domingo, junio 24, 2012
miércoles, enero 11, 2012
The 30 Best PC Game Soundtracks of All Time
miércoles, diciembre 28, 2011
Esa ropa que siempre ha querido tener pero nunca ha conseguido? (pregunta de interés mercantil :-P)
Mucha ropa de Arman.... que algun dia tendre.
domingo, diciembre 25, 2011
jueves, noviembre 03, 2011
What I Learned From Steve Jobs
Many people have explained what one can learn from Steve Jobs. But few, if any, of these people have been inside the tent and experienced first hand what it was like to work with him. I don’t want any lessons to be lost or forgotten, so here is my list of the top twelve lessons that I learned from Steve Jobs.
Experts are clueless.
Experts—journalists, analysts, consultants, bankers, and gurus can’t “do” so they “advise.” They can tell you what is wrong with your product, but they cannot make a great one. They can tell you how to sell something, but they cannot sell it themselves. They can tell you how to create great teams, but they only manage a secretary. For example, the experts told us that the two biggest shortcomings of Macintosh in the mid 1980s was the lack of a daisy-wheel printer driver and Lotus 1-2-3; another advice gem from the experts was to buy Compaq. Hear what experts say, but don’t always listen to them.
Customers cannot tell you what they need.
“Apple market research” is an oxymoron. The Apple focus group was the right hemisphere of Steve’s brain talking to the left one. If you ask customers what they want, they will tell you, “Better, faster, and cheaper”—that is, better sameness, not revolutionary change. They can only describe their desires in terms of what they are already using—around the time of the introduction of Macintosh, all people said they wanted was better, faster, and cheaper MS-DOS machines. The richest vein for tech startups is creating the product that you want to use—that’s what Steve and Woz did.
Jump to the next curve.
Big wins happen when you go beyond better sameness. The best daisy-wheel printer companies were introducing new fonts in more sizes. Apple introduced the next curve: laser printing. Think of ice harvesters, ice factories, and refrigerator companies. Ice 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0. Are you still harvesting ice during the winter from a frozen pond?The biggest challenges beget best work.
I lived in fear that Steve would tell me that I, or my work, was crap. In public. This fear was a big challenge. Competing with IBM and then Microsoft was a big challenge. Changing the world was a big challenge. I, and Apple employees before me and after me, did their best work because we had to do our best work to meet the big challenges.
Design counts.
Steve drove people nuts with his design demands—some shades of black weren’t black enough. Mere mortals think that black is black, and that a trash can is a trash can. Steve was such a perfectionist—a perfectionist Beyond: Thunderdome—and lo and behold he was right: some people care about design and many people at least sense it. Maybe not everyone, but the important ones.
You can’t go wrong with big graphics and big fonts.
Take a look at Steve’s slides. The font is sixty points. There’s usually one big screenshot or graphic. Look at other tech speaker’s slides—even the ones who have seen Steve in action. The font is eight points, and there are no graphics. So many people say that Steve was the world’s greatest product introduction guy..don’t you wonder why more people don’t copy his style?
Changing your mind is a sign of intelligence.
When Apple first shipped the iPhone there was no such thing as apps. Apps, Steve decreed, were a bad thing because you never know what they could be doing to your phone. Safari web apps were the way to go until six months later when Steve decided, or someone convinced Steve, that apps were the way to go—but of course. Duh! Apple came a long way in a short time from Safari web apps to “there’s an app for that.”
“Value” is different from “price.”
Woe unto you if you decide everything based on price. Even more woe unto you if you compete solely on price. Price is not all that matters—what is important, at least to some people, is value. And value takes into account training, support, and the intrinsic joy of using the best tool that’s made. It’s pretty safe to say that no one buys Apple products because of their low price.
A players hire A+ players.
Actually, Steve believed that A players hire A players—that is people who are as good as they are. I refined this slightly—my theory is that A players hire people even better than themselves. It’s clear, though, that B players hire C players so they can feel superior to them, and C players hire D players. If you start hiring B players, expect what Steve called “the bozo explosion” to happen in your organization.
Real CEOs demo.
Steve Jobs could demo a pod, pad, phone, and Mac two to three times a year with millions of people watching, why is it that many CEOs call upon their vice-president of engineering to do a product demo? Maybe it’s to show that there’s a team effort in play. Maybe. It’s more likely that the CEO doesn’t understand what his/her company is making well enough to explain it. How pathetic is that?
Real CEOs ship.
For all his perfectionism, Steve could ship. Maybe the product wasn’t perfect every time, but it was almost always great enough to go. The lesson is that Steve wasn’t tinkering for the sake of tinkering—he had a goal: shipping and achieving worldwide domination of existing markets or creation of new markets. Apple is an engineering-centric company, not a research-centric one. Which would you rather be: Apple or Xerox PARC?
Marketing boils down to providing unique value. Think of a 2 x 2 matrix. The vertical axis measures how your product differs from the competition. The horizontal axis measures the value of your product. Bottom right: valuable but not unique—you’ll have to compete on price. Top left: unique but not valuable—you’ll own a market that doesn’t exist. Bottom left: not unique and not value—you’re a bozo. Top right: unique and valuable—this is where you make margin, money, and history. For example, the iPod was unique and valuable because it was the only way to legally, inexpensively, and easily download music from the six biggest record labels.
Bonus: Some things need to be believed to be seen. When you are jumping curves, defying/ignoring the experts, facing off against big challenges, obsessing about design, and focusing on unique value, you will need to convince people to believe in what you are doing in order to see your efforts come to fruition. People needed to believe in Macintosh to see it become real. Ditto for iPod, iPhone, and iPad. Not everyone will believe—that’s okay. But the starting point of changing the world is changing a few minds. This is the greatest lesson of all that I learned from Steve.
miércoles, noviembre 02, 2011
sábado, septiembre 10, 2011
Un PIP-Boy para poder salir del refugio
A los que no hayan jugado Fallout 3 no les dirá demasiado este accesorio, pero todo el que haya salido del Refugio 101 entenderá bien el cacharrito. Y hay que reconocerle a su creador que ha hecho un excelente trabajo, pues como podéis ver en el vídeo a continuación, no solo es clavado al del juego en su aspecto, sino también en su funcionamiento.
Vía: Joystiq
Si los Logos fueran honestos
Viktor Hertz hizo algunos logos, de la forma en que pudieran ser honestos.
Honest logos – a set on Flickr
Gmail es hasta 80 veces más eficiente que otras soluciones
Google ha publicado en el día de hoy un estudio llamado Google’s Green Computing: Efficiency at Scale en el que se compara algunos servicios del gigante de Internet frente a otros métodos. Los resultados son muy interesantes y muestran que la llamada nube puede llegar a ser más eficiente que otras alternativas más tradicionales, tanto es así que desde Google indican que es hasta 80 veces más eficiente desde el punto de vista energético.
Algunas grandes empresas están construyendo grandes centros de datos donde tienen miles de servidores, esto nos podría hacer pensar que el consumo de estos edificios es muy importante, pero según indica Google en este estudio las técnicas que se utilizan en el desarrollo de estos centros de datos hacen que sean mucho más eficiente que tener un servidor en una oficina o casa. Esto lo consiguen gracias a la maximización del rendimiento de los servidores acompañados de unas instalaciones de alta eficiencia energética. En el estudio tratan del consumo de energía que tiene el uso de un servidor en las oficinas de una empresa, se argumenta que a menudo estos servidores son infrautilizados y que además no se disponen en la mayoría de casos de instalaciones que sean energéticamente eficientes.
Además señalan otros puntos negativos por los que tener un servidor tradicional es poco eficiente energéticamente, como es la necesidad de tener otro servidor para las copias de seguridad del servidor principal, disco de red para almacenamiento redundante o la co-ubicación de servidores en múltiples lugares que estén físicamente separados. Todo esto lo hacen acompañados del consumo de energía de este tipo de soluciones como se puede ver en el PDF.
Cuanto más pequeña sea una empresa menos eficiente son sus instalaciones, esa es una de las conclusiones a las que llega el estudio como se puede ver en la gráfica anterior, en la que las emisiones de CO2 anuales por usuario superarían los 103 Kg, mientras en empresas más grandes la cifra se reduce y el que mejores resultados ofrece es Gmail, con una media de menos de 1,23 Kg.
En el blog de Google han hecho una comparación con otros elementos y dos de sus servicios más populares, Gmail y YouTube. Concretamente hacer uso de durante un año entero del servicio de correo electrónico de Google tiene las mismas emisiones de CO2 que si cogiéramos una botella de 750 ml, metiéramos un carta dentro y la tirásemos al océano. Mientras que estar visionado vídeos en YouTube durante tres días completos tendrían unas emisiones similares a las de fabricar un DVD, empaquetarlo y enviarlo.
Un estudio muy interesante que muestra un punto a favor al cloud computing gracias al desarrollo y construcción de unos centros de datos muy elaborados en el consumo de energía con una alta utilización de los servidores para no desaprovechar nada de energía. Sin embargo la nube actualmente tiene otros hándicaps que hace que depender únicamente de este tipo de servicios en la actualidad sea arriesgado, pero seguramente será algo en lo que irán avanzando con el paso de tiempo, lo cual no quiere decir que en un futuro la computación se base en la nube.
Imagen: GigaOM
Decalogo: Diez mensajes secretos en el billete de un dólar
Los aficionados a las teorías conspirativas conocen muchas historias sobre la simbología usada en el billete de un dólar, un sencillo papel que -Capitalismo mediante- se convirtió en un ícono de los últimos dos siglos.
Pero como en el fondo uno sólo encuentra lo que busca, el artista Dan Tague se topó con una decena de mensajes hippies escondidos en la verde moneda. Al doblar un billete de un dolar (a veces hasta 100 veces), Dan descubrió estas increíbles frases:
1. We Need A Revolution
2. Holy Sh!t
3. Trust No One
4. Reality Sucks
5. Freedom Land
6. Live Free Or Die
7. Lest We Forget
8. Love and Hate
9. The Kids Are Alright
10. Dont Tread On Me
60 Espacios de trabajo espectaculares
Los que diseñamos sabemos que tenemos una gran carga de trabajo delante del ordenador, así que es realmente importante que estemos agusto con nuestro lugar de trabajo, eso está clarísimo.
También es totalmente cierto que no todo el mundo se puede permitir tener workspaces como los que vemos en esta recopilación, pero poco a poco y con trabajo se pueden lograr, así que coger las ideas nunca está de más.
Sin duda tenéis que estar contentos con vuestro lugar de trabajo, y si no lo estáis… pues os tendréis que plantear un cambio.
Fuente | Hongkiat
Singapore Work Office. (Image Source: leonefabre)
Basement Home Office. (Image Source: martynelson)
Alienware Mac Home Setup. (Image Source: paulmichaelsmith)
My Home Office III. (Image Source: trancemist)
Ubuntu Family. (Image Source: john)
Panoramic View Home Office. (Image Source: paladin27)
Office Digital Darkroom. (Image Source: cohophoto)
Designer’s Desktop Workspace. (Image Source: normanbolditalic)
Apple Cinema Display. (Image Source: anthonygrimes)
Apple Home Office Setup. (Image Source: misterplague)
Office Recording Studio Gear. (Image Source: authentic)
Desktop Mac Pack. (Image Source: purplelime)
Apartment Home Office 2010. (Image Source: garrettmurray)
Dualscreen Workspace Setup 2007. (Image Source: garrettmurray)
Apple Workspace September 2010. (Image Source: technolsp)
Working From Home. (Image Source: tbisaacs)
Multi Desk Home Office. (Image Source: radrew)
Mac Windows Ubuntu. (Image Source: LuckyRoller)
Working Home Studio. (Image Source: rezado)
Custom Desk 2009 iMac. (Image Source: jwhelan)
Creative White Working Space. (Image Source: jlouwagie)
New York City Offices. (Image Source: newyork808)
Professional Home Office Setup. (Image Source: ktdeeds)
MacBook Pro Mighty Mouse. (Image Source: christianreistad)
Widescreen Home Office in Michigan. (Image Source: paladin27)
Macintosh Desk Books. (Image Source: simoncarr)
Red Rocket Media Group workspace. (Image Source: foundphotography)
Wishingline Design Studio. (Image Source: wishingline)
Coupled Apple Samsung Office. (Image Source: tbisaacs)
Creative MacBook Pro Setup. (Image Source: kittymeow84)
Large Mac Cinema Display. (Image Source: fabrico)
iMac iPhone iPad. (Image Source: sigalakos)
Corner Desk Home Office. (Image Source: jstacey)
Working Home Office/Theater. (Image Source: kd5ftn)
Chris Spooner’s Personal Design Setup. (Image Source: spoongraphics)
Home Office Workspace 2009. (Image Source: Quentin Rademaker)
Textmate PHP Development Code. (Image Source: tbisaacs)
Illustration Bright Working Environment. (Image Source: mimsybee)
Audio Home Office Tools. (Image Source: lamkevin)
Mac Professional Home Studio. (Image Source: rodrigo72)
Mac, iPhone, iPad on Desk Space. (Image Source: twarner405)
Well-lit Creative Space. (Image Source: sgnwsk)
Little Mac World. (Image Source: jus4ur)
Workstation Part Deux. (Image Source: justinbregar)
Creative Setup April 2010. (Image Source: paulm)
Sunlight Black Studio Work. (Image Source: ediblestarfish)
Mac Illustration Workspace. (Image Source: joshuasmith)
Working Late at the Office. (Image Source: morran)
Home Office Command Center. (Image Source: pongky)
Creative Space in the Attic. (Image Source: purplelime)
January 2007 Small Office. (Image Source: etchalon)
Tri-Monitor Setup. (Image Source: plasticmind)
Interior Home Office Early 2006. (Image Source: garrettmurray)
Dual Mac Open Workspace. (Image Source: snecx)
Desk Mac Mini. (Image Source: pavlosurf)
MacBook Air Home Setup. (Image Source: showngo)
Home Office Front View. (Image Source: matthewwegner)
Studio Mac Pro. (Image Source: mariliacardoso)
Open Desk Space Macintosh. (Image Source: skip694)
Kitchen Windows Working Area. (Image Source: gurnam)