Helping Creative People Create

Faking It: Why Wearing Designer Knockoffs May Have Hidden Psychological Costs: Scientific American

So what’s going on here? Ironically, as the scientists reported in the May issue of Psychological Science, wearing counterfeit glasses not only fails to bolster our ego and self-image the way we hope, it actually undermines our internal sense of authenticity. “Faking it” makes us feel like phonies and cheaters on the inside, and this alienated, counterfeit “self” leads to cheating and cynicism in the real world.

via Faking It: Why Wearing Designer Knockoffs May Have Hidden Psychological Costs: Scientific American

Draftboard – Collaboration tool made for designers by designers

Draftboard – Collaboration tool made for designers by designers.

Pretty nifty tool for collaborative design.

Bootstrapped, Profitable, & Proud: GitHub – (37signals)

At first GitHub was a weekend project. Tom Preston-Werner and I were hanging out at a sports bar after a local programming meetup when he told me his idea for a git hosting site. It’d be a place to easily share code and learn about git, a git hub. It started more out of necessity than anything else: we both loved git but there was no acceptable way to share code with others. Tom thought I’d be interested in helping fix the problem, and I was.

We began meeting on Saturdays to build the site piece by piece. We’d grab brunch, talk about ideas we had for the site, then get to work. Tom would design pages or features and I’d implement them. As soon as the basics were in place we started using GitHub at my day job, a startup I had cofounded with PJ Hyett. It was a great way to improve the site, as PJ and I were using GitHub daily and really getting a feel for what was missing and what was working.

I love stories of people who are passionate about their products because they actually needed to use them in the first place.
The best products are the ones that are built out of love (and make money).

Bootstrapped, Profitable, & Proud: GitHub – (37signals).

Notational Velocity

After reading Shawn Blanc’s interview of Leo Babauta and his sweet Mac setup>Notational Velocity. Very lightweight and isn’t like most text editors or note taking tools.

Basement.org: The New Clutter

The article itself has devolved into a flashing, animated pile of fluff. The casualty of the rat race towards ad impressions isn’t just crappy layout and thoughtless art direction. It’s awful and useless content. The formula is pretty straightforward: catchy headline, hot topic of the day, add a dash of controversy, stir into a gooey mixture and bake for ten minutes. Even better: take a jab at someone who’s on top: Apple, Facebook, etc. People love to shoot Goliath (or at least shoot in his general direction)

Basement.org: The New Clutter.

Your Brain on Computers – Studying the Brain Off the Grid, Professors Find Clarity – NYTimes.com

Hours later, the group arrives at the raft launching site, Mexican Hat, named for a sombrero-shaped rock outcropping. The travelers assemble and pack the rafts, loading food for five days, beer, water jugs, a portable toilet, tents and sleeping bags, kitchen and first aid supplies. Then they’re off.

A short distance downstream they see it: a narrow steel bridge 150 feet above the river — after which there is no longer any cellphone coverage.

“It’s the end of civilization,” Mr. Atchley jokes.

Late in the afternoon, they make camp on the banks. They eat pork chops, the Big Dipper brilliant above, the thousand-foot canyon walls narrowing their view of the heavens. A few bats dart and dive, seeking bugs drawn to the flashlights.

The men drink Tecate beer and talk about the brain. They are thinking about a seminal study from the University of Michigan that showed people can better learn after walking in the woods than after walking a busy street.

The study indicates that learning centers in the brain become taxed when asked to process information, even during the relatively passive experience of taking in an urban setting. By extension, some scientists believe heavy multitasking fatigues the brain, draining it of the ability to focus.

Your Brain on Computers – Studying the Brain Off the Grid, Professors Find Clarity – NYTimes.com.

Consumers Find Ways to Spend Less and Find Happiness – NYTimes.com

“This actually is a topic that hasn’t been researched very much until recently,” says Elizabeth W. Dunn, an associate professor in the psychology department at the University of British Columbia, who is at the forefront of research on consumption and happiness. “There’s massive literature on income and happiness. It’s amazing how little there is on how to spend your money.”

Consumers Find Ways to Spend Less and Find Happiness – NYTimes.com.

Hat tip @travisapeterson

Innovation is Not Creativity – Vijay Govindarajan – Harvard Business Review

We surveyed thousands of executives in Fortune 500 companies to rate their companies’ innovation skills on a scale of one to 10, one being poor and 10 world class. Survey participants overwhelmingly believe that their companies are better at generating ideas (average score of six) than they are at commercializing them (average score of one).

via Innovation is Not Creativity – Vijay Govindarajan – Harvard Business Review.

The Creativity Crisis – Newsweek

For the first time, research shows that American creativity is declining.

The Creativity Crisis – Newsweek.

Scott Belsky: How To Avoid The Idea Generation Trap :: Videos :: The 99 Percent

Scott Belsky: How To Avoid The Idea Generation Trap :: Videos :: The 99 Percent.

I loved the part about finding beauty in organization. It’s not intuitive, but viewed in a different light, organization is a pretty fun/powerful/useful thing.

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