Dreamweaver CS3
Aarron Walter - Author, Building Findable Web Sites
Robert Hoekman Jr. - Author, Designing the Obvious
Jason Santa Maria - Designer, Happy Cog
Eric Meyer - Author, CSS: The Definitive Guide
Jeffrey Zeldman - Author, Designing With Web Standards

If web design, development and standards interest you then I would recommend checking out An Event Apart. I had a blast and hope to attend again in the future. It was good to hang out with Tim and the rest of my pals from BarCampNOLA in New Orleans.

Hope to see you all again soon.

Tags: aeanola08, An Event Apart, barcampnola, new orleans, nola

Google Apps Engine vs Amazon S3

Posted by Dave | Filed under Development, Google, Technology

According to a recent TechCrunch post, Google will be venturing into the application cloud business to compete directly with Amazon’s S3 service.

From TechCrunch:

Unlike Amazon Web Services’ loosely coupled architecture, which consists of several essentially independent services that can optionally be tied together by developers, Google’s architecture is more unified but less flexible. For example, it is possible with Amazon to use their storage service S3 independently of any other services, while with Google using their BigTable service will require writing and deploying a Python script to their app servers, one that creates a web-accessible interface to BigTable.

Are there enough differences for both services to exist or will there be a knock-down, drag-out fight in the near future. It’s hard to beat Google’s “hey, kids, our dope is free…for now” model.

It should be interesting to watch this unfold.

- Dave

Tags: amazon, application, Google, hosting, s3

Venture capital constipation

Posted by Dave | Filed under Business, Technology

According to a recent Wired article VC firms are having a difficult time finding start-ups that need their money. Simply put, there are not enough start-ups out there in need of large cash injections.

As companies become cheaper to launch, fewer entrepreneurs need the kind of cash infusions that VCs provide. And angel investors are encroaching on VCs’ turf by throwing more money at early-stage companies; in 2006, angels pumped a total of $26 billion into 51,000 startups, up from $18 billion in 2003. At the same time, large companies are snapping up Web businesses before these startups ever see a second or third round of funding.

The article mentions several reasons for this huge pile of unused cash, but never mentions the possibility that modern start-ups are being run more efficiently than the mythical champagne-soaked, Ferrari-fueled start-ups of yore.

Angel investors, marketing via social networks, affordable hosting and distribution have certainly made things much cheaper for entrepreneurs to create and spread their product or service. However, I think start-ups have become more efficient than they used to be.

Am I imagining this?

Tags: entrepreneur, startup, Venture capital

Some SXSW 2008 high points

Posted by Dave | Filed under Networking, Technology

1. Talking with Junyu Wang, an interaction designer from Google China, over dinner at a Mongolian BBQ restaurant.  We talked about the prodigious use of TOR, Google translate and other proxy services that allow the people of China to surf the web uncensored.  He also spoke about how the majority of the population doesn’t really care about the censorship. More importantly, he enjoyed Harry Potter and his cat doesn’t have a name.

2. Hearing Jason Fried & Jim Coudal speak frankly about their businesses and the creative process.  These guys are bright.  I took notes.

3. Frog Design party.  Fire dancers from Sangre del Sol Fire Troupe.  Neato.

4. Meeting a ridiculous number of fascinating technology professionals in various stages of inebriation.

I’ll be posting some of the things I learned after I decompress and read my feverishly-scratched notes.

It’s good to be home.

Tags: SXSW, sxsw2008