Vitriolic Humor

Like fellow Montgomery blogger, Charles Presley (Eating Montgomery, insert witty title here), I was amazed (after it was pointed it out to me) that there is an arrow in the Federal Express (FedEx) logotype. It's been there for over 10 years now and despite seeing this logo thousands of times, I've never noticed it before.

The ugly secret however is that now that I know it's there, my mind purposefully analyzes the logo each time I see it to catch the arrow, burying the brand and meme of FedEx deep in my cranium. Now I'm passing the curse on to you:

Besides being a brilliant use of typography in design and a simple, effective logo it's got the additional hook of the arrow in the negative space between letters. The man who designed this was interviewed by The Sneeze. His name is Lindon Leader and his company is Leader Creative. There, now you know who to bug, don't call me if you can't get "the arrow" out of your head...

Tags: leader fedex logo design graphics typography federalexpress type arrow logotype

Posted by speedeep at 5:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I'm still looking for something that functions as all (or most) of these devices in one small, compact form factor. After seeing what Apple pulled off with their new iPod Nano, this shouldn't be too far off in the future.

This device should encompass the following functions:

• Cell Phone
• PDA
• MP3/OGG (Vorbis) Player
• AM/FM Radio with recording/scheduled recording
• Portable Storage
• GPS Receiver

I'm looking for something based off an open source operating system, like Linux. I'd prefer to have shell access (say, like my Linksys running Sveasoft's firmware.) and the ability to compile and run programs of my own (i.e. openly extend the functionality of this device through software.).

As a consumer, I am not looking for this device to have any sort of camera functionality. I would prefer the capability to transfer digital image files from a camera to this device either wirelessly or through a compact flash media.

This device should have a full mini keyboard (thumbboard?) and ideally support for external USB keyboard and mouse. It should be able to connect to available networks via Ethernet, Wi-fi, EVDO, Infrared, USB (1 or 2), and 1394/Firewire (400 and 800.) It should interconect and share data equally well on an PC/Windows, Apple, and Unix platforms and from digital cameras, digital video cameras and other data sources.

We're getting closer on some of these vectors:
Asus MyPal A636 GPS-Enabled Pocket PC

Does this thing exist yet? Feel free to add a comment...

Tags: open-source compact mp3 multi-purpose geek linux gadget media tool appliance

Posted by speedeep at 7:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

So Apple has gone through their "mini" stage and are stepping into "nano" (though inappropriately used, perhaps) with their great looking iPod nano. 2GB for $200, 4GB for $250. This thing will drastically accelerate Apple's already great revenues. The design is right, the price is right. Everyone's got to have one. Right?

Apple, you've come so close, but there are a couple hang-up points that are still keeping me from buying any iPod:

• From the iPod nano "Features Guide":
  "You cannot switch from using iPod nano with a Mac to using it with a Windows PC (or vice versa) without erasing all data on iPod nano." (That's not on the public web site, now, is it?)
• nano (and possibly the other iPods?) like to attach themselves to an "authorized computer." If the authorized computer isn't available, then you must "restore your iPod software." Guess what? Again, all of your data is erased if you "restore your iPod software" on another computer. This is some sort of very lame attempt at rudimentary copy protection. Good thing Apple is protecting you, no?
• Where's the Linux/Unix support?
• They obviously tossed out the FireWire in an effort to make this thing as small as possible. Wasn't that a core component of Apple's interconnectivity? I'll take that change as a sign that (at least as far as Apple is concerned) wireless is where it is at. Where's the wireless iPod nano?

Apple has (IMHO) crippled an otherwise great technology by including the anti-copy nannying features and lack of open, multi-platform support. It's a digital storage device. Why doesn't it act like one?

A couple of review links:

• Ars Technica
• Russell Beattie
• Blogtending

Tags: ipod nano - ipod - nano - mp3 - mp3 player - apple - apple ipod nano - design - user interface - mobile - wearable - wearable technology - meme - ipodstore - apple store

Posted by speedeep at 8:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)