In 2000, Dave Gorman set out on a mission to prove that “loads” of people had the same name as him, by finding and meeting 54 other Dave Gormans (one for every card in the deck— including jokers.)

Just this morning, I quickly found a way to get in touch with 50 Dave Gormans, and also discovered that there are 352 people who share my own name and have registered on Facebook. His mission would clearly have been a lot faster with Facebook— although I doubt it would have made a great story. (Similarly, there’s no way that his Googlewhack adventure would be a success if he embarked on the same mission today.)

Having (somewhat arrogantly) dismissed MySpace as being barely (if at all) different from the “old school” of free websites like Angelfire and Geocities, and “social networking” being the domain of schoolchildren who have plenty of time on their hands and just want to compare how many friends they have, in the space of the last couple of weeks it seems like everyone I talk to is suddenly using Facebook. From registering a couple of weeks ago to see someone’s photos, then someone mentioning it in conversation the next day, to having new friends added on an almost daily basis. I know it’s not going to be long until I start getting worried that I haven’t checked my wall recently enough or something. (more…)

May 30th, 2007 | WWW | 3 comments

Typography is the art and techniques in using type; from the design of the individual characters of a typeface to using the correct punctuation in a word processor.

In much the same way that information technology using computers has mimicked and adopted terminology from the paper based office, the art of typography has moved on from Gutenberg’s movable type printing press. (For example, we still use the term “leading” to refer to the space between lines of text, even though the strips of lead used in printing no longer have anything to do with the process.)

Before the word processor, typography was the domain of professional editors and typesetters. With the introduction of the word processor, users had much more control over the layout of the text; the distinction between a typewriter and a printing press became blurred. Todays word processors are closer to desktop publishing applications than electronic typewriters, with a wide range of font faces and sizes, page layouts, and even the ability to include images. Features that are available to pretty much anyone with access to a computer, but very few people are being taught how to use them. (more…)

May 23rd, 2007 | Web Content | No comments