What the heck is unicode?
Remember computers just deal with numbers. Unicode enables a single software product or a single website to be targeted across multiple platforms, languages and countries without re-engineering. It allows data to be transported through many different systems without corruption.
Unicode provides a unique number for every character, no matter what the platform, no matter what the program, no matter what the language.
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January 18 was the great internet blackout to both protest and raise awareness about two pieces of legislation facing a vote in Congress. You may have noticed that our blog and website were blacked out for the day.
We captured a few of the more interesting efforts that we came across.
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Debtris US
A little bit about money in our sphere. We especially like the little dot that represents the OPEC Climate Change Fund.
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directed by: David McCandless
animation by: Miles Tudor, Dom Del Torto
music: Daniel Pemberton
sources: NY Times, The Guardian, BBC
data here: http://bit.ly/debtris
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Ice Cube takes us to the Eames House and celebrates their vision and design. The Eames’ are design heroes.
The Eames House, Case Study House #8, was one of roughly two dozen homes built as part of The Case Study House Program.
Read MoreSo google does it for us again today. Now that we have an iPhone 4S we want a way to hook our nifty device to a tripod for time lapse photography. How do we do that without a tripod of some weird thing constructed of rubber bands and cardboard?
Our search discovered this wonderful little device. Funded on Kickstarter and now available to you and best of all me.
Check out all three Glif packages here >
Read MoreThe Fire is a fiendishly effective shopping portal in the guise of a 7-inch slate.
— Wired.com
We always thought that Amazon should have been giving away the Kindle to get folks hooked. Apparently they finally got that idea into Beta. With the Kindle you got a reader although a clunky device — no elegant industrial design offered. But now you get a sleeker little tablet that really isn’t worth much unless pay $79 a year.
In depth review at Wired.com
We suggest you take a look at the Nook at $249. it does everything you could hope for in a powerful little tablet.
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So, one would wonder why no one has been paying attention to Wallee. This little company has a great little selection of smart little devices that will make you love your iPad even more. This is an image of their wonderful wall mount. It’s so simple it is perfect. You can twist your iPad to be horizontal or vertical. With a simple twist you can remove it from the wall. So, next time you are cooking and want to read a recipe but don’t want the danger of ingredients falling on your iPad get a Wallee wall mount. You can buy additional disks to mount it in multiple locations.
They also make the Pivot; your iPad looks like a mini iMac when attached to the base. The Kick is a smaller stand option. Carry is a nifty minimilast bag. Hand Strap, Headrest, and last but not least, Glove.
The newest product is called Wallee Lock. You can mount an iPad to a wall and secure it from folks with sticky fingers.
The only item not on our wishlist is the Hand Strap. We just don’t have the need. All of the products are under $100. US
If you want to see creative uses check the gallery out here : gallery >
Read MoreThe iPad is beginning to take hold in the airline industry. Quite surprisingly the airlines are.
Bonus: American Airlines, during its iPad trial program, suggested that by ditching the heavy paper-based pilot flight bags for iPads, they’d save enough weight to reduce their annual fuel bill by $1.2 million. Which also means less polluting fuel is burned.
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Tony Fadell is a name you may recognize; he use to work at Apple on a little product that just turned ten years old, the iPod. He left Apple spent a year in Paris and came back to create a new company Nest Labs. The first product to come to market — a thermostat.
…the architects presented him with the options for the thermostats that would adorn the walls of his perfect home.
They sucked.
“What was wrong with them?” he now says. “They were ugly. They were confusing. They were incredibly expensive. They didn’t have half the features you would expect for a modern thing. None of them were connected, so they didn’t talk to each other. I wasn’t able to remotely control them. In Tahoe, you want to be able check on the temperature of the house or turn it on before you get there. Because it’s really cold in the winter. I couldn’t do any of that, and I was like, Why is this?”
This is disruptive technology at its best.
Don’t you hate your thermostat? I do. It’s an awful white plastic box. Did I program it? No, too difficult. New plan; get a Nest.
As you can see it is a beautifully simple device. A jewel.
Watch this video and you’ll order one too.
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Bad Behavior has blocked 236 access attempts in the last 7 days.
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