When will we be able to share our imagination with others?
Posted by Jay Morgan in meditations on June 8th, 2011
I wonder if, when, and how we might ever be able to project our imagination as a way to communicate with others.
Project: Here, used as the verb, like above, “to project” meaning, to externally represent the synthesis of what you can conceive, visualize, imagine, realize, dream, et cetera.
And, represent your imagination in such a way that it is readily accessible, comprehensible, understood, even if to a legitimate, if specialized, audience or peer group. It must be shareable, but not manipulative, nor harmful.
Specifically, that you would project what you imagine in the native* format in which you conceive, visualize, imagine, realize, dream, et cetera.
*Here, I use “native” to refer to an internal phenomenon which might not yet have been realized. Certainly, any existing means of communicating would be void as the means, medium, or platform intended here. There is much finer art to explore in the unexplored territory between existing forms of communicating and the neural, biochemical, biological, atomic, chemical, and physical interactions. We can currently observe interactions which we either can or cannot define, or describe as valid towards something representing as externally comprehensible.
I want to wok on accomplishing that. Towards accomplishing it indirectly, hopefully directly. Game on.
What’s the difference between the black market and the “white” market?
Posted by Jay Morgan in meditations on October 30th, 2010
Some days I daydream this:
I open my bankname.com account, click to view my investment accounts, and toggle “View Black Markets” to “on”.
The investment (and feature) possibilities could be placing bets on fights and games, investing in fighters or athletes, trading futures on drug prices, or a kiva-funds-death-and-destruction section I could offer loans to military groups, unlicensed/unapproved business ventures, pirates, pornographers, maybe drug-runners.
I often wonder if there will be a future when what we now consider the “black” market is an arcane term of the middle days of human civilization worldwide. Years after the major world governments legalize narcotics in favor of regulating them and stealing the power from druglords. Years after we still look like ourselves now. It would be fun to see that.
Maybe that’s why I keep daydreaming it.
Ways the iPad changed my behavior at the 3-month mark
Posted by Jay Morgan in meditations, User Experience on October 30th, 2010
After a few weeks of having the iPad, I came up with a loose schedule for how and when to use it. Earlier, it had served as quasi-eye-candy: I spent time exploring the broadness of possibilities and apps. I balanced that with a touch of UX analysis.
And, then, I got into one particular iPad productivity app. Omni Group’s OmniFocus for iPad marked the turning point. The interaction design reflects a sound approach of planning in the vocabulary of the platform, if you will (a lá LukeW’s “Mobile First”). At this point, I realized I had a reliable set of tools that didn’t interfere with the work/consume habits I’ve developed when using a laptop.
Here’s the rough plan I came up with for using the iPad:
#1 Use: An always-visible productivity toolkit while I’m working on the MacBook Pro.
The results:
I can stay in place on the MBP while keeping what I need to reference or to do secondarily on the iPad.
The Apps:
- OmniFocus for iPad, managing to-dos and projects;
- Mail for iPad, keeping up with project-related emails;
- DropBox for iPad, sharing and accessing project files;
- Evernote for iPad, taking and reading notes;
- MindMeister for iPad, mind mapping IA, project plans;
#2 Use: A multi-purpose tool while I’m at home and not working on something or playing.
The results:
I can quickly switch between productivity & planning, reading, drafting work ideas, researching, or shopping.
The Apps:
- Productivity at home splits between OmniFocus, Mail, and Evernote. Additionally, I use Safari for web apps like Harvest or Mint, since personal and family productivity includes managing our finances.
- Planning and drafting work ideas when not focusing on work means I’m sometimes simply using the iPad as a tablet upon which I stabilize a notebook so I can write, sketch, and brainstorm on paper. (When can I get Balsamiq for iPad?!) I seem to use MindMeister in any platform much less ever since they put that folder-based dashboard on the web interface. I do use OmniFocus, Evernote, and Mail at home.
- Reading apps are typically not the ones I used on the iPhone, mostly because the iPad news apps aren’t as high-quality as the iPhone versions. I tend to use Safari when reading on the iPad because the browser size is fine for most non-optimized sites. Also, because many sites I view do optimize for iPad. Note: There’s just as much strategic skill in knowing when and how to optimize a website, and not to force something into an app.
- Researching might be something light, like Maps for directions, or something more involved like looking for instructions for a home maintenance project.
- Shopping on the iPad is a nascent activity for me: I’m ok navigating a NYTimes.com, but I’m not interested in the agony of the typical B2C or B2B site.
When I look for a prototype for shopping on the iPad, the one and only is Ebay’s AIR app for desktop that came out a couple of years ago. What a coincidence that LukeW worked on that, huh? And, I remember how people used to look at it with a blank stare. It wasn’t immediately clear to most the value or potential of the interface dynamics the Ebay team had established in their AIR app.
A careful eye for what I’m not using much on the iPad:
- The NYTimes app situation reflects a broken or weak strategy. I presume it’s not about follow-through, since they managed to launch the iPad-specific app that is clearly differentiated from the iPhone app. Given how they’ve adapted for the better in many respects of product and UX strategy, I expect something better will be here soon.
- Twitter apps in general, and Tweetdeck specifically. It’s worth noting I don’t use Twitter much these days.
- OmniGraffle for iPad, Keynote, Pages, and Numbers. These tools are hobbled – if not useless – without the ability to leverage the templates I rely on when using these tools on the desktop. This might sound like I’m asking them to break the rules of planning for the platform, but the templates are neither simple accelerators nor crutches for newbies. In fact, templates are the foundation of applying those awesome tools to your purpose and craft.
Wish I had a Mark-up Language for Argument Structure
Posted by Jay Morgan in applied cognition, meditations, Prototyping on September 23rd, 2010
I just read an argument which, when represented conceptually, looks something like this:
a means x.
b means y.
In this case, the magic happens around the conceptual and semantic characteristics of “x” and “y”.
What a magical prism an experienced perspective provides.
If you weren’t familiar with the subject matter, then “x” and “y” would simply be different words. And, the article supporting that argument might seem inert or unnecessary.
The more familiar you are with the concept “x”, the better you understand the how the nuances distinguishing “x” and “y” from each other are more like a logical proof for separating the concept “x” because the concept “x*” can be so distinguished from the original concept.
The Nuance Machine™
(Actually, I’d probably call it Themographer™ or The Mental Organ™, or m_organ™.)
Here’s what I imagine:
A way to visualize the terrain of conceptual space described by “x”, “x*”, “a”, and “b”.
A way to visualize any conceptual space, where any conceptual space can be uni- or multi-dimensional.
A way to visualize multiple, concurrent conceptual spaces.
A way to visualize conceptual connections and relationships within, between, and across conceptual spaces.
A way to adjust the visualization of a conceptual space by dialing up or down, so to speak, the number of dimensions in that space.
I liken this to:
The way we represent the multiple, concurrent, multidimensional spaces, or spectra, of visible light with color. Consider the use of color in light of the fact that we generally represent the non-visible spectra with numerical values with the unit for cycles per second.
A bit of advanced themology: We have organs, our eyes, to detect the visible spectrum. At one time we were not aware of the non-visible spectrum. Part of the visible spectrum can damage our tissue – UV light giving us a sun burn. We recently made tools to detect and analyze the non-visible spectra. However, we don’t have any representative language for those non-visible spectra like we do for the visible ones.
In fact, you could remove the adjective “conceptual”. These could be physical spaces, too, like time, space, and the other 6(-ish) dimensions defined in modern physics.
I would use this to:
Visualize schools and patterns of thought, like:
- political ideologies;
- religious ideologies;
- belief systems;
- philosophical ideologies;
- cultural systems and cultures;
- mental frames; and,
- arguments.
To visualize active, dynamic patterns of thought:
- the formation of a judgment;
- decision-making (imagine exploding the black-and-white of causality into the full spectrum!);
- debates;
- the breaking, development, editorial analysis, scholarly analysis, and public reactions to media reports;
- reactions to world events like a disaster or the Olympics;
- the formation, diversification,
To visualize contexts of thought, such as:
- social environments;
- home environments;
- work environments;
- cultural environments;
- political environments.
To visualize the dynamics of relationships, such as:
- power-orientation;
- the stages and states of caring, loving, liking;
- the stages and states of hatred, prejudice, dislike, rejection, jealousy;
- you get the idea…
I want to be able to _see_ that argument. That’s why I ask for a mark-up language. Because, I want to see it and to be able to show it to other people.