Skipping Reels of Rhyme

there is nothing profound here.

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I’m not sure if I agree with this advice… But just check out the design… Amazing.

I’m not sure if I agree with this advice… But just check out the design… Amazing.

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I’m posting a few old photos… This was at the MFA in Boston, from a set of wood sculptures done by Ellisworth Kelly. Check it out if you have a chance, it’s on the first floor underneath the north end of the modern wing… Something about a white-walled room with nothing inside but lights and single-piece wood sculptures is really cool. Aesthetically, it feels totally pure. Just a dude, carving wood. Go see it.

I’m posting a few old photos… This was at the MFA in Boston, from a set of wood sculptures done by Ellisworth Kelly. Check it out if you have a chance, it’s on the first floor underneath the north end of the modern wing… Something about a white-walled room with nothing inside but lights and single-piece wood sculptures is really cool. Aesthetically, it feels totally pure. Just a dude, carving wood. Go see it.

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Every time I fly through Denver and have time to kill in the airport, I’m really impressed by how awesome of a space it is. This room feels huge, and there’s a ton of glass so you get mostly blue sky if you look in any direction. Plus, there’s an awesome Learjet hanging 15 feet away from me. Twigs keep falling near me as I sit here… Why? Oh yeah, some sparrows are building nests somewhere above me. And that’s just awesome. Why would you ever build a dull block of rooms and corridors when you could have light, and space? And birds!

Every time I fly through Denver and have time to kill in the airport, I’m really impressed by how awesome of a space it is. This room feels huge, and there’s a ton of glass so you get mostly blue sky if you look in any direction. Plus, there’s an awesome Learjet hanging 15 feet away from me. Twigs keep falling near me as I sit here… Why? Oh yeah, some sparrows are building nests somewhere above me. And that’s just awesome. Why would you ever build a dull block of rooms and corridors when you could have light, and space? And birds!

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Banking reform

So these guys calling themselves “Simple” have some pretty disruptive ideas - fundamentally, they want to replace your bank. It seems like they’ve taken a long, hard look at the current user experience and tried to fix the areas that need work. What are these areas? Here are a few of my own:

1. Overdraft fees. Why am I charged more money when I run out of money? The amount also seems excessive.

2. ATM fees. I know that these are excessive. My bank is geographically located in the west/midwest, so literally every ATM in Boston (where I go to school) is out-of-network. As a result, every time I want to pull out $20, it actually costs $25.

3. Online banking. I view my account online all the time, sometimes immediately before I make a purchase. However, every time I go in to my physical bank location, they caution me against using their web or smartphone apps, saying that the balance shown may not be up-to-date. What’s the point, then? When I opened my checking account as a teen, they told be to use the balance sheet in my checkbook. This may have seemed reasonable then, but does not any longer. It’s (almost) 2012. We have real-time access to all sorts of information, 24 hours a day. Why does my banking app have business hours?

As far as I can tell, Simple addresses all of these concerns. They don’t charge you ATM fees (at least on their half of the transaction), and have a large network (if I get a couple of ATMs in Boston, I’ll be happy). They opt to decline your transactions instead of even giving you the option to overdraft. And they have what looks like it’s shaping up to be a phenomenal web and smartphone app.

So why haven’t banks addressed these concerns already? They’re not being forced to, and it doesn’t make financial sense for them to start now.

And of course, a startup is relatively harmless. I strongly doubt that Simple will be stealing significant market share for at least a few years. But what it might do is provoke change from other banks. If Simple shows that it is possible for a better bank to succeed, there’s no reason we shouldn’t demand the same changes in larger banks.

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advice, muttered hastily on a porch in boston at 2AM

Daylight has a strange way of twisting your perception into an entity that exists independently of you. You never call on it, though you feel that you could. And it’s a good thing, that you never call on it. You’d give terrible advice.

That one, he’s upset about the wake he’s leaving in what he perceives to be a ‘no wake zone’, which he’s halfheartedly patrolling himself. He’s concerned about the major things, at the moment, but if he thinks too much he’s start to expose all sorts of seemingly innocuous events that have had more effect than he intended. That retrospective would be crippling, but he won’t get that far. He’ll stop at some sort of resolution, or promise, or new crusade.

There’s more to it than that. Be concerned with the future? You have to dissect the past. Living in the present is a romanticized ideal that refuses the experience of the past or hope of the future - to be moaned about by the unhappy. “Oh, how we wish we could just be content, to be rid of this cursed knowledge of our unhappiness”. Because it’s not just that they’re unhappy - it’s that they’re aware of it. They see this as a bad thing. Is it? Doesn’t the recognition of a problem precede it’s solution?

So that’s the advice that fits? “At least you know?” How about, “Fix it.” If it wasn’t dark, I’d think it was daylight.