Noteworthy: Small and Mobile

Small is the New Big

Figure 1 Small is the New Big is one of those books that just really hit home with me, and I recommend it to almost everyone who is passionate about their profession.

Small is the New Big is one of my top recommendations for anyone passionate about their profession. I’m on my second read through it, and it continues to reinforce and refresh my thinking about business and marketing on the web. I can’t recommend it enough. (Figure 1)

The riffs throughout the book focus on the following three themes, nicely summarized inside the front cover.

• Small is the new big because big has gone from a huge advantage to a liability.
• Authentic stories spread and last, but lies get exposed faster than ever.
• The ability to change fast is the single best asset for any person or organization.

If you agree with all that, you’ll most likely love this book as much as I do. The only disclaimer is that many of the riffs are already available on his blog. However, I find this consolidated and tactile version to be a much more enjoyable way to read them.

Mobile Web Design

Figure 2 Mobile Web Design by Cameron Moll goes on sale August 28th.

Cameron is an incredibly articulated speaker and writer, and I’ve been waiting for this book for sometime. In the free preview snippets, he offers a rough estimation illustrating just how quickly and how far mobile phone usage has penetrated everyday life relative to some other mainstream products. It’s an increasingly relevant and complex subject that we shouldn’t be ignoring. Based on what I’ve seen of the preview, I strongly suggest picking up a copy. Mobile Web Design by Cameron Moll (Figure 2)

Happy Webbies

Figure 3 The guys at nGen Works have put together a great little site, HappyWebbies.com.

I got to meet the nGen Works crew at refresh06 last year, and it’s been fun to keep up with the great stuff they’re doing. You might be familiar with them as the guys sketching all of the crazy characters at SXSW. From wallpapers to windows and on to redesigning their office, they’re a fun group to keep up with. (Figure 3)

Happy Webbies is the web nerd version of Happy Bunnies, and they’re off to a good start. With illustrated likenesses of Jeffrey Zeldman, Eric Meyer, Molly Holzschlag, and Jakob Nielsen, it’s a good light-hearted and entertaining site. Varick promises there’s more to come, and it should be thoroughly entertaining to see the results.

Field Notes

Figure 4 Coudal Partners released Field Notes, and they’re supposed to start shipping soon.

Most likely another fantastic product from Coudal Partners. They’ve teamed up with Draplin Design Company of Portland to create Field Notes. (Figure 4) I’ll have to reserve my opinion until they arrive, but this looks like a great little pocket notebook. Since I’m trying to get away from the comptuer and get back to pen and paper more, these came along at just the right time.

For anyone else that has an unusual interest in good old fashioned pen and paper, I also recommend Edward Tufte’s high quality acid-free graph paper and the recently-posted-about Dot Grid Book.

Like it Matters

Brian Oberkirch has been writing a lot of great stuff, and his most recent post about the social web and the fine art of friendship rang particularly true for me. I’ve noticed that with Twitter, Flickr, Upcoming, and the variety of other social applications that I end up having more interesting and engaging conversations with the people I’m able to keep up with through the “social web”.

It’s difficult to go to lunch or dinner with each and every friend on a weekly basis, but if you’re able to passively keep up with how they’re doing, it makes it that much more enjoyable when you do finally get an opportunity to sit down and converse.