From: Gleanings
To: Faces
Subject: Gleanings: I got the whole world in my hands

OPENING THANG

Feed mag is starting a multi-part story on globalization. I'm very excited.
http://www.feedmag.com/templates/default.php3?a_id=1644

Oh, and I curse reel player on the blog
http://eleganthack.com/blog/2001_03_01_pastblog.shtml#2704024

USABILITY MATTERS

Interview with Jef Raskin-- my latest hero!
http://www.computerworld.com/cwi/story/0,1199,NAV47_STO57255,00.html

NIST WebMetrics tools
http://zing.ncsl.nist.gov/webmet/

Jakob says "Traditional phones must die."
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20010107.html
and points to the
review of the new VisorPhone
http://www.salon.com/tech/col/garf/2001/03/07/visorphone/
(yeah, but he thought micropayments would be here by now, didn't he?)

DESIGN MATTERS

here's one for all you tiny font folks
http://www.futabita.com/
( *very* in "under construction" but still kinda fun)

NEWS

when will people realize we live in an era where nothing is protectable?

Interactive Week: DeCSS 2? DVD code broken again. (tomalak.org)
Last week, a Web site published the pair's seven-line program, which
unscrambles the protection around a DVD so quickly that a movie can play at
the same time, although the film appears choppy. It's the shortest program to
break DVD defenses to date.
http://www.zdnet.com/intweek/stories/news/0,4164,2693768,00.html

ZDNN: From November 16, 1999; DVD encryption break is a good thing. Bruce
Schneier.
http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/comment/0,5859,2395497,00.html

APROPOS OF NOTHING

I just thought this was cool
http://www.uk.research.att.com/facesataglance.html
but I also love this
http://www.k10k.net/imageUpLoaded/jonathan_keller_lrg.jpg
from the K10K desktop project.
http://www.k10k.net/

5 star hotel on the net
http://www.habbohotel.com/

I can't believe no one calls RealPlayer on what has got to be the worst user experience in registration ever. Do you want mail? do you? are you sure? you must want some mail. are you sure?

Of course their lowest trick is this one:

looking at this, you'd hit next, wouldn't you? Better scroll first...

Jesse and I have chattted about immoral IA before and couldn't come up with an obvious example-- until now.

it ain't right.

addendum: Marc writes

Living in Seattle, I had a brief vision of printing out your 'blog and physically standing in front of their headquarters downtown, shoving copies of your example in front of their employees as they walked into the building.

"Are you SURE you don't want this informative flyer? Are you SURE? Well, too bad, you have to take it, because I didn't GIVE YOU THE OPTION not to!"

Consider it a guerrilla strike for good IA. :)