Links for 2006-04-02

Posted April 2, 2006 12:17 AM.

• OK/Cancel comments on the new argument that ugly design is attractive to users Reminds me of a talk at SXSW about humans poorly evaluating odds/stats. Don't forget the ugly sites that don't succeed! You'd need to compare the proportion of ugly sites that succeed with the proportion of pretty ones to have a leg to stand on.
• Tom Baker apparently singing various songs in a sort-of Wiliam Shatner stylee... If you thought you coudln't bear to go to your grave without hearing Doctor Who 'singing' The Smiths' "How Soon is Now" then feel free to rest at last. Extraordinary.
• Americans are starting to think that maybe Mexican Coca-Cola is the real thing (given that it's made with sugar rather than corn syrup) They say there's no perceptable taste difference?! Balls! Without an enormous amount of ice, I find American Coke completely repulsive. Coke in Europe tastes less syrupy and congealing. I always seek out Mexican Coke when I'm in the US.
• "The Great Mosque of Djenné is the largest mud brick building in the world and is considered by many architects to be the greatest achievement of the Sudano-Sahelian architectural style" Absolutely extraordinary - I've been watching images of this programme on TV and it's quite extraordinary how it fits in with the environment around it, and how well suited to purpose it is. Craftsmanship and design together...
• Flickr has some beautiful Creative Commons Attribution-only pictures of Djenné's Great Mosque I'm increasibly stunned by the breadth and beauty of some of the images that Flickr contains. Really almost whatever you can think about is represented in there. There are more of Djenné under less open licenses...
• George Clooney and Brad Pitt are moving forward with Ocean's 13 Can I just say that I thought Ocean's Twelve was absolute rubbish and I got quite angry during the whole Julia Roberts metanarrative arsery.
• World of Warcraft announce the second race from their upcoming expansion pack and it is... Wisps?! So we're all basically assuming that this is an April Fools joke right? Specifically the bit about turning into trees in the middle of combat and taking a massive hit in defence against axes...
• A terrifying story from a Minnesotan newspaper - Americans trust atheists less than recent immigrants and even poofs! "Americans rate atheists below Muslims, recent immigrants, homosexuals and other groups as 'sharing their vision of American society.' Americans are also least willing to let their children marry atheists."
• "Norah Vincent spent 18 months disguised as a man. She relives the boys nights out, the bad dates - and what happened when she ended up in bed with another woman" Watching straight men and women from a distance is always valuable, and reminds us that no matter how unbalanced the power relationship, men are just as trapped in their roles as women. Maybe more so.
• PortForward.com is an extraordinary site explaining how to use routers and firewalls and stuff It didn't quite answer my question, but I can't help but think that I'm in the minority.
• Digital Web Magazine has an article on creating dynamic websites that adjust to widescreen monitors I honestly don't get this stuff though. I know that PC users have browsers that fill the entire screen and I get that people are used to sites that do that, but still - it's dumb!
• The Top 10 weirdest keyboards ever is a list of the top ten weirdest keyboards ever. Duh. Some of these keyboards are totally fucking weird, already. And there are eleven really, because they include the ZX Spectrum.