AT&T 1993 “You Will” Ads
June 19th, 2010
Watching these ads made me remember all of the changes that have happened over the last 20 years. Amazing!
The Day-Ruining Invoice
February 18th, 2010
Designer Jessica Hische comes out with the Day-Ruining Invoice notepad. What a great idea, and a fantastic way to vent. Available for $25 and on top of that it is letterpress.
Desktop Background: Stop Wasting Time
January 7th, 2010
I stumbled across this awesome desktop background… thought you all might enjoy.
The rest of the Kitsune Noir web site has some great design inspiration.
Ketchup Week is December 26-31
December 24th, 2009
A few years ago I had this crazy idea that the week between Christmas and New Years would be perfect for catching up on some side projects.
This all began when I realized that a significant number of people either take the week off, or assume you do. So it frees up a considerable amount of time, and thus others expectations.
And that’s how Ketchup Week began. I’d love to find a sponsor for it — perhaps Heinz or another ketchup maker — but for now the emphasis is on personal productivity.
Catching up on your work doesn’t necessarily mean you are working — it might mean you are catching up on relaxing.
So make this Ketchup Week your best!
How Different Groups Spend Their Day
August 2nd, 2009
The New York Times has a sweet information graphic that provides an interactive look at how most people spend their time.
Personal Productivity Blogs
July 6th, 2009
I read a large number of personal productivity blogs, and thought it would be fun to share two of them with you.
Steve Pavlina’s Personal Development for Smart People
A site that became wildly popular after it was revealed that the owner, Steve Pavlina, makes a living off of ads on the site. Pavlina even tried the concept of Polyphasic Sleep to the amusement of his readers (but then discontinued after some time). Another good article is titled How to Become an Early Riser.
David Seah’s Better Living Through New Media
Dave came up with an interesting idea a few years ago to create beautiful and useful productivity tools for himself. On paper. He calls them The Printable CEO, and shares his work with you for free and many people use them daily.
Andy Ferra, a designer in Phoenix I have had the pleasure of working with, wrote this about The Printable CEO:
One of the things I like about it most is it helps you define a clear system for prioritizing tasks and process to go through when you’re not being productive to help you get back on track.
A Timeline of Timelines
January 30th, 2009
Cabinet Magazine brings us this amazing Timeline of Timelines. It is really more of a list, but I enjoyed reading it.
Japan Census Asks People to Track Time
October 20th, 2008
Wow! The country of Japan asked their citizens to include a record of what they were doing in 15 minute intervals. This was done as part of their census and what’s best is they released the data publicly and Jonathan Soma took the results and made a visual graph of the data. Sweet!
Tip: Click on the small text link that says “Everything” to expand the view, or double click on the graph to zoom.
I got the link via Kottke.org.
Don’t Waste Time
July 8th, 2008
A recent Dilbert comic proclaims that the key to time management is not wasting time. How true that is.
Hold a Meeting!
May 1st, 2008
For all of you folks who work at home in solitude:
Follow us on Twitter
February 7th, 2008
We’re fast becoming fans of Twitter — the coolest social network we’ve seen. If you’re on Twitter, feel free to follow us and learn what we’re up to!
Follow Minute Glass: http://twitter.com/MinuteGlass
Follow Chris: http://twitter.com/christingom
Follow Tom: http://twitter.com/tomchapin
Going to SXSW Interactive!
February 7th, 2008
Tornado will have a presence at SXSW this year. We’ve wanted to go for years but always been so busy with client work. This year, we’ve decided to go anyways! We’ve bought our tickets and everything.
So who’s going? Chris Tingom and Thomas Chapin. If you’re going to be there this year, and would like to meet up, just give us a shout. Thanks.
Facing the Giants
February 1st, 2008
Facing the Giants is a movie about football and this inspirational clip will inspire you to do your best and never give up on your goals.
Ketchup Week 2007
December 26th, 2007
It’s Ketchup Week! The one week a year when you can ketchup on all of your work! It’s also the week where we’re going to be spending quite a bit of time working on our web app! Should be fun and productive.
The Buildings on U.S. Currency
November 21st, 2007
I ran across this great picture on Reddit this evening. I just had to pass it along. It’s really a fitting extension to my article I posted in July.
Source: Flickr
Article: U.S. Currency and the Pictures Behind The Portraits
See your salary in real time
October 15th, 2007
Simply enter your monthly salary and this tool will show you how much money you are earning in real time. It’s fun and could be depressing all at once. Click here to give it a try.
Story of the Mexican Fisherman
August 24th, 2007
A boat docked in a tiny Mexican village. An American tourist complimented the Mexican fisherman on the quality of his catch. “How long did it take you to get those?” he asked.
“Not so long,” said the Mexican.
“Then why didn’t you stay out longer and catch more?” asked the American.
The Mexican explained that his small catch was quite enough to meet his needs and feed his family.
“So what do you do with the rest of your time?” asked the American.
“I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, and take a siesta with my wife. In the evening, I go into the village to see my friends, have a few drinks, play the guitar and sing a few songs. I have a full life.”
The American interrupted. “I have an MBA from Harvard and I can help you! You should start by fishing longer every day. You can then sell the extra fish you catch. With the extra revenue, you can buy a bigger boat.”
“And after that?” asked the Mexican.
“With the extra money the bigger boat will bring, you can buy a second boat and then a third boat, and then more until you have an entire fleet of trawlers. Instead of selling your fish to a middle man, you can then negotiate directly with the processing plants. Pretty soon you could open your own plant. You could leave this little village and move to Mexico City, Los Angeles, or even New York! From there you could direct your whole enterprise.”
“How long would that take?” asked the Mexican.
“Twenty — perhaps twenty-five years,” replied the American.
“And after that?”
“Afterwards? Well, my friend,” laughed the American, “that’s when it gets really interesting. When your business gets really big, you can start selling stocks and make millions!”
“Millions? Really? And after that?” said the Mexican.
“After that you’ll be able to retire, live in a beautiful place near the coast, sleep late, play with your children, catch a few fish, take siestas with your wife and spend your evenings drinking and enjoying your friends.”
***
The moral of the story… Know where you’re going in life — you may already be there.
Great Places To Get Startup News & Tips
August 22nd, 2007
I absolutely love reading about web and technology startups. The following links are some of my favorite sites to get news about new web applications, and other tech startups. The people behind these businesses and the decisions that they make are interesting to me. Many of these sites offer excellent advice.
U.S. Currency and the Pictures Behind The Portraits
July 9th, 2007
The other night I wondered about the pictures we have on our currency and decided to research the portraits behind these pictures. Surprisingly, I couldn’t find too much collected research online and so I’ve decided to post my findings.
George Washington: Gilbert Stuart painted a number of portraits of George Washington. More than 100 in fact. One of the biggest no-nos in the design community is the horizontal flipping of photos of people. Because your face is not perfectly symmetrical, it is frowned upon as a design technique.
Despite this, our $1 bill contains a reversed picture of George Washington.
It’s really difficult to tell whether the above photo is the exact match. I have prepared two of the likeliest possible photos and matched them up so you can see how closely they match when reversed.
Abraham Lincoln: The easiest of the bunch to declare an obvious match.
Alexander Hamilton: The first Secretary of the Treasury (appointed by George Washington). The portrait is by Caroline L. Ormes Ransom.
Andrew Jackson: I bet you didn’t know that Grover Cleveland was on the $20 bill in 1914. Trivia: Jackson held an open house party where a 1,400 pound (635 kg) wheel of cheddar cheese was served as refreshment. The cheese was consumed in two hours. View full photo.
Ulysses S. Grant: This was the best photo I could find that is the exact same as the currency. It is obviously the same picture though, as you can see the hairline is the same.
Benjamin Franklin: Probably one of the coolest founding father. He wasn’t just a diplomat, but an electrical genius and very wise. This picture is inspired by an an engraving from a painting by Joseph Duplessis (1783). View full picture.
Bonus: The $2 bill is rarely used, but still printed (about 2% of all currency printed). The painting on the reverse side is John Trumbull’s “Declaration of Independence.”
Sources and larger pictures:
Web 2.0 Expo in SF
April 15th, 2007
I’m at the Web 2.0 Expo with the crew from Viddler, the coolest video sharing web site! If you’d like to meet me please get in touch. I’ll be here through the 18th.
This blog is devoted to our upcoming product which is a time tracking, project management web application.
Read More:
- Profile on Viddler
- Web 2.0 Expo Schedule
- BrainFuel (My main blog about web design)
- Tornado Design (Phoenix based web design consultancy)
- LinkedIn Profile
- Sign up for beta release announcement
- Videos from the Web 2.0 Expo
- While you’re here, grab our RSS Feed, thanks!
