The litter in littérateur. Ricky Opaterny on Books, Music, Art, and Sports

11/26/2011

Charlie Brown by Loud Crow

Filed under: Technology — Ricky @ 2:37 pm

20111126-135952.jpg

The Charlie Brown Christmas app from Loud Crow is the best thing I’ve seen on the iPad in a while. It’s surprising, beautiful, and absolutely delightful for what it is. Along with Aweditorium, it’s one of the few apps that makes a tablet feel like a special device and not simply a repackaged version of the PC.

11/24/2011

Real books are physical objects

Filed under: Books — Tags: — Ricky @ 3:29 pm

The reproduction has been done painstakingly, and conjures up an almost tactile sense of the handmade original. A mourner is always searching for traces of the lost one, and traces of that scrapbook’s physicality—bits of handwriting, stamps, stains—add testimonial force: this person existed.
The poet Anne Carson’s “Nox,” review : The New Yorker

11/23/2011

The sketchbook of Susan Kare

Filed under: Technology — Tags: , , — Ricky @ 10:44 pm

Kare’s first assignment was developing fonts for the Mac OS. At the time, digital typefaces were monospaced, meaning that both a narrow I and a broad M were wedged into the same bitmapped real estate — a vestigial legacy of the way that a typewriter platen advances, one space at a time.

The Sketchbook of Susan Kare, the Artist Who Gave Computing a Human Face

The lost interview

Filed under: General,Technology — Tags: , , , , — Ricky @ 10:30 pm

I went to the theater to see this lost interview with Steve Jobs from 1995 that was originally shot for Triumph of the Nerds and came away from it inspired. Because what other executive in Silicon Valley would ever cite Picasso and Thoreau? And that he did makes me believe that, perhaps, there’s a place in the Valley for someone like me.
EXCLUSIVE: Steve Jobs ‘The Lost Interview’ Teaser – YouTube

How can I find more videos like this one?

Filed under: Photography — Tags: , , — Ricky @ 7:23 pm

Weile. By Thomas Schweigert from Leica Camera on Vimeo.

Erin McKeown and the problem with streaming music

Filed under: General — Tags: , , — Ricky @ 12:16 am

To make the monthly minimum wage of $1,160, a musician needed to sell 143 self-pressed compact discs. To make that from Spotify, they would need people to stream their songs more than 4 million times — not humanly possible unless you happen to be Lady Gaga.

Is my passion for Spotify destroying the musicians I love? – San Jose Mercury News

11/22/2011

The old Banana Republic store facade

Filed under: General — Tags: , , — Ricky @ 1:39 pm


One of my favorite things about going to Stanford Shopping Center when I was a kid was seeing the old Banana Republic store.
Store info and other Republic Business | Abandoned Republic

11/20/2011

A few photos from the Occupy movement

Filed under: Photography — Tags: , , , , — Ricky @ 8:16 pm

Taken with my Leica M8 and 40mm Leica Summicron-C. I’ll be adding more photos soon.

Jeff Sachs on Occupy Wall Street

Filed under: General — Tags: , , — Ricky @ 9:46 am

Activists are needed among shareholders, consumers and students to hold corporations and politicians to account. Shareholders, for example, should pressure companies to get out of politics. Consumers should take their money and purchasing power away from companies that confuse business and political power. The whole range of other actions — shareholder and consumer activism, policy formulation, and running of candidates — will not happen in the park.

The new movement also needs to build a public policy platform. The American people have it absolutely right on the three main points of a new agenda. To put it simply: tax the rich, end the wars and restore honest and effective government for all.

The New Progressive Movement – NYTimes.com

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