Meriblog: Meri Williams' Weblog

I feel for this guy — poor vandalised bike!

This is my word of the day. Pretty much most of my friendship circles at school, university and now work have consisted of people who experience this (suffer seems a strong word for something with such a positive background but I suppose potentially a truly negative impact)

Interesting how our formal education processes in many countries have really reduced the capacity for polymaths to develop. I suppose those most so included are likely to develop any way though! Last couple of years I've sponsored a scholarship at my old highschool for a student displaying polymath tendencies.

Insightful article about how to spot good programmers.

This is a really interesting site: pairing up problem solvers with complex problems and the people who want them solved (and can pay for solutions). Sort of like an innovation / solutions marketplace.

Wow. Hell of an innovative way to pay for college! Not sure how I feel about this, on the one hand sad that anyone has to do this to get an education, on the other hand good on her for getting that much…

Very entertaining game demo where shouting at the screen kills things! Looks hilarious

Gorgeous blog with beautiful graphs — true meaning of information visualisation

This is really really funny, especially if you're constantly exposed to Farmville by friends & family on Facebook as I am!

Another Funtheory video, this time a bottomless bin. Clever!

Innovative way to make more folks take the stairs!

Really funny video of an extremely drunk guy in a market, edited silent movie style.

Absolutely gorgeous set of surf (as in sea as well as sport) photos on Flickr. One of the most beautiful groups I've seen in a while!

Interesting list of good DRM-free eBook sites. Since we'll be heading off on a three month sabbatical next year and I read voraciously when on holiday (on average 2 books per day!) I'm thinking I'll need to invest in some sort of reader closer to the time.

All about hunch.com and how it works. Be warned, it's strangely addictive!

This is fantastic!

Article about how the changing "internet generation values" will change the workplace. Certainly some of these dynamics are at play — the extent to which the general population really lives open source-esque values, however, I'm not sure is as great as posited.

This should win an award for "most misleading title"

Amazing ROI for Dell from their Twitter account — little bit old-school, but still a valuable data point

Looks like Firefox penetration might just go up from 31% in Europe…

This is a fantastic gadget — I wondered when programmable RFID would start to infiltrate the home market. Interestingly I imagine the "kid checking in when he gets home" use case and the "wave your keys at it and it tells you the weather & traffic" will be v popular.

A guide to Spymaster, the game currently taking Twitter by storm.

Lovely study in good navigation on websites. Inspiring!

Design patterns are a really powerful concept, but often pattern libraries are a little too abstract to be useful. This UI pattern library prefers to be eminently useful and pragmatic rather than pure — and is infinitely better for it!

I know that this is as bad as blogging about my cat (for the record, I don't have one!) but watch this video and if you still think it didn't improve your day, come back and complain in the comments 😉

Wonderful demo of what looks like a brilliant little synthesizer — amazing what different uses the iPhone touchscreen tech has opened up!

This photo essay is absolutely beautiful and deeply moving.