Why YKK zippers are the brown M&Ms of product design An Article by Josh Centers theprepared.com A ‘pro tip’ for evaluating the quality of a piece of gear is to look at the small details, such as zippers and stitching. Cheap-minded manufacturers will skimp on those details because most people just don’t notice, and even a cheap component will often last past a basic warranty period, so it’s an easy way to increase profits without losing sales or returns. If a designer does bother to invest in quality components, that’s a tried-and-true sign that the overall product is better than the competition. All the way throughThe Cycle of Goodness designdetailsquality
Untangling the Bank An Essay from Field Notes on Science and Nature by Bernd Heinrich Specific aimsMore than a witnessPeculiaritiesSecrecyIf it wasn't written down+1 More
Specific aims Having specific aims, I then started to add almost everything else I could think of that might help me monitor and control my progress.
More than a witness Documentation has made the difference between simply being a witness to nature and being one who identifies themes and questions.
Peculiarities Taking notes has always helped me zero in on the interesting questions. In taking field notes, the way to find these peculiarities is to keep track of as many observations that may not appear at the time to be relevant at all.
Secrecy At a glance, my journal seems to be a mess. It is not meant to be seen or read, except by me, and often not even that.
If it wasn't written down I’ve been keeping journals of one sort or another since I was a teenager, and if there is one thing I can now confidently say about all this scribbling and note-taking, it is that if it wasn’t written down, it didn’t happen. The more I wrote the more that did happen, because all this process stirs up ideas. Stopping to sit and write costs time and energy, and some biologists feel that it should be discouraged.
An active participant Note-taking helped transform me from a young boy on barefoot runs who passively observed the tangled bank of the Maine woods into a naturalist-scientist who is an active participant in unraveling the mysteries of the natural world. notetaking