From the lost drawer: 1957 Italian typing manual

May 14, 2014
by Riccardo Mori
Et Cetera

The amount of interesting stuff I’ve inherited from my late grandparents is astounding, and I do wish I had much more free time (and a better, faster, professional scanner) to digitise it. I found this typing manual from 1957 half-hidden beneath old maps and model train catalogues; I almost missed it because its cover is missing.

The manual’s original title is Corso graduato di Dattilografia Razionale [which should translate to Rational Typing Graded Guide] by Luigia Ballerini Ratti and published by G.B. Petrini in Turin, 1957. About 90% of the book’s contents is made up of typing exercises, of course, but there’s an introductory section featuring a few interesting pictures of the most popular typing instruments of the time — most worth scanning. Apologies if some of the pictures aren’t perfectly aligned: the book is rather fragile due to the missing cover and spine, so I had to be delicate to avoid breaking it completely.

Fig05

The caption says: Typewriter for rendering Japanese characters.

 

Fig06

The caption says: Typewriter used for transcribing with ordinary characters and for typing shorthand.

 

Fig09

Olivetti Lexikon electric typewriter

 

Fig10

 

 

Fig12

Remington portable typewriter

 

Fig13

The new Underwood Standard De Luxe

 

Fig14

Underwood Sundstrand Adding Machine

 

Fig15

The famous Olivetti Divisumma electric calculator

 

Fig16

Olivetti teleprinter/teletypewriter

 

Fig17

Remington Rand Adding Machine — model 93

 

Fig18

Remington Rand Foremost Bookkeeping Machine

 

Fig25

 

This is a diagram that explains how to place your hands on the keyboard to correctly type using all ten fingers.

Translation:
Tastiera universale = Universal keyboard
Mano sinistra = Left hand
Mano destra = Right hand
Mignolo = Little finger
Anulare = Annular (ring finger)
Medio = Middle finger
Indice = Index finger
Maiuscole = Caps key
Barra spaziatrice = Spacebar
Pollice = Thumb

 

A Dropbox folder containing the high-resolution scans of these images is available at this link. Enjoy.

Other posts in the “From the lost drawer” series

 

NYC 99

May 14, 2014
by Riccardo Mori
Briefly

Nyc99 miller 1843 sm

I mentioned this work in progress by Jim Hughes on Twitter and App.net when it went online back in February, but I feel it deserves another, more permanent mention here on my website as well.

Jim Hughes is the author of the excellent Codex 99, and if you love design, typography, cartography, illustration, photography and environs, you should really add it to your RSS feeds. In February he launched a new web project, NYC 99, which he described as being basically a Codex 99 post expanded into an entire site.

What is NYC 99? In short, an historical atlas of New York City. From the About page:

The idea of NYC 99 is to present significant and/or interesting maps of the city with enough historical background to provide at least some context. The history of NYC is, ultimately, the history of pretty much everything and there is certainly no shortage of material, both in print and online. [To] make up for my severe and probably over-simplified condensing I’ve included references to original sources.

For each of the maps I’ve tried to include, wherever possible, at least one example large enough to actually read. As more and more cultural institutions (read: libraries) put their collections online this part is becoming increasingly easier.

Again, this is a work in progress, so don’t visit expecting this huge collection of maps. I imagine this is a demanding work of curation and so far Hughes has put together a great narrative, and the materials are of excellent quality. Maybe if you have first-hand access to resources he needs for the project, you could help him with his endeavour.

The post-traffic-spike chill

May 8, 2014
by Riccardo Mori
Briefly

Traffic spike

Much ado about the iPad, my recent article on the latest iPad debate, attracted the attention of the good Federico Viticci of MacStories, and after he linked to it, my site got a huge spike in traffic. I’m not obsessing anymore about visitor statistics, but as you can see from the image above, on May 5 I received at least ten times the daily average of visitors. (I also gained a few followers on Twitter, and a bunch of email messages — I promise I’ll reply to them all, so be patient).

When these things happen, more than the numbers themselves, what interests me is the visitors’ behaviour, which can be rudimentarily assessed using the WordPress admin console. It’s intriguing to see, for instance, where new visitors look, which other pages of the site they visit, which links they click, and so on.

From the data I’ve gathered these days, the results are rather depressing and reveal a general disinterest for everything that’s not the article people came to visit. As you can see, from any article page you can pretty much access a healthy amount of content on my site. Yet, only 15% of visitors who read (or accessed) my aforementioned article went to visit my home page. 5% clicked on the About Me page, 1% clicked on the iTunes link for my ebook of short stories (which is quite visible on the sidebar) and — probably even more surprising — less than a dozen people clicked on the Projects page.

In other words, people don’t seem to stay or at least willing to explore more when they arrive on a blog they probably never saw before. I’m surprised, and not because I’m so vain to think I’m that charismatic as to retain 90% of new visitors, but by the general lack of curiosity. I can understand that not all the people who followed MacStories’ link to my site had to like it or agree with me. What I don’t understand is the behaviour of who liked what they saw. Why not return, why not decide to keep an eye on my site?

When I encounter some new-to-me blog (usually by chance or because I followed the link from a trusted site I already read on a regular basis), I tend to keep tabs on it for a while if I liked whatever article I was pointed to. I typically reserve the practice of reading an article and leaving the site immediately for big news portals who shower me with ads and extra content I don’t really care about. But blogs written by a single person? I usually want to know more about the author, especially if I like what he or she has to offer. I explore their site, I tend to return, etc. Evidently it’s not what most do.

I’m very interested in your opinion on this. You know where to find me.

App.net is not over

May 7, 2014
by Riccardo Mori
Tech Life

A rough patch

App.net is experiencing a difficult moment. Yesterday, in an update on the official App.net blog, founders Dalton Caldwell and Bryan Berg wrote:

The good news is that the renewal rate was high enough for App.net to be profitable and self-sustaining on a forward basis. Operational and hosting costs are sufficiently covered by revenue for us to feel confident in the continued viability of the service. No one should notice any change in the way the App.net API/service operates. To repeat, App.net will continue to operate normally on an indefinite basis.

The bad news is that the renewal rate was not high enough for us to have sufficient budget for full-time employees. After carefully considering a few different options, we are making the difficult decision to no longer employ any salaried employees, including founders. Dalton and Bryan will continue to be responsible for the operation of App.net, but no longer as employees.

[…]

App.net will continue to employ contractors for help with support and operations. In addition to operational and support help, we will also be utilizing contract help for specific new development projects.

[…]

We will be open sourcing a larger and larger percentage of the App.net codebase. We would love to get community contributions and improvements. Today we are launching a new open source page at opensource.app.net. The first new piece of software we are open sourcing is our microblogging web application, Alpha. The source code to Alpha is available here.

The emphasis is theirs, but apparently it was not enough, judging by the wave of defeatism I saw developing on my timeline. As I posted yesterday, I frankly don’t get the ‘thanks for all the fish’ attitude on many App.net users’ part. It’s a difficult moment, sure, but the service is not closing down. Now’s the time to stick together, not to run around like panicked mice fleeing the (allegedly) sinking ship.

Then the pundits chime in

…And their attitude doesn’t help, either. Mind you, I’m not saying they’re wrong (they’re not). I’m just saying that their contributions — promptly popping up little after Dalton Caldwell’s announcement — are limited to being negative remarks, an occasion to reiterate their criticism towards App.net, but offer very little in the constructive department. Telling their readers See, I told you App.net was doomed only emphasises the perception of how doomed App.net is, instead of spreading a message like Look, App.net is facing a critical moment. Mistakes were made but it’s a platform that deserves support, which is certainly a more helpful attitude. Because, let’s be honest, if you’re not on App.net but you trust the opinion of Gruber, Arment, and the like, would you want to join after reading their commentary?

Everyone, of course, is entitled to express their opinion and criticism, yet I can’t help but feeling that this kind of attitude is wrong and a bit unfair. Do you want to read something that actually offers more constructive criticism and a few strong ideas and possible solutions to better shape App.net’s future? Read Time to get SNAASty by Oluseyi Sonaiya. His closing paragraph perfectly describes my same feelings on the matter:

There’s an air of despair around ADN right now that disappoints me. People are acting like failure of a company’s first business model is a death sentence, like the collapse of a podcast aggregation/syndication startup called Odeo didn’t give birth to a little service called Twitter.

Mount up. We have work to do.

Holding App.net wrong

It sounds borderline hypocritical to me that these prominent pundits, after remarking how doomed App.net is, go on saying good words about Caldwell & Co. and their work, yet the majority of them never really got involved with App.net and didn’t renew their yearly subscription. Brief aside: $36 per year is not a fortune. They keep insisting how paying for apps and services is the right thing to do. What’s the harm in giving $36 as a donation to support the cause, even if they’re not active App.net users? Or why not switch to a monthly subscription, try to get involved again, see what happens?

Some say that App.net’s concept has been too vague, and that it’s never been clear what App.net is supposed to be. I beg to differ. This is what the Join App.Net page said back in September 2012:

App.net is a different kind of social platform.

For members: App.net is an ad-free social network.

It’s your real-time feed, a home for meaningful conversation, where you control your data. Find the apps you love and make App.net your own. Connect, play, and discover.

For developers: App.net is the open API you can trust.

App.net is your new platform, a backbone you can rely on. We’re the pipes you can build your web, mobile, and desktop apps on. Our API is here for you, and we won’t shut you out. Find your audience.

It seems pretty clear to me. Yes, maybe over time App.net has lost some of the initial focus; maybe it lacked a strong campaign to invite people to join the platform, either as users or developers, but I also think that many people (prominent pundits included) made the terrible mistake of viewing App.net and Twitter as an either/or proposition. Joining App.net didn’t — and doesn’t — necessarily mean leaving Twitter behind. They could have taken the opportunity offered by App.net to expand their network and extend their reach, instead of trying to replicate their Twitter experience. (For what it’s worth, it’s what I did. I’m both on Twitter and App.net and try to actively participate in both networks. I appreciate differences and what ultimately matters is people and where the conversations are.)

And what’s also ironic is that, strictly speaking, App.net offers a superior social experience than Twitter. There are no ads or promoted posts, a single post can be as long as 256 characters instead of 140 — which makes a big difference if you really want to communicate and have conversations instead of just broadcasting your witty quips. Private messages can be as long as 2048 characters, and you can include links without problems. Also, there is virtually no spam, thanks indubitably to the fact that App.net is mainly a paid service and that free accounts are limited in a way that doesn’t encourage the creation of spammy bot accounts. (When I pointed this out to a Twitter aficionado, he said that Twitter got really better at handling spam as well. Sure — it only took Twitter six years or so. I’ve lost count of how many spam accounts I had to manually block/report since 2008.)

And these are just a few superficial benefits you get as a user of the social network. I’m not a developer, but over time I’ve seen all the neat apps & services developers have created for the App.net platform and I’ve always heard positive things about the developer-friendliness of App.net.

Final remarks

There are a lot of quotable posts I could extract from yesterday’s debate on App.net as it unfolded in my timeline. I especially like these two very much:

  • I’ll say this for App.net: They’ve had the decency not to seek acquisition and selling all my info to vultures. — Joe Cieplinski
  • No matter what is said, @dalton and @berg never fucked over their users or developers. I can’t think of many other companies that fit in that category. — Ben Brooks

 

Again, while I agree that it’s up to App.net to find a way to improve things for the future, getting all defeatist and fatalistic does not help at all. Those who still believe in this platform should stay and keep doing what they’ve been doing best: engage in conversations and share food for thought in a way that I’ve never seen happening on Twitter since I joined six years ago. Those who like to pontificate and point out whatever mistakes App.net’s founders have been doing so far, should also offer some constructive criticism and actually propose something they think could be a more effective solution, remedy, course of action; otherwise a great way to help is to just shut up.

I don’t have concrete solutions myself, but the aforementioned post by Oluseyi Sonaiya is really worth reading. I simply wanted to write something that could convey both my irritation towards certain negative reactions and attitudes following the recent App.net news, and a more generally positive ‘hang in there’ message. I don’t think App.net is doomed, but defeatism can be so easily contagious in the current tech debate.

Flickr’s identity crisis

May 5, 2014
by Riccardo Mori
Handpicked

Justin Williams, in Why Not Flickr? —

Yesterday’s post on the State of Photo Sharing in 2014 seems to have been well received. Most everyone agreed with what I said, which is always nice. One common refrain I’ve heard is “Why didn’t you include Flickr?”

[…]

Even with this improvements, Flickr still suffers from an identity crisis. Is it a photo sharing site or is it a photo archiving site? Is Flickr still the destination I go to for sharing my best photos with the world, or have they given that up in favor of uploading everything and tacking an ad on it? I don’t know the answers to these questions, and I’m not sure Flickr has figured it out either.

When I opened my Flickr account in 2005, the question “Is it a photo sharing site or is it a photo archiving site?” didn’t really matter. Before that, my other online community experience had been LiveJournal, and I approached Flickr with more or less the same spirit — I saw it as a place where you could both store your photographic production and interact with other like-minded people within Flickr’s community. I never felt a real distinction between the archiving part and the sharing part. 

Remember, Flickr always described itself as a photo-sharing service — it’s interesting to go back in time to Flickr’s home page in March 2004 and see that the first item in the “What is Flickr?” list is Outrageously simple ‘drag ‘n’ drop’ real time photo sharing!

Then Instagram came and subtly changed the meaning of photo-sharing, emphasising the ephemerality of the captured moment over the intrinsic quality of the photograph itself. The idea of photo-sharing became more like flipping through slices of everyday life, rather than exhibiting your production as an amateur, enthusiast or professional photographer. (Of course there are exceptions, terrific photographers using Instagram as an effective tool to increase their audience and draw attention to their work.)

I don’t know if Flickr’s redesign process was initiated out of a need to make Flickr behave more like Instagram, or just because the then-current design felt outdated and uninteresting. Sometimes I think it’s been both things. I’m among those Flickr old-timers who think Flickr was just fine as it was, and that this huge facelift has brought with it some losses in functionality and usability which could be avoided (I’m still a bit disoriented by all the reshuffling of menus and controls, finding them overall less intuitive than before; and I’m still irked by the evident de-emphasising of the comment section in a photo in favour of a big photos everywhere at all costs design policy). 

But I’m also thinking that Flickr could take advantage of this ongoing design shift to effectively become both a photo sharing and photo archiving site. Flickr can find a new audience by putting up a fresh ‘photo-sharing’ face while maintaining its photo-archiving heart to avoid losing long-time users. It could become the most versatile photo site by offering different interaction experiences according to which device you use to access Flickr, and a comprehensive photo experience as a whole. 

So, when you’re using your iPhone or Android smartphone, the emphasis is on an Instagram-like experience: quickly snap and upload a photo, share it with your contacts/followers, take a look at their streams, fave photos, leave a quick comment, etc. When you’re using your computer to access Flickr, the emphasis can shift to an experience that’s more oriented towards photo-archiving — adding tags; editing metadata; doing some retouching; assigning photos to different albums, collections, groups; and so on and so forth. On tablets the Flickr experience could find its sweet spot between the merely social aspects of the service and the editing & organising of what’s being shared.

I wouldn’t say that Flickr is experiencing an ‘identity crisis’ — I see it more like a transitional phase, and what happens next is crucial. I still believe Flickr has a strong enough backbone to be a powerful, versatile, all-encompassing photo service, appealing to different needs by tailoring its approach according to the user’s preferred device. It has the potential to reinvent itself without necessarily losing different categories of users and without throwing away important parts of its history and identity.