Core77’s editors spend time combing through the news so you don’t have to. Here’s a weekly roundup of our favorite stories from the World Wide Web.
Grafters: Industrial Society in Image and Word
More looking than reading here: We Make Money Not Art visits a photography exhibition that finds a human (and artful) aspect of industrial photography through a collection of atypical worker depictions. The variety of relationships between manufacturing and man in the samples hints at a richness that is missing from portrayals of today’s craft resurgence.
—Eric Ludlum, editorial director
Did Keyboard Design Peak in the Late ‘90s?
I found this Afterpad post about how to hook up a retro keyboard to an iPad—and why you would want to do so in the first place—strangely compelling, mainly for its informative digression on the three major types of keyboards (scissor-style, rubber dome and mechanical) and its convincing argument for why mechanical offers the best typing experience. After going down the rabbit hole of related links—naturally, there’s an r/mechanicalkeyboards subreddit—I’m starting to wonder if my standard-issue Apple wireless keyboard is in need of a serious upgrade, er, downgrade.
—Mason Currey, senior editor
Umberto Eco: “We Like Lists Because We Don’t Want to Die”
The list of reasons I love Umberto Eco is long and describes its own contents. This short interview shows off his sense of humor, his love of words, and why he’s a writer, philosopher, and grumpy Italian grandpa that we should all miss.
—Kat Bauman, contributing writer
Juliette Cezzar on Accepting Critique and Overcoming Resistance
I try to carve out some time each week to read a long, meaty, meaningful piece of content — and often find myself turing to The Great Discontent for their in-depth interviews with those who create. This week was an easy choice, as they recently featured the one and only Juliette Cezzar, who I admire greatly for her work and leadership in the design world. She talks about her path to design and learning to take critique, along with other lessons learned along the way. Okay, I’ll stop fangirling now.
—Carly Ayres, columnist, In The Details
Say It with a Noguchi Table
This week Curbed introduced a set of emojis that the architecture and design tribe can call their own—because, let’s face it, sometimes what you really want to say is best expressed by a tiny Frank Gehry flipping the bird.
—Rebecca Veit, columnist, Designing Women
A Mapping App For Urban Wanderers
Efficiency in getting from point A to point B is overrated—there is so much to be gained from a little meandering. Likeways, an app released last month, tries to make that easier by generating a more circuitous route to your destination while taking you to some lesser-known, interesting venues along the way. These spots are sourced through their popularity on social media, but users can opt out of that feature and simply enjoy being off the beaten path.
—Alexandra Alexa, editorial assistant
Why We Should All Be More Pretentious
Signs of pretentiousness for many of us will often induce eye rolls, but as author Dan Fox discusses in a recent interview, pretentiousness might be something creative people (like designers) actually benefit from if they simply embrace the trait from time to time: “Pretentiousness is a driving force in art, because it entails risk—the risk of over-stretching your ability, of perhaps falling flat on your face. But if you played it safe all the time, you’d never get anywhere interesting.
—Allison Fonder, community manager
http://www.core77.com/posts/47682/Why-We-Should-be-More-Pretentious-Emojis-for-Designers-and-an-Intimate-Look-at-the-Industrial-Revolution