A serious blow to the well-liked media software: “Two weeks ago Hulu called and told us their content partners were asking them to remove Hulu from Boxee. We tried (many times) to plead the case for keeping Hulu on Boxee, but on Friday of this week, in good faith, we will be removing it.” A blog post at Hulu offers an earnest if not particularly detailed acknowledgment that this is an unfortunate situation for users of both Hulu and Boxee; no real explanation is given, other than Hulu’s content providers asked for the removal. To be honest, I doubt if I will have any use for Boxee unless this situation is remedied somehow.

Jump to this link

Four newspapers from Europe and one from Mexico take prizes in this prestigious, thirtieth annual creative competition. Some of the sample layouts from the winners (seen most easily in the embedded slideshow at the bottom of this page) are gorgeous; most are highly illustrative, and many are so visually ornate that they’re almost indistinguishable from magazine design. For me, they make for such interesting — and enjoyable — contrasts with the relatively austere aesthetic of The New York Times.

In other news, this year’s best designed horse-and-buggies should be announced soon. Kidding! Oof, I’m in trouble.

Jump to this link

Courtesy of the school’s Masters in Interaction Design program, an interview with the well-known creative mind behind The Feltron Annual Report. In this dialogue, he touches on the problem of the designer as an author: “In a larger sense, the Annual Reports are an outgrowth of a search for content to use as a source for design. As long as I’ve been a designer, I’ve searched for ways to design personal content.”

On 11 Mar, Felton will be appearing on a blockbuster bill of fellow speakers — Jen Bekman, Rebekah Hodgson and Jason Kottke are the others — at one of the program’s well-attended Dot Dot Dot lectures in New York. If you’re looking to go back to school or to deepen your expertise in interaction design and you’re not already considering this program, you should be.

Jump to this link

The design writer William Bostwick offers and explains five points for designers who need to express themselves in written form: “Write about yourself, write a story, write real words, don’t write too much.” Excellent article recommended for any designer serious about his or her career.

Jump to this link

No two ways about it, I’m pretty excited about “Watchmen.” The original comic book mini-series has held a pretty special place in my heart since I first bought it, issue by issue, upon its initial publication two decades ago. It was the best, most complex and most satisfying graphic storytelling that I’ve ever read, and also the comic book that ruined all other comic books for me, so high did it set the bar for super-hero fiction. If there’s been anything quite as good since, I haven’t come across it.

Less pontificatingly, I have one reservation about this movie — and in fact all masked super-hero movies: with all of the technology and effects wizardry at the disposal of the film industry, is there really no better solution for making these characters’ masks look convincing than that gaudy black make-up spread around the eyes that they always use? Please, someone put some ingenuity into that.

Jump to this link

I’m completely captivated by this photographer’s preternaturally beautiful portraits of empty parking structures, not least because they’re in sync with the geometric photographic style that I favor.

Jump to this link

Animation historian Jerry Beck unearths several examples — some little seen — of early animated appearances of the Superman character, both sanctioned and satirical.

Jump to this link

Embarrassed I missed this on Saturday, but here it is: the incumbent dean of design on his early career as a graphic designer. “If you worked in a design studio in 1980, you were surrounded by colored paper, rubber cement, X-Acto knives and cans of aerosol spray glue. Our work, whether an annual report or a poster, was done by hand.”

Jump to this link

Daniel Lewandowski: “This site is meant to honor and pay utmost respect to the life and work of Mr. Rand. When I first began this project, I discovered that there were no “single-source” references to Mr. Rand or his works anywhere on the internet. Thus sparked the idea to build this tribute/archive site.”

Jump to this link