("JP")

Perhaps the key to finding the illegible margin is captured in Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Amos Tversky’s quip: “the secret to doing good research is always to be a little underemployed. You waste years by not being able to waste hours.”

Because you’re looking for something which is hard to see, you have to have some sort of “tinkering budget”... See more

Reframing “work” as a process of embodied intention not only inverts the relationship between process and output (and makes us question why that relationship ever seemed hierarchical in the first place) but also forces us to prioritize the things that make process more enjoyable, true, delightful and meaningful.

“June Jordan was an architect,” or so declares the black feminist writer and blogger Alexis Pauline Gumbs.[1] This declaration involves some political risk on Gumbs’ part, as Jordan is more popularly known as a writer, playwright, and poet. Several rhetorical questions immediately come to mind when one considers the veracity of her claim. Questions... See more

Think of it like a chef who not only masters cooking techniques but understands agriculture, chemistry, culture, and human connection. Their expertise isn't confined to the kitchen—it flows into storytelling, sustainability, community building, and innovation. For us, enrichment might mean pursuing multiple interests deeply enough that they begin... See more

There’s an old story about Octavia Butler that I often return to: A young man once asked the visionary science fiction novelist the answer to ending all the suffering in the world. “There isn't one,” Butler replied. “So we’re doomed?” he asked, confused. “No,” said Butler. Then she delivered the words that would remake my understanding of the... See more

Most people stop at consumption. This has always been the case, and will continue to be the case forever and ever, Amen. This makes sense, as it requires the least amount of effort. But the evolution of algorithmic and hyperpersonal content makes moving beyond consumption even more challenging. If I already enjoy the content I’m being served, why... See more

A successful visual analytics product should strive for the Holy Grail of information visualization as described by Ramana Rao – “using visualization as a filtering tool, not just visualizing already filtered information.”

Favelas, spontaneous architecture

Rio is not known as the safest city. There are favelas 4 situated on the hillside. Yet there is a lot we can learn from them.

The architectural design of favelas is not planned. For decades, people helped each other with constructing the unit next door (on a whim it seems!), resulting in a complex and intricate... See more

Legibility is a concept from James Scott’s seminal work, Seeing Like a State . It’s not a book that lends itself well to one-sentence summaries, but my attempt is “we assume that only what we can measure is real and everything that is real can be measured.”

The book is titled Seeing Like a State , because the idea of legibility as I’m using it here... See more