greenpoint design

What is IdBlog?

October 21, 2005 on 5:15 pm | In IdBlog | Add a Comment

What’s an IdBlog? Mostly a place to talk about tools in this modern networked world. Old world tools have evolved over centuries. Our current digital implements seem to be in a constant state of flux.

Consider the standard hammer, for example. Most models you find today are made out of one solid piece of steel with a rubber handle and a curved nail-pulling claw at the back. But if you’ve ever dug around in your grandparents toolshed, you’ve seen the old wooden handled variety with all kinds of strange heads. Certainly those tools had their uses, but they’ve been pushed aside by the greater utility of the standard model.

The digital tools we use today have only had about 60 years or so — if you take the Enigma machine as a starting point — to evolve. And in the last 10 years the pace of innovation and evolution has accelerated.

In the hyperlinked workshop of the internet implements are conceived, used and discarded in a matter of months. Remember Fortran? How about HyperCard? In this frenetic environment it’s hard to know where to invest your time. Why bother learning a new code if it’s going to be a trivia question in 10 months?

Here are some questions that I’d like to try and answer in this space:

• What makes a good tool, is it utility or ubiquity?
• How do standards change a tool’s value?
• When should you discard an implement and move on to the next better solution?
• And how do tools use us?