Jorge Quinteros
Blogger, web enthusiast & avid photographer based in Brooklyn.

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30th December 2008

Elegance of Real Simple Magazine

My criteria for purchasing a magazine is based primarily on 3 things: how constructive the content is, how it’s presented to the reader and whether the material will be worth saving to reference back on if I enjoyed it the first time. Lately we’ve been picking up every issue of Real Simple magazine, a monthly publication about living simply, avoiding consumerism, cooking frugally and basically enjoying lifes small pleasures that come for free. All the articles are very informative and what I find noteworthy is that there’s always at least one story that you can relate to and apply seamlessly to your life.

But aside from all the useful tips, the one element that I was immediately drawn to about this magazine was the beautiful design and photography displayed in every single page. I’m not trying to sell you a subscription but if you’ve never skimmed through an issue before, I highly recommend you flip the pages on one without even buying it. Even the advertisements and annoying subscription inserts are handled gracefully and are not distracting. Ron Reason, the creative director of the magazine explains:

We spend a lot of time selecting photographs for the page, making sure the content is balanced, the images are arresting, and that there’s a diversity of color and style… so that it stands out in the middle of a bombardment of celebrity, screaming headlines. #

As a person with a background in design, the refine use of typography for both headlines and copy text is something that I find aesthetically pleasing and which others readers may deem inconsequential. For inspiration on any project, I always have at least 4 issues on m desk.

I do have to note that while the magazine’s target audience is women, that doesn’t take away the fact that the information provided can be distributed and read by anyone who appreciates the concept of simplifying their life and essentially “Getting Things Done” and doing them in new ways.

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28th December 2008

Monitor Shopping

Most of my time on the computer consist of array of things. Among the top 3 is blogging, photo editing and RSS reading but when you try to juggle more than one, it can become quite frustrating when the only canvas you have to work with is a 15” screen, which for me comes from a MacBook Pro. For that reason I’ve been in the market to purchase a monitor that would widen my workspace without slimming my pocket.

As an Apple aficionado, I think the Apple Cinema Displays offer features to justify the hefty price and I’ve always favored their products over any other alternative out in the market but this time, I had established making the exception of finding something that was comparable in specifications and style. Without delving too much into the long and arduous weeks of sifting through reviews, blog comments and forums as to what came close to an ACD, I made my decision on a HP w1907.

The 19” screen stands beautifully adjacent to my MBP and offers that ample space that I long desired while still keeping the inherent mobility you gain by having a laptop. This monitor has a very “cool” glossy black finish and its sharpness is out of this world. I also appreciated the slightly underused built-in speakers although I rely more on the JBL Spot system for that thumping sound. The only shock I experience upon final installation and usage of the monitor was getting accustom to that glossiness against the matte finish of the MBP but I’m willing to oversee that.

If your primary computer is a laptop and are in the fence if expanding your workspace is worthwhile, consider the following excerpt from a study conducted by Microsoft:

The researchers conducted user studies that proved the effectiveness of adding a second or even third monitor to your workstation, creating a wide-screen effect. Give someone a second monitor, let them use it for while, and then try to take it away. It just isn’t going to happen. They’ll never go back to a mono display. #

“With a bigger display you look at your work more the way you look at your desk. It took me some time to get used to it, but then something happens. You start you use tools faster and better, you can put things you need to have around open next to what you’re doing. You don’t have to scroll as much, and can use your eyes and your amazing brain to find information fast by scanning over text and visual information.” #

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9th December 2008

$0.99 Cent App Dilemma

I’ve never purchased an iPhone App that cost more than $1.99. There is an abundance of exceptional Apps that I’m sure they’re worth paying the full price but unfortunately you don’t necessarily know how great they might be until you’ve purchased it and if that means paying $9.99 for it and you end up not too fond of it, then you just lost out on $9.99. Craig Hockenberry explains why this attitude and how they as developers are suffering from it:

From what I can tell, it’s because people are buying our products sight unseen. I see customers complaining about how “expensive” a $4.99 app is and that it should cost less. The only justification I can find for these attitudes is that you only have a screenshot to evaluate the quality of a product. A buck is easy to waste on an app that looks great in iTunes but works poorly once you install it.

To avoid all this hesitance, Apple should have the option of downloading a 1-day trial for every App, with the exception of FREE ones of course, so if it appeals to someone, they’ll be more incline to paying full price on it based on their experience and not just on reviews and screenshots.

Developers would benefit in not feeling the need of downgrading a worthy $9.99 App to 99 cents, just for the sake of gaining popularity and breaking even with all their time, effort and money in developing.

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3rd December 2008

Power of Comparison

A co-worker was given the BlackBerry Storm as an early holiday present and I was eager to tinker with it after reading the not so favorable reviews on the device. With an open mind, I experimented with it for a while and after some unpremeditated frustration, gave it back and made the automatic comparison that the experience with it was nothing resembling to the iPhone. For her, it is the best touch-screen device ever but unfortunately I already have a preconceive notion of what a device with this capability should feel like and it’s that comparison factor that I did that I’m mostly interested in exploring.

As consumers, we innately compare one product or service from another so as to choose the one that best suits our needs but sometimes that very distinction that we do, is what tends to make or break newness.

Take for example the recent shutdown of Pownce, which despite being bought off by Six Apart, the reason I think it didn’t lift off is because it was too comparable to Twitter with the exception of a few unique features. You don’t need all these services that have sprung out of pure competition, especially when they all essentially serve the same purpose. Products are different but consider the struggling Zune against your iPod which sales alone speaks for which one is more popular.

The perception of what you consider one thing better than the other is based on which service or product you first had a satisfying user experience with, so the fact that I’m biased towards anything Apple is not going to change the mind of someone who’s utilized PCs their entire life. My first MP3 player was an iPod so I would expect nothing less from other devices who claim to do the same.

There’s new innovation being introduced everyday and those companies that are able to take advantage of it first and create something different, will have the advantage of having customers who will use them as a cornerstone for all the other repetitive stuff that will come along.