“Nothing sounds quite like an ice cream van, and this post on EM411 left me wondering how they work. This is what I found: ‘Early models consisted of a hand tuned Swiss musical movement (like a music box) fitted with a magnetic pick up and the amplifiers used radio-type valves. In 1958 reliable transistors came on to the market and efficient amplifiers were built to work directly of the vehicle’s battery…’”

“There are some things that become so ubiquitous and familiar to us — so seemingly obvious — that we forget that they actually had to be invented. Here’s a case in point — the weblog post’s permalink. I mean — let’s think about it. The problem was that a weblog’s front page is by far its most visited page. This is the page where everyone actually sees your content (or at least it was until the creation of RSS feeds). But it’s not possible for someone to effectively bookmark or link to that particular entry on that page, because shortly it will scroll off the bottom.”

“Those familiar illustrations on the pages of The Wall Street Journal look just like engravings. But the intricate portraits, called headcuts, are actually a sort of pointilist sketch — drawn by hand using a technique known as ’stippling.’ Noli Novak, a New Jersey-based artist, has produced Journal art for nearly 20 years. At her studio, she typically receives an e-mailed photo of her subject. Then, deftly employing a number-one pen, she copies a three-by-five inch image onto special vellum paper.”

“Take notice all you unique visual designers — whether you use Dreamweaver or Six Apart or Oil on Canvas; whether your income is $2,000 a year or $200,000 a year; whether you receive a 1099 or not: The IRS applies the same rules and regs to all of you. That’s right, unique carries no weight with the IRS. You all must follow the same rules. Here are some time and money-saving tips — a Designers Dozen — on how to simplify those complex rules to fit your unique situation. All stem from questions you have asked me or areas I know you need help in.” (Thanks kottke.org!)

“I don’t know a lot about makeup. When Organic started the pitch process for a major pitch for a cosmetics company, I thought Bobbi Brown was married to Whitney and that MAC was a line of Apple products. How could we get smart about women’s cosmetics? The answer was to immerse the team in the lives of women who use the product.”

“In the 1840s, Esther Howland was handcrafting romantic cards cards of lace, foil and feathers. Hallmark now owns her collection.” Learn more about the mother of the Valentine’s card by watching a video at Hallmark.com (but first, don’t miss this gem: Zombie Valentine). (Thanks HOW!)

A 1:04:18 MP3 recording of XPLANE founder and CEO Dave Gray’s presentation at MeshForum: “A poorly communicated concept is a missed opportunity. Visual thinking is a mode of thinking to assist with communication, like a calculator assists with math. It serves as a tool to communicate fairly difficult concepts.”

Bummer. Haddock was one of the first links in my late ’90s daily weblog travels: “If you’re one of Haddock.org’s few regular visitors you’ve probably noticed that the Haddock Directory part of the site had its last daily update in October. After updating the Directory every day (well, kind of) since its launch in 1997 I’d finally had enough of the dull and thankless task earlier last year.”

“Reasons behind the name Aboveground Zine Library? It fits the idea of the library just right. Why isn’t it called underground zine library? The reasons is simply, it’s not an underground zine library. It’s out in the public and the library isn’t stashed in a secret location.”

“This site contains PDF documents that can be printed and cut out to make lens hoods for a variety of 35mm and digital SLR camera lenses. Lens hoods give better quality photographs by reducing flare caused by nonimageforming light.”

“Long before the term design was ever associated with newspapers, there was Ed Arnold. Long before there were Macs, or QuarkXPress, or SND, there was Ed Arnold. In the book of newspaper design, Ed Arnold is the Genesis — the prologue to a rich story of how our craft developed. And the trailblazer — a lone, but resounding, and articulate, voice. I can’t think of anyone else who could sit with a non-believing publisher and editor and convince them that packaging the news attractively was the key to getting readers to pay attention.”

“Interviewing Cory Doctorow is easy. You just flip the on switch by asking the first question, and he emits a constant stream of brilliant, insightful stuff. Editing interviews with Doctorow is easy as well. He generally speaks in coherent, whole sentences and frequently expresses complex ideas for some length that don’t get lost mid-paragraph. So it’s a pleasure to present this conversation…”

“Bill’s quick exit from the set of The Daily Show aside, he has not been doing Vista or Microsoft any favors with his recent performance. Contrast this with his alter-ego, Mr. Jobs, who even in the face of controversy surrounding the Apple options backdating scandal can get up on stage and wow his employees, his customers and the technology community at-large. Steve is a rock star. Bill looks as if he’s been living under a rock.”

“People ask me, ‘How can I get our employees to be passionate about the company?’ Wrong question. Passion for our employer, manager, current job? Irrelevant. Passion for our profession and the kind of work we do? Crucial. If I own company FOO, I don’t need employees with a passion for FOO. I want those with a passion for the work they’re doing. The company should behave just like a good user interface — support people in doing what they’re trying to do, and stay the hell out of their way. Applying the employer-as-UI model, the best company is one in which the employees are so engaged in their work that the company fades into the background.”

“Design-Feed is a design feed aggregator. We hand-pick the most interesting design related RSS feeds and present them in an easy-to-browse format. This means you can get all the latest design news in one place, rather than trawling through hundreds of sites a day. Every post aggregated is also searchable by keyword.”