The 37signals blog is widely read so I don’t often link it but this post was most interesting. The post summarizes the remaking of the New York and London subway maps and points out that usefulness is more important than accuracy.
Would you rather look at this:
or this?
“The distorted map gets the job done better than an accurate one and that’s what really matters.”
Touche.
Interesting article borrowed from the School of Real Estate.
Real estate investment according to finance gurus is a sound investment. What is important in the case of a real estate deal is whether or not the investment is profitable and what its growth prospects are. The formula for success according to leaders in real estate is just “CLEAR” :
Imagekind is happy to announce we’ve partnered with Flickr to add another great way for Flickr members to do stuff with their photos using the Flickr API.
Flickr photographers can now go to Imagekind and easily produce framed prints of their Flickr photos, and set up their own stores to sell their work to their adoring fans.
You might have seen our handiwork at Flickr’s recent birthday party, which gives you a good idea of the kind of quality and size we’re talking about!
Create Your Own Masterpiece
Flickr members can now easily create any Imagekind product, from framed fine art prints, to beautiful prints on canvas, and even our newest framed products (see below), from any image in their Flickr Photoset – without any re-uploading!
Sell Your Photos
Any Flickr member can easily set up an Imagekind account to start selling their work right away, and directly import their images from their Flickr photoset! These members will get the same great options and on-demand service as every Imagekind member:
* Great quality prints and framing – reliable on-demand service
* You control the pricing and markup, and you keep all of your profit
* Additional 15% commission on sales of mat and framing options with your art
* Joining a thriving marketplace that is redefining how people worldwide buy art online
Any existing Imagekind member can now also effortlessly import images from their Flickr photo sets directly into their Imagekind galleries – right from your Imagekind member admin.
In addition, we’ve been working hard to implement a few new product offerings, continuing to provide more and more options for anyone creating or buying art.
Launching New Products: Ready-Made & Multi-Opening Frames
More ways to show off your art! Don’t want to spend a fortune framing your prints? Ready-Made Frames to the rescue! Ready-made frames come in fixed standard dimensions, but you will still be able to choose your mat and frame style.
Plus, you can now you can even frame multiple images at one time! With our Multi-opening frames you can select the images, determine the number of openings, and choose how you want them arranged. To find out more about these new offerings, take a look at our Ready-made page.
One important note; these options are not currently available for work being purchased from an Imagekind gallery by the shopping public. We have a few kinks to work out regarding how to allow more pricing control for images going into these ready-made products, as we’re sure many of our artists would like to set different markups for their work when used in these frames.
However, any Imagekind member can create these items themselves for their own use or for resale, from any image in their Imagekind galleries or Flickr photosets, at our wholesale or “base†cost.
As always, we’d love your feedback on all of these new developments, so feel free to post away here, or join us on the Imagekind Forum. Our members and their original art are what make this endeavor really special – so thanks for all your support while we’ve been busy, and welcome to all our new Flickr friends!
I can’t claim a big time IPO in 2007 like my former RealNetworks colleague and friend Sujal Patel at Isilon is able to do. However, that doesn’t seem to stop start-up entreprenuers from sending me several emails per week asking for tips as to how Imagekind was able to raise VC money with relative ease. These are only my thoughts in no particular order based on my own opinions. I hope some of this is helpful for you if you’re looking to get your own software company funded. [Click for rest of post on Curious Office]
It ain’t so green that’s for sure. It also isn’t the most technologically advanced SUV on the planet. In fact it is no doubt one of the least technologically advanced SUV’s at least in terms of creature comforts. For anyone thinking of buying one of these cars let me give you the skinny.
A new Audi Q7 is way more high tech. Especially on the inside. Backup camera, winter package…you name it. You don’t get that with a Porsche.
Warranty? Buy a new BMW X5 and ALL issues are covered to include brakes and brake rotors. Not so with ANY Porsche.
Want gadgets? Buy a Range Rover. You even get a fridge between the seats.
You get nothing of the sort with a Porsche.
However, drive a Porsche and it is clear why you’d buy one of these things.
It flys. It handles like a car. It is arguably not pretty but it is a blast to drive.
It guzzles gas and I’m not proud of that.
But it really is a drivers car. If you don’t care about that kind of thing do the planet a favor and don’t buy one.
These cars are great drives. They are obnoxious and I won’t buy another one but in the meantime it is a lot fun.
There ya have it. Do as you must.
I live all day in Photoshop, Illustrator, Lightroom, Dreamweaver etc. I’ve decided I need to try the Mac universe. Now I have an office full of both sets of gear to include 2 TB of network storage and another 2 TB of USB 2 storage available to all machines. Here’s a pic of my new setup.
Rainbow Series: I've begun work on some light-hearted images I've taken around Seattle which have been treated with the spectrum of the rainbow. I'll be adding to this set over the year.
Photo Paintings: It's fun to take some old photos from my collection and see if I can get them to look more like physical works of art. Sometimes it works and sometimes it does not but the process is quite fun.
Chernobyl Series: I've been working on some image collages with some old Chernobyl photos to try and pull some emotion out of some already spectacular images.
New Years 2007 in Hawaii: We spent New Years at Mauna Kea on the Big Island. Highly recommended to get some sun this time of year.
Through Curious Office, we start or invest in other companies. Among them are the companies below.
Imagekind: I co-founded this company with Adrian Hanauer and was the CEO, designer, builder manager etc etc etc. In other words, the first person. It is today one of the fastest growing online art and photo commerce communities on the Internet.
Curious Office: I founded this investment company and software lab to build companies and invest in other companies.
SEOmoz.org: This resource for webmasters develops content and tools for anyone who has an interest in search engine optimization. It is one of the most popular sites of its kind.
Shelfari: We invested along with Amazon.com and others in this fast growing community for book lovers.
Wishpot: We're working hard to help CEO Max Ciccocosto develop a cutting edge network that helps people manage their personal wish lists, gift giving and more.
FeedDigest: We were the seed investor in this company that helps convert RSS feeds from outside sources into content that is ready to be published on your own websites as HTML. FeedDigest was acquired in 2007.
I can only manage so many social networks and for the time being I'm committed to Facebook. However, you'll also find me on aSmallWorld too but add me to facebook if you want to stay connected in the most efficient manner.
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