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“Just remove the duck” (2013)

rachelbythebay.com

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Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#301

Post by driverdan »

TallGuyShort wrote: post #42
mvdwoord wrote: post #8

A story from the time recounts that Piero Soderino, the head of the powerful Florentine Republic, even told the famously irascible Michelangelo that David's nose was much too large. Michelangelo then hid some marble dust in his hand, climbed back up his ladder and pretended to do some more "chiseling" on the offending proboscis. While he did so, he let some marble dust fall from his hand. The pompous Soderino was foo…

Not a huge Steve Jobs fan, but I had a professor who had worked as a designer under Steve Jobs and tried something similar. Steve insisted that a new mouse needed to be just a fraction of a millimetre slimmer so a person's palm was lower and closer to the work surface. They figured he was being an unreasonable "delicate genius" and returned a few days later with the identical mouse and claimed they had reworked it to…

Which is, of course, absolutely ridiculous if true. Not everyone has the same size and shape hands as Jobs did. I hate all of Apple's mice because they're far too small for me.

Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#302

Post by dilap »

raziel2p wrote: post #242
dilap wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to play a racing game called Trackmania; there was no collision, but it was really competitive in that you'd be racing simultaneously networked w/ other players. You could definitely tell when you completed the lab in a time that was say 10ms behind a different time. 600 milliseconds, +- say 50ms, is pretty recognizable.

Top level players will gain ~10ms or more on eachother every other turn. At a level below the very top you're going to see gaps far bigger. With experience, you'll definitely be able to tell which parts of the track you did well or poorly at, but there is no way you're going to be able to get an accurate feel for all of those tiny gains and losses over the course of a 30-60 second track to accurately judge exactly ho…

I think you might be right...maybe I am remembering differences of more like 100ms?

And thinking about it, in Trackmania it was less a perception of time that you noticed, but a sense of how smoothly and perfectly you had hit every turn. You could easily race the almost the exact same time multiple times in a row, and then feel it when you hit a turn more smoothly and shaved a few fractions of a second off your time. (Or similarly feel it when you screwed up and added a few seconds.)

Man, thinking about this is making me miss trackmania :)

Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#303

Post by ryan-allen »

Ensorceled wrote: post #185
dchichkov wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is a more likely, albeight sadder explanation. Steve was simply able to read the faces of the team and correctly guess that they didn't comply. As a compliance professional he was very sensitive to that and immediately reacted.

Or, a more likely and less idiotically cynical explanation is that a man famous for having vision, aesthetic sense and incessant drive for excellence that enabled him to completely revolutionize multiple technology industries ACTUALLY had vision and a sense of aesthetics.

I think you're right here, he did have a sense of aesthetics.

The blog post I think was talking more about people who just have to change something to 'make their mark' and usually the mark makers are the managers, not the doers or the designers, making arbitrary changes so they feel validated, or powerful, or in control, who knows.

Steve knew what was nice though, indisputably, and in Australia we have the saying "Who's rooting this cat?", in Steve's case he was the one rooting it, whereas the PM in the blog post barely even knew the cat.

Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#304

Post by Throwaway1224 »

zipfle wrote: post #274
sxp wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a similar story about Larry Page when Gmail was being developed: Before Google launched Gmail in 2004, its creator, Paul Buchheit, brought it to Page’s open cubicle office for a review. As Buchheit called the program up on Page’s computer, the boss made a face. “It’s too slow,” Page said. Buchheit disagreed. It was loading just fine, he said. No, Page insisted. It had taken a full 600 milliseconds for the pa…

That's a super old story, at least as old as this zen koan: http://www.ashidakim.com/zenkoans/48accurateproportion.html

Have you ever read this one: http://www.ashidakim.com/zenkoans/34asmileinhislifetime.html

I've been reading it for 12 years, and I still can't figure it out.

I have thoughts about it... but nothing that's sort of an "aha".

Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#305

Post by anigbrowl »

mvdwoord wrote: post #8

A story from the time recounts that Piero Soderino, the head of the powerful Florentine Republic, even told the famously irascible Michelangelo that David's nose was much too large. Michelangelo then hid some marble dust in his hand, climbed back up his ladder and pretended to do some more "chiseling" on the offending proboscis. While he did so, he let some marble dust fall from his hand. The pompous Soderino was foo…

I forget the name of it, but a pro audio company used to sell a very impressive-looking piece of rack equipment with several imposingly-titled buttons and sliders but which had nothing inside, whose sole function was to serve as a placebo for unwelcome meddlers.

Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#306

Post by ggchappell »

sxp wrote: post #120
TallGuyShort wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a huge Steve Jobs fan, but I had a professor who had worked as a designer under Steve Jobs and tried something similar. Steve insisted that a new mouse needed to be just a fraction of a millimetre slimmer so a person's palm was lower and closer to the work surface. They figured he was being an unreasonable "delicate genius" and returned a few days later with the identical mouse and claimed they had reworked it to…

There is a similar story about Larry Page when Gmail was being developed: Before Google launched Gmail in 2004, its creator, Paul Buchheit, brought it to Page’s open cubicle office for a review. As Buchheit called the program up on Page’s computer, the boss made a face. “It’s too slow,” Page said. Buchheit disagreed. It was loading just fine, he said. No, Page insisted. It had taken a full 600 milliseconds for the pa…

> I find it likely that Jobs and Page were able to pick up on millimeter & millisecond defects.

Quite possible. It's also possible that Jobs & Page made all kinds of more or less random comments, and people remembered and retold the stories about the times they were strikingly correct.

I'd guess the truth is somewhere between the two.

Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#307

Post by Terr_ »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #248
TallGuyShort wrote: post #39

>> The sacrificial duck kept the meddling manager away from the stuff that was important. The territorial dog analogy is perfect. I've seen parks where they put fake fire hydrants and other features in the dog area so they can feel satisfied without leaving their designated area.

That's not really fakery, though. It's giving the dog a 100% valid marker to use. The dog doesn't care if it can supply water.

Like stapling advertisements to a telephone pole: You don't care whether it actually supports cables that carry power or data.

Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#308

Post by Terr_ »

bornon5 wrote: post #116
leviathan wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back in the days I worked a while as a web designer, spent my days in Photoshop, learned all the shortcuts. So I was showing the design to this client who always wanted to modify things, and he said he doesn't like the orange a lot and if we can tweak it. I had a red layer, and a yellow layer over it with opacity, so I clicked on the yellow layer, and started pressing random numbers on the numpad (pressing numbers ch…

Similar thing happened to me - a client didn't like a shade of blue I was using, even though it was the exact shade she had told me to use. She then sent me a PowerPoint file with just a blue box in it and told me to use that blue instead. Of course it was the exact same blue as before. I re-sent her the file, and she immediately transmitted her enthusiastic approval.

"What do you mean, calibrate my monitor color?"

Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#309

Post by yellowapple »

sytse wrote: post #168
sxp wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a similar story about Larry Page when Gmail was being developed: Before Google launched Gmail in 2004, its creator, Paul Buchheit, brought it to Page’s open cubicle office for a review. As Buchheit called the program up on Page’s computer, the boss made a face. “It’s too slow,” Page said. Buchheit disagreed. It was loading just fine, he said. No, Page insisted. It had taken a full 600 milliseconds for the pa…

Great story, I hope that Larry loads drive.google.com sometime this week and orders that the loading time has to improve as well

Or pretty much anything in *.google.com, for that matter.

Re: “Just remove the duck” (2013)

#310

Post by yellowapple »

graeme wrote: post #199
analog31 wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My carpal tunnels ache just looking at it.

I agree with you. I could never use Apple mice. I hurt my arm muscles typing a few years back. Haven't been able to use them since. (fixed the arm problem with physio and massage) However, the apple trackpad on my macbook air seems to work great. I like this more than even ordinary mice, which can sometimes aggravate the issue.

I personally swear by Logitech's trackball mice (the ones where the trackball is operated with the thumb); less wrist movement involved, meaning less strain there.

In contrast, my wrist hurts just thinking about the Mighty Mouse or whatever it's called.

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