Archive for March, 2009
Ada Lovelace day: Featuring Susan Kare
Tuesday, March 24th, 2009
Ada Lovelace day is today. It’s a day to highlight women who’ve had some influence in technology and science. Ada is believed to be the first computer programmer, at a time when there wasn’t really even any electricity. A math wizard herself, she saw the potential of her colleagues invention for doing almost everything when everyone else saw it just for solving math problems. Ada Lovelace is a day for others to choose a woman who has been an inspiration to them.
There’s a few fantastic women in technology I’d love to highlight, including two of my best friends here in London (Meg and Magz, both fantastic, passsionate developers). I had a few more people I was considering writing about including my math teacher in high school, who taught finite, and made statistics so fun, or the goth girl from NCIS, who is so cool but also knows everything about science, but my choice was so easy at the end of the day.
I’m a web designer. Code is important, but what makes a truly fantastic website or program, is how usable it is.
“Move the spotlight over. Here she is, Susan Kare!” (crowd errupts in cheers).
Don’t know who she is? Oh, sorry.
Well, you know her work, and you probably love it.
Susan Kare's website
Susan Kare worked at Apple back in the day. She was the screen graphics and digital font designer for the original Macintosh computer. She’s the original designer of all the cute little icons used by the macs for so long, and basically revolutionalized computer displays. Remember the original trash can? The happy mac? Or the bomb when things went wrong? Think about it: apple was the first one to use icons in their graphical “window-style” display, and the rest of the big boys followed suit. She did this all in 1983, when I was just over a year old. Susan Kare, in a big way, changed computer usability, made it accessible to the masses, and continues to do so now.
These days, everyone is harping on about usability in computer software, but Susan Kare was a pioneer in this field. She didn’t use gradients or drop shadows to add emphasis to her work. She cared about every pixel being in place, the fonts being perfect and the whole thing working seemlessly. No gimmics, just solid information design.
Beat that!
Safetygoat a retro/vintage champion?
Sunday, March 22nd, 2009
Well, what do you think? Is safetygoat the champion of retro wordpress design? Well, we’ll see. Customizing wordpress to work for this design was quite a learning experience. It would be nice to win something for it, so who knows? You gotta enter in these things 
So I’m entering it in this: Best WordPress Design Award
Fingers crossed!
Update: You can now vote for safetygoat here!
Safetygoat sponsors the Photo Scavenger Hunt! (OSPSH)
Tuesday, March 17th, 2009
Last thursday, 14 londoners assembled for the innaugural Old Street Photo Scavenger Hunt. In teams of 3-4, we had an hour to take as many pictures of items on the official list as possible, each item worth 5 to 100 points. If safetygoat was featured, you got an extra point, and if a team member, you also received an extra point.
Here’s the list of items…
People
1. Free paper person – 5 points
2. A jogger - 5 points
3. Cyclist wearing a bright yellow vest - 5 points
4. A punk - 10 points
5. A melancholy emo kid - 10 points
6. A stranger talking on an iphone - 10 points
7. Free paper person getting shoulder barged - 10 points
8. Person on rollerblades - 10 points
9. Construction worker actually working - 15 points
10. Person in grey hoodie – 15 points (in the city??)
11. G string showing above trousers line – 15 points
12. A midget/giant - 25 points
13. A baby – 25 points
14. One of you serving beers behind a bar - 25 points
15. Genuine celeb - 30 points
16. A transvestite or prostitute - 30 points
17. Boris Johnson in the flesh - 100 points
Places
1. A four storey house – 5 points
2. An alley an SUV couldn’t fit through – 10 points
3. A bridge – 10 points
4. A fountain – 10 points
5. A building with buttresses – 10 points
6. A building with a Canadian flag on it – 10 points
7. Any building with the word “cock” on it – 10 points
8. Any street with “Oliver” in it – 10 points
9. A circus – 10 points
10. KFC – 10 points
11. A hill suitable for cheese rolling – 15 points
12. A celebrity’s house – 20 points
13. An old-fashioned well – 20 points
14. The inside of an adult store - 25 points
Things
1. A clover - 5 points
2. An over priced wine menu - 5 points
3. Kebab meat on turning thing - 5 points
4. A scooter - 5 points
5. A one footed pigeon - 5 points
6. A travel book to Peru - 10 points
7. Any fruit based beer - 10 points
8. Hamburger sauce - 10 points
9.  A horse statue - 10 points
10. A rude looking vegetable - 10 points
11. A banksy painting - 10 points
12. Closing down sale posters in store window - 10 points
13. Harley Davidson - 15 points
14. Packet of mint sauce - 15 points
15. A duck - 20 points
16. Garden gnome - 20 points
17. McDonald’s egg mcmuffin - 30 points
Here are a few highlights (and favourites) from the night. You can see all the pictures here.
The winners overall were Taurette-a-saurus Rex (Bash, David, Simon and myself) followed closely by CRAS (Chris, Ruth, Anna and Steve Berryman). Honourable mention to Dan-Meg Sandwich (Dan W, ShinyHappyDan and Meg) and Deep fried Sausage & hung lo sauce (Ollie, Margaret and Phil Berryman). It was a huge success, especially the beers after!
Thanks again everyone who participated (especially “Boris Johnson”), and all the good sports at various bars around Old Street!
Free paper man getting shoulder barged: 10 points
Mint sauce – 15 points
Guy in a grey hoodie – 15 points
Travel book on peru – 10 points
An emo kid – 10 points
A canadian flag – 10 points
Pouring a pint – 25 points
Duck – 20 points
A baby – 25 points
A giant – 25 points
A street with Oliver in it – 10 points
Hill suitable for cheese rolling – 15 points
Boris Johnson – 100 points
A prostitute – 30 points
McDonald’s EggMcMuffin – 30 points
Cock on a building – 10 points
Construction worker – 15 points
The after party!
