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marco.org

This is a collection of all recommended articles from marco.org. Sign up at QUOTE.fm to keep up with recommendations by following source pages.

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An alternate universe

marco.org
The Surface is partially for Microsoft’s world of denial: the world in which this store contains no elephants and Microsoft invented the silver store with the glass front and the glowing logo and blue shirts and white lanyards and these table layouts and the modern tablet and its magnetic power cable. In that world, this is a groundbreaking new tablet that you can finally use at work and leave your big creaky plastic Dell laptop behind when you go to the conference room to have a conference call on the starfish phone with all of the wires and dysfunctional communication.
Estimated reading time: 9 min

Right versus pragmatic

marco.org
Relying solely on yelling about what’s right isn’t a pragmatic approach for the media industry to take. And it’s not working. It’s unrealistic and naïve to expect everyone to do the “right” thing when the alternative is so much easier, faster, cheaper, and better for so many of them.
Estimated reading time: 3 min

The power of the RSS reader

marco.org
The true power of the RSS inbox is keeping you informed of new posts that you probably won’t see linked elsewhere, or that you really don’t want to miss if you scroll past a few hours of your Twitter timeline.
Estimated reading time: 4 min

Free works

marco.org
The best thing we can do isn’t necessarily to try to pay for everything, which is unrealistic and often not an option. Our best option is to avoid supporting and using proprietary monocultures.
Estimated reading time: 4 min

I’m not a “curator”

marco.org
Codifying “via” links with confusing symbols is solving the wrong problem.
Estimated reading time: 5 min

Interpreting some of Twitter’s API changes

marco.org
I sure as hell wouldn’t build a business on Twitter, and I don’t think I’ll even build any nontrivial features on it anymore. And if I were in the Twitter-client business, I’d start working on another product.
Estimated reading time: 6 min

My next text editor

marco.org
I’ve now chosen my TextMate replacement, but before I reveal it, let me give a huge disclaimer: You will have your own opinion. It’s probably safer to talk about Jesus, gun control, Israel, global warming, parenting techniques, regional pizza styles, Linux distributions, why I don’t like cats, or my favorite PHP features.
Estimated reading time: 4 min

Learning from competition

marco.org
They’re not fanboys. They’re not brainwashed by “marketing”. Your competitors’ customers aren’t passing on your product because they’re stupid or irrational. They’re choosing your competitors for good reasons, and denying the existence of such good reasons will only ensure that your product never overcomes them.
Estimated reading time: 3 min

What happens when a Twitter client hits the token limit

marco.org
The effective rule, therefore, is even simpler: “Don’t build anything for Twitter.”
Estimated reading time: 2 min

A future full-time job

marco.org
Realistically, nobody has job security. It’s a myth. Even CEOs don’t have job security (see HP or eBay), except Steve Ballmer, who seems curiously immune to losing his job.
Estimated reading time: 2 min

Time and taste

marco.org
People who naturally recognize tasteful, well-designed products are a small subset of the population. But people who can create them are a much smaller subset.
Estimated reading time: 3 min

Ben Brooks on Twitter’s “API Changes” →

marco.org
Nobody in the Android ecosystem — not Google, not manufacturers of Android devices, and certainly not the gadget blogs that review and promote them — seems to care about long-term user satisfaction, even when “long-term” is as short as a two-year smartphone contract. Rich people and gadget bloggers can upgrade their smartphones every 6 months, but what about everyone else? Will most of Android’s userbase feel much loyalty to the platform at their next contract renewal?
Estimated reading time: 1 min

Talent acquisitions

marco.org
If you want to keep the software and services around that you enjoy, do what you can to make their businesses successful enough that it’s more attractive to keep running them than to be hired by a big tech company.
Estimated reading time: 1 min

Anti-Apple Anger

marco.org
Apple’s products are opinionated. They say, “We know what’s best for you. Here it is. Oh, that thing you want to do? We won’t let you do that because it would suck. Trust us. If you don’t like it, there’s the door.”
Estimated reading time: 6 min

Jeff Atwood leaves Stack Exchange →

marco.org
Instapaper is one person and no funding. I work completely from home. I don’t even put an unhealthy amount of hours into it, and it’s very low-needs (and therefore, low-stress) to keep the service running. This is a lifestyle that I’m not willing to give up for the promise of taking VC money, hiring a bunch of people, making everything free, and hoping to cash out after a few years of nonstop “crunch mode” by selling it to a big company so they can ruin and “sunset” it a year later.
Estimated reading time: 1 min
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