Intelligent design
Dec. 9th, 2005 12:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomus
I feel like I've raved forever about Sapporo-based design e-zine Shift. I've always liked the way their conception of design is wide enough to include a Girls on the Street fashion section. (You can see the latest batch, photographed as usual by Atelier Fly's Meyuga, here, but the styles these days are a bit... understated, it must be said.)When I visited Sapporo in January, the high point of my podcast was a visit to Shift's headquarters, a big brick building consisting of Shift's offices, a gallery and small bookshop, a lending library devoted to art, architecture, design and photography books, and the wonderful Cafe Soso. I also keep a close eye on the Shift blog, which often supplies topics for Click Opera (and vice versa).
So I'm delighted to say that Shift has just published its first article about me, written by their Milan correspondent, Francesco Tenaglia. It's blushy stuff: "Nick Currie's writing is brilliant. He manages to bring together apparently unrelated cultural products and ideas to create lucid analyses using the composite microcosm of visual culture as a platform to observe the broader aspects of society." (Francesco clearly hadn't seen my "Black Ships" essay when he wrote that!) It also finds me in somewhat religious (or is it megalomaniacal?) mood, answering a question about collaboration with a desire to work with the Great Designer in the Sky: "Nature or chance or God or whatever we call it is the ultimate designer. Looking down at the world from a plane is perhaps my favourite visual experience. I'd like to work with whoever laid that stuff out!"
Speaking of intelligent design, it's great to see a major, free archive of poets reading their work online. Launched this month after five years of planning by its architects, poet Andrew Motion and recording producer Richard Carrington, The Poetry Archive is a fabulous resource, a place you can visit to hear everyone from Peter Porter (an early hero I used to quote in my NME interviews) to Adrienne Rich.
But, alas, Poetry Archive's design isn't as intelligent as its content. The embedded RealAudio implementation is appalling. You have to click the title of the poem you want to hear, then scroll down to where the embedded player is, and click "Play" to hear it. There are no FF or RW controls, and you can't open the file in Real Player unless you look at the page source and find its name. What's more, when you click on another poem by the same poet, it plays the first poem again. The only way to play further poems is to look them up in the Poems Index. I went so far as to download Opera, thinking it might be a problem with the Safari browser, but in Opera it was worse; I couldn't even play the first poem. I'd recommend Motion and co. to get a professional designer to look at their site... but I'm horribly afraid the make-over would involve Flash, and just make things worse.
Finally, just a word to say that Click Opera will be quiet over the weekend. I'm flying to a secret location in England to attend my brother's wedding, but I've been forbidden to mention anything about it here, because Click Opera is a scurrilous and disreputable place, the kind of place you wouldn't want respectable wedding photos displayed or the names of decent people named. And it's quite true; regular readers know that all we tend to talk about here is the size of black men's willies. So mum's the word... see you Monday!
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(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 11:41 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 11:53 am (UTC)No.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 12:45 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 12:48 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 11:41 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 11:46 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 11:46 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 12:09 pm (UTC)update
Date: 2005-12-09 03:54 pm (UTC)Re: update
Date: 2005-12-09 08:21 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 02:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 06:10 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 06:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-10 01:37 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 12:08 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 12:22 pm (UTC)Speaking of which, I heard this telling slip on the BBC World Service yesterday. "Ceremonies have been held around the world," said the woman reading the news, "to commemorate the death of the British Museum... to commemorate the death of the British musician John Lennon." I thought that said it all, really. (I suspect Lennon would have been tickled too by the "Spaniard in the works".)
poetry archive
Date: 2005-12-09 03:20 pm (UTC)Re: poetry archive
Date: 2005-12-09 03:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 03:33 pm (UTC)Looks like the site would be safe from a Flash invasion judging from it's Accessibility Statement (http://www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/accessibility.do)
I'd give the site pretty high accessibility ratings. Except for a few minor errors Moondog would be able to navigate the site. But he would have a tough time reading his own biography on line (http://www.moondogscorner.de/frame.html)
RealPlayer blows.
Flash might not be so bad, actually
Date: 2005-12-09 07:13 pm (UTC)Speaking of which, (plug plug) we have a little project going - podcast transcription services, to enhance searchability and accessibility. check out www.transcribr.com ;)
?
Date: 2005-12-10 01:14 am (UTC)The Accessibility Statement actually says that they publish textual extracts in Flash (Flash 8, in fact). And Flash Player if far more ubiquitous than RealPlayer. http://www.macromedia.com/software/player_census/flashplayer/
So wouldn't it be more compatible with the Accessibility Statement to use a single plugin for text and audio?
Flash can be used effectively as an audio player. Type Radio is a great example. http://www.typeradio.org
-Sean
Re: ?
Date: 2005-12-10 02:31 am (UTC)Now how the hell did I miss that? Sorry for the knee jerk anti- Flash reaction.
You and pop_kandy make some good points.
Thanks for the Type Radio link.
And of course, who can forget this fantastic use of Flash (http://www.artandleisure.com/art/momus/flash/folktronic/folktronic.html)
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-09 03:55 pm (UTC)Firefox all the way, squire.
impressed
Date: 2005-12-09 04:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-10 02:14 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-10 02:26 am (UTC)Fuck.
We keep on reforming/hoping. Those two enemies will forever be linked together.
Do you drink beer, you look young enough!
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-10 01:27 pm (UTC)SUN
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-10 06:19 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-11 12:33 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-11 02:53 pm (UTC)Ever stop by the Kreuzberg Kulture Klub?
I'd assume so.
-Rachel Haywire aka. Generation Hex Satanist
(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-12 03:30 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-12 05:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-12-12 11:47 am (UTC)Viking Moses
Date: 2005-12-12 05:01 am (UTC)