Aberro Specus

This weekend is likely to be a busy one, and let me tell you why.

Members of the blogenning (which we now affectionately and spitefully refer to the blogging agreement as) Brandon and Jaco are traveling down from Boston and Philly (respectively) to visit and spend the weekend in Dover visiting me. In about 24 hours Brandon will arrive here (Jaco is arriving earlier in the day, mid-afternoon), and we shall have an entertaining weekend.

The highlight of the weekend is Sunday, when we will be going to Kings Dominion for the day. I haven’t been there in a few years and it is my favorite amusement park, plus I’ll be going with Crista, my best friend Brandon, Jaco, and my parents. It should be awesome.

Besides that there will be much hanging out, guitar playing, some drinking, and general goofing around. I haven’t seen Brandon in about a year, so it will be nice to see him, and haven’t seen Jaco since the same time even though he lives closer, so it’s all-around exciting.

Look for tales of (mis)adventures and insanity after the weekend, and don’t expect much posting from any of us till Monday (more than likely, you never know with us).

~Ian

Anyone who bothers reading this will know I’m obsessed with zombies, and if you didn’t you apparently  don’t pay much attention, but now you know. My focus in writing is currently zombie survival short stories, and I write abundantly on the matter. One of the outlets for this writing is a fiction blog I keep with Brandon N. Schory, where we portray a group of survivors who have managed to establish an internet uplink, and set up a blog in order to find other survivors, as well as help others survive with advice, tips, and tricks.

Originally we established this blog on Blogspot, but we recently moved it to Wordpress, both because Wordpress is, well, better, and because we are both more familiar with Wordpress.

The new address is http://bostonzedheads.wordpress.com, and you can also visit it from the links on the sidebar. So if you enjoy zombie stories, and/or want to read some of Brandon and I’s writing, go read Boston Zed Heads.

~Ian

Snatched from Warren Ellis, who snatched it from here. Check either of those for the site.
This is a design brief from the Touch project.

“In this project we want to design and test a range of icons that explain important aspects of RFID-based interactions. How do we visualise the presence of RFID? Are there useful ways of representing the kinds of interactions and functions involved? Is the job of the icon to indicate the active field, the verb, or the technology? At a different level, do we also need approachable graphics to alleviate anxiety, confusion or frustration? Do users know what the limits of the system are and do they care?”

An interesting project, seems relevant, especially considering all the changes with the T implementing the RFID Charlie Cards recently.

“If we take the example of an NFC purchase interaction (a till or cash register), will users know whether the transaction involves giving or receiving? Will they intuitively know the risk involved? Where does the content (the amount of money) get represented?”

So take a simple RFID transaction, like using a bankcard at 7Eleven (which I do practically everyday) and figure out how to represent this transaction with icons that are easily understood in order for people to better understand how RFID works. It’s a noble cause… now if only it would help get RID of RFID…

Check out the full story here.~Ian