hans's blog

A bunch of the key figures in the creation of the internet speak about some of what they worked on:

Why do we still have to "save" work when working with a computer? Do you have to "save" when using pen and paper, or paint? The most important question here is, does breaking out the "save" function into a manually triggered activity actually add something useful?

I was just revisiting a essay/speech called Hackers and Painters. It highlights one of the things that we are trying to create at IDMI: beautiful software. The core idea is that Computer Science is really three different things lumped together into one: one is basically math, another is basically a natural science, and the third is hacking. Hacking is what we are interested in, creating well designed software that solves real problems in useful ways.

Contrary to what many people will tell you, the real reasons why lots of features don't exist or don't work well is not technical. Instead, the wireless carriers often turn off features or deliberately cripple them. This radio spot covers the core of the issue well:

http://onthemedia.org/transcripts/2007/03/02/04