From the category archives:

photos

Spotted: Floss!

March 21, 2010
Floss hack

I’m hard at work on an evening design project (which you can see sneak peeks of here and here). In the meantime I thought I would share this wonderful hack I spotted in my dentist’s office this week:

Isn’t this use of dental floss somehow poetic and beautiful?

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Spotted: Safety on a Plane

February 28, 2010
Safety messaging on an airplane

On one of my recent flights, this was the view of the tray table on the seat-back in front of me, pretty much at eye level:

Staring at it through my normal take-off angst, I found myself trying to imagine who had decided this was the right text to inscribe on every tray table. It’s hard [...]

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Spotted: Use in Case of Fire Only

January 19, 2010
Elevator button reading To Be Used in Case of Fire Only

I’m not sure why elevators seem to be magnets for confusing interfaces (although I probably could take some guesses). To add another example to the list, my friend Scott recently sent me this picture:

How great is that button? Apparently it was on a wall all by itself, with nothing at all to indicate what happens [...]

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Scratching an Alignment Itch

January 8, 2010
Toyota Avalon dash display with alignment issues

This is the LCD info display in the dashboard of my mom’s 2002 Toyota Avalon. (Please excuse the blurry iPhone photo.)

During my last visit, I think I spent too much time in the car, because that display really started to bug me. I just cannot for the life of me imagine a designer could look [...]

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Spotted: Elevator

December 30, 2009
Elevator sign

Perhaps it only goes down, Alice in Wonderland style.

This is the view through the doorway after the Oakland airport security screening. I encountered it while traveling this week and it gave me a chuckle. Only after I walked past the sign, halfway to the far escalator and then turned left, could I finally see an [...]

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Designers Gone Wild: Microwave with iPod Envy

August 23, 2009
Thumbnail image for Designers Gone Wild: Microwave with iPod Envy

Quick–can you figure out how to use this microwave to nuke your leftovers for 30 seconds?

Maybe you guessed that you could press the circle-thingy to pop it out, twist it to 30 seconds, then press Start. Good guess but, sorry, no. The knob does pop out when you press it, but nothing happens when you [...]

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Spotted: 3, 4, 5, oops!

August 1, 2009
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Let’s see… Phones, calculators, computers, and almost every other number input device have THREE numbers to a row. This machine has FIVE snacks to a row, and they are numbered by the row, column grid. So what are the designers of this vending machine to do but put their number buttons FOUR to a row, [...]

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Spotted: Loyalty Cards

August 1, 2009
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How many of those cards in your wallet are loyalty cards? You know, the ones that give you special coupons at a specific store, or when they’re punched ten times get you a freebie. Probably quite a few, right? Most of us have one or two credit cards, a bank card, an ID, and the [...]

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Spotted: You (and You) are Here

July 30, 2009
Thumbnail image for Spotted: You (and You) are Here

Perhaps this Noah’s Bagels is built on a singularity in space-time wherein two different groups of people can occupy one space without discomfort or confusion.

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This Is NOT Your Dumpster

March 8, 2009
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I see this place almost every day and am both amused by the poor setup and impressed by the lengths the owners of the dumpster have gone to in order to clarify who should have access to it.

The dumpster is accessed by this driveway, which is the driveway that belongs to the building on the [...]

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