Have nothing in your houses…

I love this quote shared by my friend Amit:

“Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful” -William Morris

Walter Iooss

This collection of pictures by Walter Iooss is just full of great shots (via Signal vs. Noise).

Clark Little

Clark Little has some great photographs of waves. Thanks to Tom Tunguz for the link.

Designing the on-hold experience

Image via Wikipedia

On designing the on-hold experience:

In the first of two experiments, Munichor and Rafaeli found that callers who were given information about their place in line reported more positive experiences—and hung up less frequently—than those who were played background music. And as for recorded apologies? They can make the situation worse, said Rafaeli.

Every interaction your company has with a customer is an opportunity to leave a good impression. via David Hammer.

Virtual Keyboards

This article about virtual keyboards on iPhone and Android is a good case-study of how seemingly small changes can make or break a design.

It also contains this brilliant idea:

[David Pogue:] “Although you don’t see it with your eyes, the sizes of the keys on the iPhone keyboard are changing all the time. That is, the software enlarges the “landing area” of certain keys, based on probability.”

For example, if you type the letter «N», the next letter is unlikely to be «H», but quite likely to be «G». Accordingly, the iPhone will increase or decrease the target areas of these keys.

The corporate culture at Netflix

This presentation about the corporate culture at Netflix is full of interesting ideas:

Speaking of Netflix, my friend Noah points us at an article that explains how Netflix delivers DVDs.

Okinawa Aquarium

I’m not big on keeping animals in captivity, but this is gorgeous. Do yourself a favor and watch this in HD, fullscreen:

via Kottke