The (very late) Sunday (Tuesday!) Diigo Links Post (weekly)

• Are Americans Afraid of Innovative Urban Design? – Design – The Atlantic Cities

  Thinking about this article in relation to what Virginia Postrel wrote about design panels (as stifling)…
  QUOTE
  “The U.S is the most conservative country that there is in terms of supporting design,” said Schwartz, who now practices in London and primarily works in Europe and the Middle East.

  Indeed, panelists noted that both the High Line and Millennium Park were heavily influenced by community members and parks advocates, rather than coming from officials or civic leaders.

  And often, it is the cities themselves that hold back the creation of new and exciting projects. Waldheim noted how cities across the country have been emphasizing the importance of their historic character, and how that may be holding them back.

  “They’ve spent so much time betting on their heritage, their cornice line, their streetlines and their facades,” Waldheim said. In terms of marketing, he says, this has been a success for places like Boston, but it hasn’t helped the city draw in contemporary designs that may be more attractive to younger people, especially the large amounts of college students that move into and then out of the Boston area.

  But as Cox notes, there tends to be a fear of change among residents in cities.

  “Communities generally understand what they have,” said Cox, “and they’re uncomfortable about losing it.”
  UNQUOTE

  tags: design atlantic_cities innovation

• The Turning Point: The Moral Example of UC Davis Students | Psychology Today

  This is a must-read article about Linda Katehi’s shameful UC Davis fiasco, and about the Occupy movement generally.
  QUOTE
  If I had to sum up the attitude of America’s governing classes in one word, I would say: contempt.
  (…SNIP…)
  People say that the Occupy movement has not been clear in its demands. I would say that their demands could not be more obvious.
  (…SNIP…)
  They want a fairer tax system. They want a sane energy policy that addresses climate change and searches for cleaner ways to power our civilization. They want a government that is not wholly owned by the rich. They want access to justice and education. They want a reasonable hope of getting and keeping a job that gives them a living wage and the ability to invest for the future.

  They want a rational health care system that they can afford. They want government policy that is driven by thoughtful attention to rational research, not ideology. They want a transparent government that holds the powerful accountable. They want a government that understands the importance of investing now in human capital and infrastructure.
  UNQUOTE

  tags: psychology_today michael_chorost ows socialtheory socialjustice uc_davis police

• Lessons Learned: Why diversity matters (the meritocracy business)

  Great article by Eric Ries on how Silicon Valley works its biases – without necessarily even knowing it does…
  QUOTE
  One last suggestion, which is a technique I learned from my IMVU co-founder Will Harvey. When it’s possible, I always believe in giving a promising candidate who interviewed poorly a chance to demonstrate their skills with a real application exercise. At my last company, for programming jobs, we’d give some candidates a chance to prove themselves by writing a real working program in just a day or two (usually, to write a version of Tetris from scratch). We’d do the evaluations of that code blind – without the person in the room. In some cases, we’d dramatically revise an opinion formed during our live interview. The work product is a more realistic test, although it requires much more work on the part of the candidate.
  UNQUOTE

  tags: eric_ries lean_startup diversity gender_gap race entrepreneurship management

• 5 Reasons The Future Will Be Ruled By B.S. | Cracked.com

  Great article, must read. Basically, capitalism disrupted. A small excerpt:
  QUOTE
  So for the publishers, the next step was clear: Make the book destroy itself.

  An ebook sold to a library will thus delete itself out of existence after a year, or after X number of times it had been lent out. This is a big source of controversy between publishers and public libraries, maybe because both of them know they’ve found the loose thread that can unravel all of society. After all:

  A. Why can’t the library just buy as many digital copies as are needed for the customers, and keep them forever, if they don’t naturally degrade?

  B. Wait a second. It’s just a digital file. Why not just buy one copy, and just copy and paste it for every customer who wants to read it?

  C. Wait a second. Why do you need the library at all? Why can’t a customer just buy a copy from the publisher and “lend” copies to all of his friends?

  D. Wait a second. If no printing and binding needs to be done, why do you need the publisher? Just buy it directly from the author.

  E. Waaaaait a second. Why buy it? Once the author makes one copy available, why can’t everyone just grab it for free?

  Stop and think about everything that just vanished there. Skyscrapers full of publishing company employees, warehouses full of books, book stores, libraries, factories full of printing presses, paper mills, all the stuff the author bought with his writing money. Gone.
  UNQUOTE

  tags: david_wong cracked futurismo bs socialtheory

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.