What they are, why you should use them, and how to use them.

A glossary of tech language, explained.

There is a bit of eye-roll material here (“if you want to be able to talk to anyone, read the newspaper every day,” LOL OK) but it’s full of a lot of good advice for anybody talking to other professionals in any capacity. --I’m looking for work and instead of a real interview I was offered an “informational interview.” Should I go? How do I prepare for it? Do you have any tips? --You should go to any interview that you are invited to, because it’s one of the best ways to learn how to have a professional conversation with someone you don’t know.

Designers must be aware of their role in social UIs and give the same thought to social dynamics that they would to legibility, scalability and others. They must be aware of what social friction they are introducing or reducing, and they need to ask themselves, “How will this UI make my user look to others?” and “How will this UI affect the quality of social interactions?”

Social media and smartphones are just a form of augmentative and alternative communication (AAC). Clicking the “like” button on Facebook is no different than clicking the “like” button on a speech generation device. The different is how many people can hear what you have to say. People who were previously isolated because of mobility or speech issues can find friends with shared experiences and interests. They get to be less alone. People who oppose the use of screens aren’t trying to silence disabled people. The problem is that they aren’t thinking about us at all. When confronted with what smartphones can do for disabled people, anti-screen folks will claim that they are not talking about us. The thing is, when they look at a café and see people using their phones, there is no way to distinguish between the people who use phones as disability aids and people who just happen to find speaking through social media a perfectly adequate or even preferable mode of communication. A false hierarchy is formed, and of course, the ways some disabled people speak is at the bottom of it.

“I usually xyz, unless you recommend something else…” “Can you say that in more/different words?” “I don’t know.” Good advice for any professional or non-intimate situation, not just ‘in the city’ as Frank writes.

Kanye’s decade-long solo career has been a struggle between the non-stop ideas running through his brain and his skills at verbalizing them through a variety of communication obstacles, whether self-created or forced upon him.

Suggested for women, but good for non-confrontational complex-havers like myself, too.

We yearn for frictionless, technological solutions. But people talking to people is still the way that norms and standards change

…we should ask: What exactly is it about Facebook that makes people ask if it’s making us lonely?”

How to present and sell design: 1) Don't wing it — postpone until you're ready. 2) Really sell your design — the idea that 'good design speaks for itself' is a myth. 3) Don't get subjective or allow your feelings to get hurt — tell them to tell you when it doesn't work. 4) Don't embarrass the client — make them look good, be honest, listen to them.

How to figure out what a client's budget really is. "Don't be smarmy. Don't be curt. Be respectful, be honest, and inform your prospect during the sales process. If you do it right, right from the start, you'll build mutual respect and communication into the entire project."

"Let me think about that." In other words: with a glut of information, we're trying to form opinions and take action on it all just as fast as it's coming in, and we're suffering for it.

This is beautiful. "Mutsugoto is an intimate communication device intended for a bedroom environment. Mutsugoto allows distant partners to communicate through the language of touch as expressed on the canvas of the human body. A custom computer vision and projection system allows users to draw on each other's bodies while lying in bed. Drawings are transmitted 'live' between the two beds, enabling a different kind of synchronous communication that leverages the emotional quality of physical gesture." Thanks for the link, Ara.

"The NATO phonetic alphabet, more formally the international radiotelephony spelling alphabet, is the most widely used spelling alphabet. ... The paramount reason is to ensure intelligibility of voice signals over radio links.

For to remember.

A superb guide for anyone proposing ideas to clients who challenge you in potentially frustrating ways.

Some people with too many emails to handle have chosen to give up on the stack entirely.

A blog of a professor of mine from Kansai Gaidai University. This post is particularly useful and enlightening.