I went all "Malkovich! Malkovich!" on my feed. Sorry.

Thanks to those of you who pointed out that my temporary switch to my FriendFeed as a feed source caused massive trouble. I managed to redirect myself to myself in the process, and it was all the same posts/tweets/photos in a horrific loop.

I've reset the source and all that should be here, for now, are my plain old blog posts. And no, this wasn't FeedBurner's fault; pure, unfiltered PEBKAC. Cheers.

Planespotting in Google Maps’ western suburbs

I love it when you run across stuff like this in Maps:


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That's a United 777, on short final to runway 10 at O'Hare. Looks like he's arriving right around noon. The daily nonstop from Beijing? That's my guess.

UPDATE (23-May): As you may now be saying to yourself, “What 777? Shobe, you hitting the highmaker again?” I’d like to point out that Google Maps updated its terrain photo layer and the 777 moment is lost to the mists of time. I should done an actual screengrab instead of trusting the damned widget to never, ever change. Nice to see Itasca repaved its portion of Irving Park Road.

Bandwidth to spare

I grudgingly switched my broadband provider this weekend. I've been a happy Speakeasy customer for years, but ADSL has reached its end-of-life point for residential speed at a consumer-friendly price point, and Speakeasy’s acquisition by Best Buy paradoxically refocused it on business customer packages.

So I’m off to Comcast. I've always feared going back to cable (I still have DirecTV for TV and don’t plan to switch that choice up any time soon), but the bandwidth available at my old DSL+VOIP price point was too much to turn down. (That’s even after the infamous “low introductory rate” expires.) So far the speed test bears this out:

My previous DSL numbers were ~1200 down, ~384 up. I already miss a couple of Speakeasy's VOIP features, such as being able to forward to a different number after a certain number of rings (Comcast call forwarding is all-or-nothing), but perhaps finally switching to GrandCentral as well will give us the set of calling features we’re looking for (but I don’t see any way to migrate an existing number to that service as a starting point, which is kind of a bummer).

As for Comcast’s traditionally bad rap for lacking a shred of grace in customer service: the installer was extremely diligent, got things wired exactly how I wanted them in the house, and even offered to show up an hour early (which worked out well). When the day comes that I'm faced with an actual problem I may change my tune, but so far I’m pretty happy.

Now that's service.

I have ordered some shoes and clothes from Zappos in the past; they have always impressed me with their wide selection, easy on-site search and filtering options when browsing items, and of course their no-questions-asked return policy. Rachelleb has also been treated favorably, and I really haven't ever heard of a negative experience in anyone's dealings with them — just how generally doggone good they are at online retail.

Tonight, I inadvertently decided to test them a bit; my browsing started with shirts and sandals, but eventually I found myself confronted with a nice suit that I really wanted. (It’s true; those who either croak and/or get hitched bring out the suit-wearing Matt Shobe. I only ask that you choose wisely.) But the description didn't make it quite clear whether the suit was tailor-ready or already hemmed. (Seemed very unlikely to be a standard fit, but I had to ask.) So, I fired up a chat session and asked. The response:

“Thanks for holding Matt! I don't see anything about it being tailor ready. I am assuming that it is. We have a 365 day return policy, with free outgoing shipping and free return shipping. As long as you return the item unworn and in the original packaging (box or plastic bag), we are more than happy to either exchange the item or issue you a full refund…If you would like to order this today to make sure you don't loose out on your size, I would be more than happy to upgrade your shipping from free standard shipping (4-5 business days) to 1 business day shipping and waive the $25 charge to get it out to you on 04/29/08 (Tuesday).”

A bit hornswoggled in reverse, I replied, in my best Eric Case:

you guys rock the service deal hard, yo

And the response: 

“No, you ROCK! I think you are right, it would be better to get the item while it is available and you will know as soon as you get it, which would be Tuesday.”

And, at the eventual conclusion, Zappos writes:

“Thanks! I will just wait till you leave the room, just in case you have any other questions! We want to make sure you are taken care of. Remember, we are here by live chat, email, and phone 24 hours a day!”

In the course of asking about an ordinary product listing feature and service policy boilerplate, I'm treated as a customer with an exception that demands premium resolution and am given a spot discount to ensure my business is retained and my satisfaction, end-to-end, is likely to be as absolute as possible. This is impressive as all hell and is how the retail world should be (and probably once was, when all commerce was local and reputation was earned one front door jingle at a time).

Zappos also happens to use FeedBurner for their blogs. That’s compliment enough, free shipping be damned. (Good thing I withheld that sentiment during chat.)

Earthquake? You kiddin' me? Earthquake?!

(…Jim Mora reference for all my fellow, longtime Jim Mora fans.)

Friends, Romans, and countrymen have been reporting that a minor earthquake hit Illinois this morning; 5.2 on the Richter scale, says the USGS. (Keep rockin’ that FeedBurner feed, USGS.) I felt nothing, but then again I’m not to be trusted for anything empirical or objective between midnight and 6am or so.

However, when I was a grad student, living in Seattle in 1995, a 5.0 hit us around dinner time. I was cooking in my apartment’s kitchen. The moment the quake hit, my kitchen became a galley on a cabin cruiser, lazily rocking from side to side, as though the wake of a large, passing ship had disturbed it at port. And much like riding through a wake, it was over quickly, righting everything. I'm not sure the vegetables I was stir-frying even shifted in the pan.

The manic reaction of the local news media was predictable; that didn't make it any less of a farce. I remember KING5’s Jim Foreman (NBC affiliate) racing to a hair salon to cover the devastation; there were shattered shelves and styling product scattered everywhere, people. Why a full-scale stylist riot and looting spree didn't consume all of Tukwila that night, I'll never know.

Constraints and design

It’s interesting to see what effect technical constraints have on design. Paradoxically, constraints can be liberating, freeing you from the tyranny of too many choices.

Case in point: weather information stalwart Weather Underground. For their standard presentation of current local conditions and 7-day forecast, WU provides equal-opportunity clutter with ad spaces and weather information:

Give it the “squint test”: narrow your eyes to and don't focus on any part of the page. Take it all in and decide if any part of the layout says, “look at me first!” For me — maybe the banner ad at the top, and perhaps the brownish blob of the current radar image window — but it’s pretty much a dead heat. Everything shouts for your attention and the lack of useful contrast makes this a data maze from which almost no information may ever escape.

Contrast this with the presentation of same data on an iPhone (simulated here with a narrowed Safari browser window):

Incredible. Tapping any of the Current, Radar, Forecast, and Warnings links scrolls to an anchored heading on this page, neatly dividing up the four main categories of weather information you’d be likely to find of interest. (Some may quibble that Warnings should be displayed conditionally — no current warning, no link.) The iPhone's standard 320 pixel width demands that the designer get the essentials front-and-center. (Rotating to activate the iPhone’s magical page-flip feature gives you 480 pixels to work with; still much less than today’s average desktop computer.) No ads to be found, but they could probably place one or two near the top, or in the Forecast section, and they wouldn't be nearly as detractive from the user experience.

The iPhone limits web plug-in options (no Flash) and strongly recommends an approach to visual styling that is in harmony with the characteristically simple lines of its built-in OS X applications. Its options for web developers writing iPhone-specific sites strongly encourage using CSS3 features that improve cross-site consistency, right down to the optimal font and point size for list layouts.

The next time I'm stuck on a design task, I think I'll put up some blinders and see if limiting my field of view paradoxically sets me free. Less is less, right, Jason?

Failure, and the failing failers who respect it

I couldn't agree more, Brad (and Mitchell). Suppressing fear of failure is one of the things that's kept me honest as an entrepreneur over the years. That doesn't mean I enjoy failing; it’s like hugging a cactus. But there's something liberating and inherently healthy about missed achievements, boneheaded mistakes, and commercial pratfalls.

In fact, failure may be the first sign you’ve finally broken free from a silent, stifling routine. See where it leads you next.