I came across this from an old, old email. It’s a parody of Confucius’ Analects, which I read in college. I remember some of the real thing sounding about this ridiculous.

I.
Lady Yee said, “The men of Ch’in are kind, but not discriminating.”
“That is correct,” the Master said.
Lady Yee said, “The men outside of Ch’in are discriminating, but not kind.”
“That is correct,” the Master said.
Lady Yee said, “I wish for a husband who is both kind and discriminating.”
The Master said, “Good luck.” II.
Lady Yee sat by the river weeping.
“What is troubling you?” the Master said.
“I am excessively sarcastic!” Lady Yee said.
The Master said, “That is false.”
“And I shall never be accepted in the eastern provinces!”
The Master said, “That is also false.”
“And one of my eyes is closer to my forehead than the other!
” The Master said, “You have a baseline level of anxiety.”

III.
The Master said, “You stupid cat.”

IV.
The Master said, “Lady Yi was good; Queen Pei was adaptable. Lady Yee is both good and adaptable.”
Lord Yu said, “What is the signifance of this?”
The Master said, “I am not sure.”

Interesting: “Nagu” (an old nickname of mine) is distinct enough of a name to identify me in most contexts. However, the name has another, distinct use as the name of a small municipality in Finland.

Ben noticed this when he saw the Flickr clusters for the “nagu” tag. You can see how separate the two clusters are, right off the bat:

My official identifier “Eric Nguyen” has way more namespace collisions; it’s funny to have that still be an issue with my weird nickname.

A fun, simplified look at how Kiva works. Kiva has done a fantastic job personalizing microfinance:

A Fistful Of Dollars: The Story of a Kiva.org Loan from Kieran Ball on Vimeo.

Here’s a great piece about a guy who was able to produce a bumper crop on a vacant lot in Tuscon, Arizona by harvesting runoff from roofs and streets around the lot. It’s a nice bit of daydreaming for the wannabe urban farmer.

Here’s a map of the growth of his terraced gardens over the years, which I include because it’s a lovely small-multiple visualization:

The Evolution of the Russ Farm

I propose toast to Gmail, the webapp that dispatches nearly all the communications and planning in my life with aplomb. Here’s a bit of history on the growth of the service.

Gmail’s user interface was new and strange when it debuted. It’s still strange to people who switch to it, now. Despite all of this, the service has thrived.

Often, designers know better than users, but it’s rare to see them winning out over the voices calling for user experiences to adhere to old conventions for the sake of “familiarity.” Gmail is a good example of usability design leading the market.