I thought this was a joke a first, but this guy is for reals! Despite his awkwardness, I have to admit he has a sweet computer. Four Nvidia graphics cards!
I saw the media blitz about Borders launching their new site the other day. Interested I went to check out the new interface. Being a search nerd and a former employee of Audible.com (digital audiobooks), I was curious to see how they would handle navigation, search, etc.
My first impression was that the interface design was definitely distinct and “on brand”. The main focus of the home page is something called “magic bookshelf” which is basically an attempt to mimic an iTunes experience. I’m not sure the metaphor makes for a great experience. Have you ever stood in front of a real bookshelf, slack-jawed and overpower by the number of different book covers, trying to find your place in the alphabetical order? Sometimes this is fun, but if you are looking for something specific, the experience ends up leaving me drained. Also the bookshelf is done in Flash and takes a long time to load, making the rest of the homepage links inactive for a few seconds.
Next I went to their search which is placed front and center of the masthead. This is where things started to fall apart. I typed in “slaughter house” to see if it would return Kurt Vonnegut’s famous “Slaughterhouse-Five”. It didn’t. It did return “The Slaughter-House of Mammon: An Anthology of Victorian Social Protest Literature” by Sharon A. Winn as the first item. Vonnegut’s famous book was not within the results. So I decided to give them a break and type in “slaughter house 5″, but when I clicked into the search box my original query disappeared forcing me to enter the query again. I did find the book on my second attempt (actually I found about 16 versions). Unfortunately, the first version I clicked on had no detailed information just the ISBN number.
This whole experience leads to the same conclusion. Search can be a kingmaker or destroyer. If you type slaughter house in Amazon, Vonnegut is in first position. And more importantly, if you type amazon slaughterhouse in Google, the first position is a direct link to the product page. Type borders.com slaughterhouse and you will see them in the third position which is a link to a search results page within a borders inventory site and not a product page within their e-commerce site.
Amazon knows their entire business depends on search not a magical bookshelf. That’s why Amazon is king. Out of the gate it looks like Borders castle walls have been breached.
I recently had to upgrade to Office 2007 and it got me thinking about how far consumer software and hardware has come in comparison to enterprise (company sanctioned) . I remember a time when I anticipated coming into the office because 1) I had a faster connection 2) a faster computer and 3) better software. But in the past 3 years or so that has completely flipped. Now, I dread logging into my computer. My connection is slow. My computer is slower (probably because of the slow network). The software is just rehashed from Office 2000 or 3 versions back from the current. I can go out a sign up for a free google account and instantly have better or at least the equivalent of what has been loaded my computer.
Don’t believe me, then just answer these questions.
Which would you rather use?
This dude is seriously metal!!!
SERIOUS guitarist looking for like-minded bandmates to make it big. (Poughkeepsie)
Reply to: comm-677453250@craigslist.org
Date: 2008-05-12, 11:13AM EDT
Look here, Hudson Valley. I’m tired of answering ads on these pages only to find poseurs, geeks and acoustic folk acts who want me to change my unique playing style to match their style. It’s time for a band that is as unique and forceful as I am, and I’m taking no prisoners.
This monumental effort will require the cooperation of a thunderous bass player with the mind and skills to keep this beast of a freight train on its tracks while a talented drummer will unleash an unrelenting hailstorm of destruction down upon his kingdom of percussion. The band will need to be as focused and driven as I am, willing to meet two, perhaps three times a week. When I host a practice session, I treat it like an Ultimate Fighter match, where nobody leaves until someone taps out. If you think you’ve got the endurance and fire to keep up, then bring your best, but be warned… I don’t let up, and I don’t want to share a stage with anyone who will.
As you can see from my picture, I wear chain mail to protect my body from the rigors of extreme playing. When you step up on stage with a true performer like myself, it’s like stepping into battle, only instead of swords and arrows, we fight with 32nd notes and pinch harmonics. So in a way, the chain mail is largely symbolic, but my legions of fans have come to appreciate and expect it. You may don similar armor, but only if it fits the theme (no hockey masks or umpire’s vests).
You are expected to have suitable gear. If you can see the top of your amplifier, don’t bother answering this ad. It is expected that you will have a commitment to tone that approaches mine. (would be impossible to exceed, to be quite honest) I have a pedalboard that is ten feet long and would not dare sacrifice a single effect for the sake of portability. My pedals are alphabetized so that I can easily find them in the middle of “battle”. Behringer up front, Zoom at the end. When you’ve been in the business as long as I have, you tend to come up with little time-saving tricks like that.
So that is my decree. I know that many of you will mock my demands and continue posting your offers and requests for lesser musicians. You may continue to carry on at your own leisurely pace, hoping for a shot at a coffee house or open mic night. I will not rest until we have our own stadium on the moon, with amplifiers pointed towards the sky’s infinite expanses, so that we may truly rock the galaxy. I wish for you to join me on this epic quest.
Yours in rock
-^v-Riley-v^-
I recently saw a web product manager position at a company close to me that looked interesting. So I decided “What the hell? I’ll throw my resume into the hat” and proceeded to their careers page. I found the job fairly easily (i had the req #) then clicked to apply. This is where things started to go wrong.
First, the form it leaded me to was not Firefox compatible (bad rendering) so I had to switch to IE. Second, they had a weird system for importing your resume and converting into the application form. This resulted in only partial or wrong information being populated into the form fields. I corrected the information and hit the submit button. As a should have guessed, a bunch of validation errors came back (you didn’t do this, you didn’t click that…etc.). Right then a completely obvious question and immediate answer came to me. Do I really want to work for this company? Hell no! If I’m applying for a supposed web-related position and you can’t even give a working web form then I’m not your man.
If you want to recruit talent, you have to impress (just a little bit) and show some respect to your potential candidates. Otherwise you are only going to get those desperate enough to fill out you buggy form.