The small city of Apeldoorn is home to one of the most successful Dutch insurance companies: Centraal Beheer. The company built a reputation creating tv advertisements that prove in 30 to 60-second the importance of being insured. In each ad, some kind of disaster looms (but is rarely shown) and the historical slogan reminds viewers …
…and deep work
In the previous post I described my personal history of regular increments of RAM in my working computers with the notable exceptions of the transitions Desktop->Laptop and Laptop->Handheld and how those transitions allowed me to appreciate a brand new type of productivity. But what does it mean to use a very low memory device on a daily …
Shallow RAM…
The first computer I played with, in the late 80s, was a Commodore 64 that came with 64 Kilobytes of RAM. Early in the 90s, I was lucky enough to upgrade to a Commodore Amiga, which was a bounce in capabilities the likely of which I rarely saw ever since. The Amiga came with half …
Gotta go hoover the talking seal!
[Citation not needed]: Hoover was a harbor seal who was able to imitate basic human speech. […] On the British comedy panel game show QI, host Stephen Fry asked the question: “What is meant by the expression “Hoover the talking seal”?” Panelist Roger McGough answered, “Well, it’s either one of those wonderful Oz expressions for …
UX for good and bad habits
Headspace is a really nice app that helps you tip-toeing into the world of meditation. I’ve been looking into ways of improving my focus and trying a few meditation apps seemed a normal part of the process. But meditation, like most beneficial practices, needs to become a habit in order to give any positive result. …
Great quotes from Leonardo
From “A Treatise On Painting”, Leonardo dispenses wisdom applicable to all Makers out there. …
Working from a Nvidia Shield K1 Tablet
Even if the dream to have an Ubuntu phone fizzled out last April, my hopes to keep on miniaturizing my work machine are as lively as ever. After spending a decade working on Desktop computers and a decade spent on Laptops, I think the time is right for another paradigm shift. It is with these …
A French croissant recipe that will work
French croissants are tough to master. The other day I was at my favorite pizza place, discussing with the pizza man the science of dough preparation. I casually mentioned that I was finally satisfied with my croissant-dough and the guy looked at me in disbelief. “Making pizza dough is a walk in the park compared …
Suggestions for a better startup incubator application
Nine practical suggestions to improve your chances of being accepted at that fancy startup incubator. …
On Brutalist Design
A few days ago a journalist for net magazine asked me what I thought about Brutalism in web design, perhaps after finding my project site listed on BrutalistWebsites.com. He was kind enough to publish a portion of the interview on the magazine, but for the sake of completeness, I am publishing it here fully. …