Hello.

I'm using Beeminder (http://www.beeminder.com) a bit more seriously now. I'm almost ready to share what I'm tracking with it. It's definitely useful and quite amazingly well through out. Thanks to everyone for your feedback about Beeminder and OhLife.

Matt Lock (@matlock) says
“I love oh life. It was a major influence on the design of www.pepysrd.com
http://storythings.com/2012/03/13/pepys-road-reading-repetition-reflection/
I think repetition and habits are a really important factor in good digital design. They can be abused horribly, but used well, they’re very effective. OhLife quickly became habit-firming because of the tiny nuggets of feedback in every daily email.”
(Thanks, Matt)

Paul Clarke (@paul_clarke) says
“OhLife sounds identical to http://thelittlememory.com which oddly enough I am finding myself sticking to every day. it’s beautifully simply done.”
(Thanks, Paul)

Kev Frost (@kevfrost) says
“similar to oohlife, I’ve started using “Private Diary” on Android to put down snippets of life”
(Thanks, Kev)

Warren Ellis is starting an email newsletter tomorrow. Can’t wait.
“It’ll also be a download of whatever’s in my head that isn’t short enough for Twitter and not coherent enough to appear here.”
http://www.warrenellis.com/?p=13945 
(I signed up, of course.)

It’s New Aesthetic Thursday!

You should definitely have heard of this by now, not least because I’ve mentioned it in this newsletter at least a couple of times. No conclusions I’m afraid, but in case you’ve somehow not heard of the New Aesthetic before now here’s a bunch of useful links to get your started. Let’s begin with James Bridle’s original post.

The New Aesthetic
“we need to see the technologies we actually have with a new wonder”
http://www.riglondon.com/blog/2011/05/06/the-new-aesthetic/
(May, 2011, previously mentioned in Roo’s letter #34)

The New Aesthetic tumblr
http://new-aesthetic.tumblr.com/
(The mother lode! Mentioned in #34)

The New Aesthetic: A preliminary primer from Sebastian Deterding
http://storify.com/dingstweets/thenewaesthetic
(A better list than the one I’ve made here, frankly)

James Bridle’s report on the New Aesthetic panel at SXSW.
http://booktwo.org/notebook/sxaesthetic/
(mentioned in #34)

Bruce Sterling: An Essay on the New Aesthetic
“…it’s a postulated creative position. By metaphorically pretending that machines are our friends, we can see what they ‘see,’ and think what they ‘think’… We do get a payoff for that effort. We achieve creative results that we would not have gotten without that robot disguise.”
http://www.wired.com/beyond_the_beyond/2012/04/an-essay-on-the-new-aesthetic/
(Fascinating and worth reading. I first mentioned in back in #46)

The Atlantic: The New Aesthetic Needs to Get Weirder
“Here’s a weird thing a computer left behind. It’s a good start.”
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/the-new-aesthetic-needs-to-get-weirder/255838/

James Bridle: ‘We fell in love in a coded space’ LIFT video about the New Aesthetic and robot storytelling
http://liftconference.com/news/new-video-james-bridle-new-aesthetic-and-robot-storytelling

Rev Dan Catt points out that it’s not about 8 bit retro.
“a response to new markings appearing in our world”
http://revdancatt.com/2012/04/07/why-the-new-aesthetic-isnt-about-8bit-retro-the-robot-readable-world-computer-vision-and-pirates/
(This was perhaps the most useful thing I’ve read on the subject in a while. Dan rocks.

Yours sincerely
Roo

Roo Reynolds
@rooreynolds
http://tinyletter.com/rooreynolds