Are "community gardens" too ugly to have in a conspicuous place in a city park?

Controversy in Madison, Wisconsin. Critics of the plan say weeds and scraggly vines would be visible to nearby residents and cars rushing by...

"Do you surround yourself with things you really like or things you like only because they are absurd?"

"Listen to your own speech. Ask yourself: Do I communicate primarily through inside jokes and pop culture references?"  What perce...

Skeuomorphism — mimicking real-life objects on the computer screen — may have died along with Steve Jobs.

And it seems doomed if it's viewed as cute or ornamental, but there's also the argument based on functionality . You might wonder wh...

"Shopping for a new car, I see that they all look bloated and sloppy, bulkier than need be."

"Restaurants serve mega-portions, sodas are bigger. And have you been on a NYC subway lately? The number of people taking up two seats ...

Tattoos.

Lots of interesting photographs here , quite aside from whether the tattoos are wise choices or well done. I love #19, done with a fisheye l...

What did you think you'd get from the photographer who photographed Obama with a statue...

... like this ? When U.S. President Barack Obama visited Prague in April, the world's press establishment followed. Photographers scramb...

"What a ridiculously insulting article" in The Atlantic.

Says a commenter on "The Most Dangerous Gamer" : The profile of [Jonathan] Blow is interesting; what isn't is the facile prese...

Is "liberation" an outdated word?

Yesterday, I wrote "Wouldn't it be a kick in the head if it turned out feminism served, above all, the interests of commerce and n...

"How can people take the love out of science and bring hate into religion so easily?"

Leave Miley alone!

"A burbled value of $100 billion would price [Facebook] at an earnings multiple of 100 to one."

"Fast-growing Apple is currently valued at 13 to one. Google is valued at 20 to one. Facebook isn't LinkedIn or eToys or even Googl...

"From his father Jobs had learned that a hallmark of passionate craftsmanship is making sure that even the aspects that will remain hidden are done beautifully."

"One of the most extreme—and telling—implementations of that philosophy came when he scrutinized the printed circuit board that would h...

You're not Apple. Don't even try design.

Sorry. That's my reaction to this thing .

"For people of a secular age, Steve Jobs's gospel may seem like all the good news we need."

"But people of another age would have considered it a set of beautifully polished empty promises, notwithstanding all its magical resul...

10 Principles of Modern Design...

... from Dieter Rams (who was chief of design for Braun — the German manufacturer — from 1961 to 1995). Oddly, I came away feeling that the ...

"Large numbers of Parisians could not see the point of placing an enormous functionless derrick in the middle of the city."

Writes Bill Bryson, in "At Home: A Short History of Private Life" : The Eiffel Tower wasn’t just the largest thing that anyone had...

Tweaking the template.

You may have noticed a few tweaks around here. There's the "Who is Althouse? ✼ How can I contribute?" in the banner. The pictu...

Have you perfected your "photo face"?

You need one, you know. What do you think... teeth/no teeth? Kissy-face jaw-lunge? Are you supposed to do something with your tongue behind...

Scott Walker replaces artwork in the Governor's mansion — a painting of 3 children of different races, blowing soap bubbles.

And the artist, one David Lenz, is "deeply disappointed": "This seems symbolic," said Lenz, referring to Walker's pr...

"Porexia."

A newly coined word for people who've gone all obsessive about the size of their pores.  And speaking of words... High-definition telev...

Designing althou.se.

Did you know I'm going to bust out of blogspot soon? When the Althouse URL isn't althouse.blogspot.com but althou.se — what do you e...