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Squirt: Speed read the web, one word at a time

squirt.io

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Re: Squirt: Speed read the web, one word at a time

#21

Post by nnnnni »

Torn wrote: post #15
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, I found it incredibly useful. My mind often wanders when I read, and Squirt solves that. I found their choice of color scheme jarring. They highlight a specific letter in blue for some reason, and you get a strange optical sensation after staring at that shade of blue for too long. I had to download their js and css, rehost it myself, search through it for the color code, and change it to black. Bu…

I suspect that's done to help anchor your focus, i.e. so your eyes don't move too much

Perhaps adding a little bit of grey to the blue would help?

Re: Squirt: Speed read the web, one word at a time

#23

Post by mercer »

mbrock wrote: post #8

I think this kind of thing is pretty interesting... For me, the reason I can't use it for most stuff I read is that I often need more time to process/understand certain words and names. On the first article from Instapaper that I tried this on, I was fed a sentence containing the words "doxological peregrinations." That threw me off, and then I knew I would have trouble keeping up. It'd be interesting if there was so…

For me it's more than just the sentence that I miss reading. I miss the context of the entire paragraph and, to a lesser degree, being able to see the preceding and following paragraphs.

I recently rediscovered the joy of reading longer pieces that take their sweet time to build up to a point, or to explain something complex. These texts are generally both longer and denser than, say, blog posts, and while paragraphs don't always require repeated reading, I usually find myself skipping back and forth between them to get a good mental image of the way they relate to each other.

I think tools such as this might be useful for reading relatively simple texts (blog posts, biographies, certain novels), but if anything I want to do less of that in the first place.

Re: Squirt: Speed read the web, one word at a time

#24

Post by jawns »

You'll notice that in the site's Acknowledgements section, the first to be credited is "Spritz Inc, the company whose patents are pending" [1].

Also in the acknowledgements is a link[2] titled "The problem with software patents."

Essentially, Squirt's creator, Cameron Boehmer, is letting everyone know that he has appropriated patent-pending technology because he rejects the idea that the method should be patentable. (Whether a court will disagree with him and impose a fine is, apparently, a chance he's willing to take.)

---

[1] http://www.spritzinc.com

[2] http://lmgtfy.com/?q=the+problem+with+software+patents

Re: Squirt: Speed read the web, one word at a time

#27

Post by scrrr »

jawns wrote: post #24

You'll notice that in the site's Acknowledgements section, the first to be credited is "Spritz Inc, the company whose patents are pending" [1]. Also in the acknowledgements is a link[2] titled "The problem with software patents." Essentially, Squirt's creator, Cameron Boehmer, is letting everyone know that he has appropriated patent-pending technology because he rejects the idea that the method should be patentable.…

Well, should it? It's a neat idea. But what exactly is the big deal being patented here? It's pretty trivial.

To me it seems that it's a bit like patenting flappy bird.

Re: Squirt: Speed read the web, one word at a time

#28

Post by jawns »

scrrr wrote: post #27
jawns wrote: post #24

You'll notice that in the site's Acknowledgements section, the first to be credited is "Spritz Inc, the company whose patents are pending" [1]. Also in the acknowledgements is a link[2] titled "The problem with software patents." Essentially, Squirt's creator, Cameron Boehmer, is letting everyone know that he has appropriated patent-pending technology because he rejects the idea that the method should be patentable.…

Well, should it? It's a neat idea. But what exactly is the big deal being patented here? It's pretty trivial. To me it seems that it's a bit like patenting flappy bird.

The patent acknowledges that Rapid Serial Visual Presentation (RSVP) methods have been around since the 1970s. Spritz's particular method of RSVP applies research into the optimal positioning of words to reduce or eliminate saccades (rapid movement of the eye). This is called ORP-RSVP (the ORP stands for Optimal Recognition Position).

I would think that if you are opposed to the idea of software patents in general, you would no doubt be opposed to this particular software patent.

But if you are not necessarily opposed to all software patents, but only the ones that try to patent something trivial, or try to add the words "on a computer" to an established real-world practice, then the question arises: Is Spritz's method, which positions words according to an algorithm that is meant to reduce saccades, trivial? One could argue that because it's an actively researched problem, it's not.

But even if you think that Spritz has a chance of getting its patent accepted, a further question arises: Does Squirt's implementation of ORP-RSVP use the method that Spritz is trying to patent, or some other similar method? I imagine there are probably a bunch of different ORP-RSVP methods, and it's not immediately clear whether Squirt's method is a true clone. It could very well end up that even though Squirt is heavily implying that it's using the patent-pending technology, it's actually using a different method.

Re: Squirt: Speed read the web, one word at a time

#29

Post by Houshalter »

return0 wrote: post #6

This kind of things are gimmicky at best, and an awful reading experience at worst. The time it takes for your eyes to adjust to the blinking letters is larger than the saccadic movement, and a single saccade reads a bunch of words instead, allowing you to both comprehend the sentence immediately, and also easily skip back-forward in case of errors.

Using an extension similar to this (readline) has let me read things much more rapidly than my normal reading speed. Even faster considering it prevents my mind from wandering or eyes from getting distracted. It's not a gimmick at all.
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