Brain Candy #65 - Despair for Fun and Profit

Despair, Inc. sells demotivational posters. If you have the misfortune to work in a company that puts stock in motivational posters, you know how annoying and depressing they can be. Nothing is as simple as a motivational poster makes it out to be. Demotivational posters are parodies of classic motivational posters. To give an example, years ago I read a short article that was meant to illustrate the uselessness of inappropriate perseverence. The example used was a fly hitting a window screen. No matter how long he perseveres, he won't get through. Despair, Inc. has boiled down quite a number of such ideas, selling posters, notecards, calendars and framed displays on such demotivational topics as "Limitations," "Ineptitude," "Consulting," "Burnout," and "Pretention." Each comes with an illustrative picture and quote. It would probably be a copyright violation to say much more - the site shows them clearly. These items are much more thought-provoking than standard motivational posters, and probably offer more useful lessons, too. Visit Despair, Inc. for a good laugh.

In the last few weeks, I've been studying digital camera review web sites very closely. There are many: I'll mention two that I've used frequently. Megapixel.net calls itself a monthly digital still camera web magazine. Each month features a cover picture, editorial, reviews, and articles, and includes a glossary, links to other sites, and other useful resources. Previous months' articles and reviews are available, making it a great resource when you're looking for a camera or for tutorials about various aspects of digital photography. The information provided is detailed, but not excessive, and technical, but not overly so. It is a very useful site for those interested in digital photography.

Steve's Digicams at www.steves-digicams.com has many of the same features as Megapixel.net, done equally well. I found it a useful resource and a complementary site. It has something more - many sample pictures, including an excellent picture of the day page. Typical daily pictures are interesting and beautiful. It's very helpful to be able to view digital photos taken with modern cameras by talented photographers. This site also has links to other sites with picture of the day themes.

Graphically-oriented designs for web applications are beginning to show up more often. A few issues back, I discussed "kartoo," a graphically-oriented search engine. I've recently found a similar design for an on-line thesaurus - "Plumb Design Visual Thesaurus," at thesaurus.plumbdesign.com/index.jsp. Let's say you wish to explore synonyms for the word "varnish." Upon typing the word into the input box, you'll see a graph that shows two small circles connected to the word, with another word, "seal," connected to one of the circles. If you click on the isolated circle, you get a definition of "varnish" as a noun. If you click on the other circle, you get the definition of "varnish" as a verb. Connected to this circle is the word "seal." If you click on this word, a whole new graph, with many nodes, pops up. The word "seal" has many synonyms, while "varnish" does not. You can grab and move various nodes around to look at the backside of a complicated word tree. I'm not sure if this site is of much practical use, beyond a standard thesaurus, but it is interesting, nonetheless.

The final website I'll share with you this month is "Tim van Gelder's Critical Thinking on the Web," which can be found at www.philosophy.unimelb.edu.au/reason/critical/. A Francis Bacon quote is used to provide the definition of critical thinking. To boil it down, it's "the study of Truth." There are a large number of categories that are linked to the main page. Some are obviously connected to critical thinking, like "The Media," "Language and Thought," and "Skepticism." There are also a few that aren't as obvious, such as "Nursing" and "Art." I think that critical thinking has declined greatly in our society - so much so that some people don't even recognize what it is or that it is missing. There is a lot to read and think about here. I hope you enjoy it.