5 little design decisions to admire

Great design exists in all shapes and sizes. We tend to remember the sexy, big launches, the…

Vaucanson’s mechanical duck

“The Duck stretches out its neck to take corn out of your hand; it swallows it, digests it, and discharges it…

My Smartphone Sabotaged My Sexting

I’d just spent the night with a woman I’d wanted for what seemed like forever. It was February…

Susan Yee, The Archive

“‘Oh, you’ll love what we’re doing now. You won’t ever have to come here! You won’t ever have to look at these drawings…

Sex in the Valley of the Screens

A few weeks ago, a friend and I were having an argument concerning the virtues of video chat when it…

He’s Just Not That Into You 

“I had a guy leave me a voice mail at work, so I called him at home. And then he e-mailed me to my Blackberry…

Forcing humanity on automated customer service

Automated system diagrams are beautiful works of rationalization of perfect categories. What they fail to do is provide the extra-ordinary information people want. The machines replicate what can be found in other machines. They guard the gates to…

EuroMaidan: Mirrors of Civil Society?

Monstration and Politics of Small Things