tell me again how gore is the one stealing this election (nyt)
"On a political level, the comments Mr. McKay attributed to Jeb Bush would further indicate an increasingly bold effort by the governor to deliver Florida to his brother. After initially taking a low-key, hands-off approach to the dispute about Florida's election results, Mr. Bush has gradually emerged from near-seclusion as a significant player in the unfolding struggle for power."
(Tuesday, November 28, 2000)

conformity through shopping? (salon)
"But [Thomas Frank] and other critics argue that in the end we're only being conned into thinking that our needs are being satisfied. What's really happening, they argue, is that clever marketers are turning us into automatons who equate being cool with buying cheap stuff that everyone else has. Under the stores' guise of delivering good taste to the general public, any chance we have at experiencing or creating authenticity is being undermined. Ultimately, our brave new shopping world is one in which we are spending more time in the checkout line than reading books, watching movies or otherwise challenging ourselves with real culture.

"'Shopping is a way of putting together your identity,' laments Nobrow author John Seabrook. And the 'homogenized taste' of today's Old Navy and Ikea shoppers proves, he says, that Americans either are consciously choosing to look and live alike or are determined not to notice that that is what they're doing."

The thing these social critics are overlooking is that they are buying into the same idea they're supposedly critiquing: that identity is on the surface. They would have you believe that you must wear "different" clothes from everyone else, thereby establishing yourself as a true nonconformist. Trying to put together a unique wardrobe is much more time-consuming (and more pretentious) than buying a full closet of Gap merchandise.

Besides, if everyone looks the same, the ideas that person has take on greater weight when interacting with the culture at large. An analogy would be monochrome paintings: at first glance they look alike, but the subtleties and nuances of expression are the primary differentiators. You just have to look closer.

So there. Nyah to you, intellectual critic man!
(Saturday, November 25, 2000)

an incomplete manifesto for growth
by bruce mau.
(Thursday, November 16, 2000)

jakob! (wired)
"Never listen to what people say. You have to observe what people do," Nielsen said.

further proof that jakob is the christopher alexander of the web: a somewhat smart egotist who can't get past his own sense of self-grandeur to see either his own hypocrisies or the limitations of his approach. what a loser!
(Thursday, November 16, 2000)

marchfirst lays off 1000 (standard)
maybe my recruiting efforts just got easier. i hope john still has his job in seattle though.
(Tuesday, November 14, 2000)

annotated ratherisms (chicago tribune)
"Rather said: 'If a frog had side pockets, he'd carry a handgun.'

"The reference: To the pointlessness of 'if' formulations. Where many of Rather's animal husbandry references are rooted in actual critter behaviors, this one uses the absurd to make its point. Everybody knows that the handgun industry has not yet made a weapon small enough for a frog to carry. This may be the most useful Ratherism of all, worth repeating anytime you find yourself stuck in the endless tape-loop of hollow speculation that is the modern all-news channel."
(Monday, November 13, 2000)

truth day (suck)
the first two pages of this are extremely brilliant.
(Saturday, November 11, 2000)

chicago tears down old, builds new (nyt)
"Of all the cities we can think of, except maybe Hong Kong, we associate Chicago with new things, with building new," said Witold Rybczynski, a professor of urbanism at the University of Pennsylvania, who wrote about Chicago's past in his book "City Life" (Touchstone, 1995). "Combining that with preservation is a difficult task, a tricky thing. It's hard to find the middle ground in Chicago."
(Saturday, November 11, 2000)

richard sapper (nyt)
this man is one of my design heroes. the teakettle he designed for alessi makes the best whistle when the water's boiling. and i work on one of his thinkpad designs at the office.
(Saturday, November 11, 2000)

etnies.com
this is the best commercial site i've seen in ages. it's consistent with their advertising, and is a breath of fresh air online. i wish i'd done it, which is my litmus test for things online.
(Saturday, November 4, 2000)

waving mao watch
i bought one of these in hong kong. it is the coolest piece of mao-related merchandise this side of a warhol silkscreen.
(Saturday, November 4, 2000)