MetaLab Goes Open Source? →

The MetaLab blog:

I don’t understand why companies think that they can get away with doing this. The internet is a surprisingly small place, and we were notified almost immediately. We’ve all had a good chuckle about this, but we’ve contacted Mozilla and demanded that they take the design down. I’d expect better from a respectable company like Mozilla. It’s one thing when a student or fledgling company does something like this, but Mozilla is a big company with the resources to create original design.

In the meantime, let Mozilla know this isn’t okay. Tweet at @MozillaNews or leave a comment over on HackerNews.

… We’ve asked for a public apology, and I’ll be doing a follow-up post tomorrow.

Note to plagiarizers: don’t fuck with MetaLab.

If real life imitated creative work.

Via Eddie Wilson.

1 Million Dollars →

Via @rands.

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Wonderful documentary. Think ‘Mission Impossible’ meets ‘Food, Inc.’

Via Emily.

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Et tu, Academy?

It’s official. No one is safe from the indulgant, ham-handed, false-sense-of-class styling of Zapfino.

It’s the Coach bag of typography.

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The Axiom Pro looks like it was designed by the Rebel Alliance.

How internet tubes deliver LOLcats.

Via There, I Fixed It.

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“Who you callin’ big”?

If I could have one superpower it would be to stay as excited about a project in the last 30% as I am while concepting it.

You?

kubi:

… and my point is: never ask to see how the hotdogs are made.

(I imagine there’s only a handful of you who recognize those photos)

I’ve visited Hawaii with those ladies many a time.

The Real Reason That There’s No Flash On The iPad

Daniel Eran Dilger:

Many (if not most) current Flash games, menus, and even video players require a visible mouse pointer. They are coded to rely on the difference between hovering over something (mouseover) vs. actually clicking. This distinction is not rare. It’s pervasive, fundamental to interactive design, and vital to the basic use of Flash content. New Flash content designed just for touchscreens can be done, but people want existing Flash sites to work. All of them—not just some here and there—and in a usable manner. That’s impossible no matter what.

Horn toot: this is the primary reason I’ve been giving folks that ask me why I think there’s no Flash on the iPhone/iPod/iPad.

The interface constructs of touch computing are entirely different from mousing. This is why there will never be Flash on an iPhone OS device. Flash was written for mouse-based interaction. It’s the same reason Mac OS X apps don’t run on the iPhone. Even the holy grail of Flash video content sites, Hulu, requires hover to display video controls.

Switch to a better task manager. @done.

Two Dozen Carriers Worldwide Unite Against Apple’s App Store

mocoNews.net:

Two dozen of the world’s largest mobile-phone companies, including Verizon Wireless, AT&T, NTT DoCoMo, Deutsche Telekom, China Mobile and Vodafone, are teaming up to create an “open international applications platform,” which is obviously in direct response to Apple’s success with its own iPhone App Store.

There’s such a thing as too many cooks in the kitchen, but this is more like too many greedy middle managers hovering over the stove.

Look. Developers will learn what they need to learn in order to make the things that they want to create. But I’ll tell you one thing. What I’m not interested in is making AJAX widgets for phones that come free with 2-year contracts. Furthermore, the last thing we need is another mediocre SDK built on frameworks designed by committee.

Best of luck.

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Every time this horrible, contrived design shows itself in a commercial this is what I see.

svoldal asked: Are you still the main developer of the Tumblr app? If so, great work! Been waiting for an update for a while, though. Haven't you got some fancy new ideas to write into the app?

Thanks! Yes, I’m still the main force behind the iPhone app, but I’m now accompanied by a few excellent engineers: Jamie and Jason at Mobelux. This will allow me to move towards primarily being a designer instead of designing and developing apps (more like 75/25 instead of 50/50).

Don’t worry though; we have a bunch of new Tumblr-based stuff in the works (including an update of the iPhone app) that we can’t wait to show you guys.