It’s not too much of a statement to call Steve Jobs the father of the modern creative class.
The first thing I ever wanted to be was an illustrator and the first place I ever really practiced that craft was on my Apple IIc. This was in the early ’80s, and despite the fact that my mother owned a small ad agency at the time, it wasn’t clear to me that Illustrator was a conceivable profession. I attempted to find a more practical application of my creative desires - Architect. But from this, too, I was dissuaded - “many architects simply spend their careers creating plumbing diagrams for office buildings” I recall being told. So I aimed for Doctor - surely this was unassailable! And off I went to Trinity College. With my Macintosh.
There, in my freshman year, I got my first email address and downloaded the Mosaic browser and learned what a hyperlink was and went for the first time to the many strange and beautiful destinations it could take me. There on the Internet and on my Mac I opened my consciousness to an entire world of media being made and people making it.
I began recalling more frequently the many preteen hours I’d spent with MacPaint and Print Shop. Sunday dawns filled with the incessant screeeeeeeech and whir, screeeeeech and whir of a dot matrix printer howling out a 14 foot banner: Happy Mother’s Day! Maybe there was an Illustrator still in me?
But by this time I was a writer. The die had been cast. I edited the Opinion section of The Trinity Tripod with Jamie Evans. In addition to writing and editing, we also had to lay out the section each Tuesday night before the printer pick-up on Wednesday morning at 6 AM. This was where I learned desktop publishing, in Quark and Photoshop, on top-of-the-line Macs.
Using those wonderful computers made this task fun. I could move pictures - and type! Oh those are called Drop Quotes! And slowly, as I completed all of the Pre-Med class requirements and contemplated taking the MCAT, I realized I didn’t need to take the MCAT, or become a doctor. I realized that being a creative professional was not just a possibility, but that it was happening - people just a few years ahead of me were graduating and doing just that! And I could too!
And if this feeling was strong enough to penetrate the thoroughly pre-Med, pre-Law and pre-Corporate ramparts of Trinity College I knew it was real. And all of these realizations happened face to face with and largely because of the power of Apple computers. And my entire career has followed. And I am not alone.
Some version of this story can surely be told by every one of my colleagues. We are not masters of the universe, we are pious citizens of the creative class. We are aesthetes and nitpickers, masochists and technophiles, organizers and disorganizers, pixel-pushers and stubborn brats, nerds and artists, oversharers and brilliant hermits, scientists and authors, gamblers and brigands, drawers and dreamers.
We are different.
We are different because of Steve Jobs.
“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.” — Ira Glass (via nefffy)
(via nprfreshair)
The In-N-Out Matrix (Every Item From the In-N-Out Secret Menu On a Single Page). #food
I miss you, California.
Pictures of the day: 28 January 2011 - Liu Bolin stands in front of soft drinks shelves as part of his latest collection of urban camouflage art in Beijing, China. (The Telegraph)
Brilliant. Hard to believe a man is there. Very Philip K.
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WANT.
(via ryanetics)
(via shapeandcolour)
NO COUNTRY FOR SMALL MEN™. A brilliant 48 shot Flickr set of dioramas based on the film of similar name. If you love dioramas and other tiny, intricate works of art as much as I do you will also love this.
A Hosting Center Fit For A Bond Villain, Namely Julian Assange and his WikiLeaks
A look at the incredible hosting center in Sweden that is home to the most infamous website on the internet.
I love the Kindle - not just my new(ish) sleek grey reformfactored and very modestly priced piece of Amazon hardware, but also its pure software brethren that make all of my digital books equally and seamlessly available on iPhone, iPad, and desktop. It’s pretty much changed my life, as many of you who’ve spoken to me for more than 15 minutes recently have doubtless heard me profess. I’ll summarize here.
A Kindle is not just a piece of hardware. Kindle Reader apps for all of the major mobile and desktop platforms are free and you needn’t own an actual Kindle to buy and read digital books. What’s better? Kindle books automatically download to all of your devices AND SYNC to your farthest read page. That means I can read at home on my Kindle at night, get on the subway in the morning and via my iPhone pick up reading the same book at the same spot at which I left off and whilst at the office continue reading on my iPad there, seamlessly. A dictionary is built right in so I need only highlight or touch an unknown word to reveal its definition and all of my underlines/highlights are not only synced but easily viewable in summary. That’s awesome. And book weight or size are no longer a problem or even a thought.
Oh and digital books are way cheap! No paper, printing or shipping. I haven’t yet decided what fate awaits my proud collection of actual books. I’m generally quite a paper-hater, except as art medium and ….decorative antique? Oh and another ancillary benefit? Nobody knows what you’re reading. Take that Stieg Larssen or Dan Brown thing wherever you go - it’s your little secret!
And classics are all free. King Arthur, Sherlock Holmes, Robin Hood, Huck Finn - free! And instant. So, anyway, that’s my spiel. Most of my office has bought a Kindle in the past month, including our dear Kristen Crusius who sleep-bought one last week (and in doing do contributed to Amazon’s single biggest Kindle-selling day!).
If you’ve been wondering about making the switch, I don’t think you’ll wonder much longer. Do it. The money you’ll save in free classics and your first five books will more than cover the $140 or $180(w/ wireless). Read on!
Yesterday, it was reported that eighty-four-year-old actor Dick Van Dyke had fallen asleep on his surfboard in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, drifted so far out that he lost sight of land, woke up to discover his predicament, assumed he was going to die on the open water, but then was guided safely back to shore by a pod of porpoises. Talking to reporters later, the actor is quoted as saying, “I’m not kidding.” This is one of those news stories so rich in kookiness that it is nearly impossible to put your finger on what part of it is the kookiest. Is it the fact that Dick Van Dyke surfs? The fact that any eighty-four-year-old surfs? Is it the simple and slightly surprising—and heartening—fact that Dick Van Dyke is still alive? Or just the notion that any sentient creature could fall asleep on a surfboard in open water?
The only part of the story that doesn’t amaze is the fact that a pod of porpoises would see a floating, drowsy light-comic actor—who might have peaked with his portrayal of Rob Petrie but did excellent work in “Bye Bye Birdie” and “Mary Poppins” and even better work as the voice of Mr. Bloomsberry in “Curious George”—and guide him back to dry land. Then again, animals are so predictable that way.
(via thetwothansands)