“It’s not just developers that are bad with estimates either. Everyone at some point is just winging it because it’s something they’ve never done before and won’t be able to successfully make a judgement until they have.” – Ashley Moran
Author Archives: Garrick van Buren
Why, Yes, I Do Live East of the Mississippi
Earlier this week, I gave my Wide Open Faces talk to the web design group at Hennepin Tech. Much of that talk is a dive into the differences among open source licenses (specficially OFL, GPL, and X11/MIT). My personal preference is the X11/MIT license. It’s short (4 sentences) and basically says; while the copyright is …
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Garrick’s More Ergonomic Workspace
Years ago, I’d have regularly scheduled massage appointments to relieve the stress in my shoulders and upper back. A result of hunching over the laptop all day. Then, I compared the ongoing price of massage to a big external monitor. The monitor was a bargain. Over the last couple weeks, I’ve been noticing the hunching …
What if They Had Only 4 Products?
“Jobs killed slow-selling products, most notably the Apple Newton hand-held computer, and reduced the number of product lines from sixty to just 4…” – Charles Hill, Garteth Jones, Essentials of Strategic Management Apple’s always had a culture of not turning back, and dragging their application developers (think Adobe) & users into their future. Dropping 3 …
Pay More, Better
Daniel Markham nails why I wholeheartedly disagree with pricing a book less than $25. “After considering those numbers, I’ve decided to go high. Retail price will be $99.99. I feel like I can justify this for a few reasons: 1) If it really helps you it’s worth that money, 2) If you pay that much …
Continuously
“I have strong believe (sic) that right now, somewhere, a new community site for programmers is rising. I only need to find it.” – z92
The Moo Train
“I want liberation from the commercial Web’s two-decade old design flaws. I don’t care how much a company uses first person possessive pronouns on my behalf. They are not me, they do now know me, and I do not want them pretending to be me, or shoving their tentacles into my pockets, or what their …
History of the term “Telephone Sanitizer”
Now, for a socially aspiring middle class family, it wasn’t quite the thing to have a truck parked in front of their house marked “Kensington W.C. Cleaning” or “Brompton Crapper Swabout,” broadcasting the messages: (a) we don’t have staff, and (b) our W.C. is dirty. So some enterprising toilet cleaner stencilled “Telephone Sanitizing” on the …
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Speak When You Have Something to Sell
“They are the un-Apple or un-Amazon, two companies who never say anything without offering something to buy.” – Dave Winer This is the most important and prescient thing I’ve read in quite a while. Speak When You Have Something to Sell. If memory serves – this point is why my favorite Evil Genius hasn’t published …
Fermenting: “GnomeMower” – Biére de Garde
After a three batches of beers with 6+ month fermentation timelines ( “Marley was Dead“, “Out Like a Lion” , “Sour Suburbanite” ) I wanted something with a slightly, faster turnaround. And – less, um, experimental. So, I pulled together this Biére de Garde Golden Strong Ale. Simple and straight-forward ingredient list. “GnomeMower” Bier de …
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