Sun, 30 October, 2005
Posted in General
at 7 pm
From Heroes of their degeneration in the London Times:
“…but we’re still a bunch of nerds. We’re the guys who got beat up in Basildon. But, you know, revenge has been sweet.”
So Depeche Mode’s new album, Playing The Angel
is out. It’s been a long time since I’ve been excited about music, but on the flip side, it’s been a long time since I’ve really had the chance to listen to music.
With my new 90 minute communte via public transit, I’ve had more of a chance to listen to music, but I have yet to switch to listening to music intentionally. Since I had previously only mlisten to my iPod (in a consistnet fashion) while going back and forth from Hot Pepper (a ridiculously short distance) I only ever had the ‘pod on Shuffle. Now with upwards of 90 minutes at my displosal, the idea of listening to a whole album becomes a possibility.
to that end I’ve spent a time or two with PtA and I’ve been surprised, delighted and disappointed. Suprised: Depeche Mode using… synths? Yes, i know Mode has often been called a synthpop band, but they’ve barely used synthesisers since their original two studio albums. Virtually everything since then has been from the use of samplers witch have a sound far removed from the the oscillating whines of your synth keyboards. It feels totally old school and it feels great.
Delighted? Finally we’ve got some good songs that push your ears, getting underneath your mind and move your forward sometimes like a bulldozer, sometimes like a Tu-114. With Exciter, all we had was Dead of Night. On Ultra, only the remixes of It’s No Good had the kind of beat that brings a listener along for the ride and sets them up to listen and appreciate the slower songs.
The disappointment comes from the lyrics. Some of it is great, but when it’s bad… it stinks. So some stuff (like Macro) is wonderful and unique. But other pieces are just uncooked. Put out without the benefit of critical revision, time to develop, time to evoolve intot a wonderful lyric.
That said, it may get better and better. It’s already surpased the last two albums, let’s see how far it can rise.
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Wed, 19 October, 2005
Posted in Media, People
at 10 pm
Over the past year I had the opportunity to see and amazing process up close: the writing of a novel.
Jock Murphy wrote an amazing book called Redemption Song. I was lucky enough to even get the chance to comment on the work before it was finished. Jock’s book is now available on Amazon and I’m just so incredibly proud to have been there for the birth of a great work of great dedication.
Congratulation Jock!
And even further, he’s made the book available on a chapter by chapter basis on his site. Take a look at some of the work and if you get hooked, buy the book! Jock took his time and his inspiration and has something that other people only hope to have, think of having, dream of having. A book of one’s own.
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Thu, 13 October, 2005
Posted in General
at 12 pm
A single document project spec should have:
- Cover page
- Table of Contents
- Overview
- Creative Brief
- Development Tools Spec
- Deployment Platform Spec
- Content Specs
- Function Specs
- Budget
- Calendar/Schedule
- Site Map (Visual Overview)
- Wireframes (Page/Screen details)
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Posted in General
at 12 pm
As some of you may know, I’m leaving Hot Pepper to go work at Planar Systems. Today I’m packing up the stuff on my desk and I’m cleaning off the stickie notes that I’ve had up for quick reminders of various items.
For my own reference, and your ammusment I have listed another one of them below:
Project Process (Short Version)
- Plan
- Content
- Design
- Development
- Testing
- Deploy
Project Specs Documents
- Platform
- Actors (example users)
- Functions for each role
- Specifications for:
- Content
- Design
- Development Platform
- Deployment Platform
- Schedule by phases
- Budget with hours and rates
- Site Map
- Wireframes
- Mockups
- Comps
Planning Process
- Goals
- Audiences
- Tasks
- Tools
- Systems
- Business Processes
- Business Tools
- Admin Tools
- Build tools order:
- Admin tools
- Bix Tools
- user tools
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Posted in General
at 12 pm
As some of you may know, I’m leaving Hot Pepper to go work at Planar Systems. Today I’m packing up the stuff on my desk and I’m cleaning off the stickie notes that I’ve had up for quick reminders of various items.
For my own reference, and your ammusment I have listed them below:
Sales Calls
- Take notes
- Get name and remember it
- Get contact info
- Get project timeframe
- Get budget size
- Get platform, media or channel
- Identify their goals
- Find out who referred them
The idea there was to list the things I needed to do when someone called in looking to feel out how much a project would cost, or looking around for people to send a project to. Most of the time I would hand these notes off to Brad or Dave, or someone to follow up on the sales part.
New Project Calls
- Take notes
- Get contact info
- Get timeframe
- Get deadlines
- Get budget
- Get deliverables list
- Get list of incoming assets
- Ask for similar projects and styles
When a project kicks off, particularly with a client that we have an ongoing relationship with, we just need to get these project notes together. These two stickies were great to rely on when a call would come in out of the blue.
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Mon, 10 October, 2005
Posted in Career
at 10 am
This is a list of the ways that we came up with at Hot Pepper to dole out assignments:
- Shared spreadsheet
- Web page
- Printed page per task
- Daily printed page
- Single task e-mail
- Multi-task/Daily e-mail
- Via calendaring app (iCal, Outlook, etc.)
- Whiteboard task list
- Shared wordprocessing doc
- Shared Outline Editor doc
The key here was to break up tasks into .5 hour minimum to 4 hr maximum elements, always include the Do date and the Due date, and the time budgeted to complete the task. Optionally each task was also given an ‘evil twin’ task of QA by another person.
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