Most of all, each album soundtracked a little bit of my year; inside are three of my favorite albums from 2006 – if you missed any of these, check them out and let me know what you think.

As Tall As Lions – self titled – link

If there was one album my roommates heard all too much of this year, it was As Tall As Lions’ second album. Emotional without being overtly emo, and accessible without being too obvious, ATAL hooked me from the first track and never left my playlist.

2005 had been all about the bass and the baritone singers for me; Nick Cave and The National were constant features, and previous favorites – like Death Cab – fell away. But this year was all about Dan Nigro’s Buckleyesque range and the interlocking guitars of “Ghost of York” or “A Break A Pause”. When lead and backing vocals cross and recross on “Song for Luna”, it’s all you can do to not smile, right before the instruments drop away and ATAL leaves us with a chorus of Singing to the moonlight – who could ask for more? And there were few songs as beautiful as “Love, Love, Love” this year.

Joanna Newsom – Ys – link

My first exposure to Joanna Newsom, I have to admit, wasn’t through her first album, but instead through the Decemberists’ cover of “Bridges & Balloons”. Later, when I heard the original, I couldn’t quite get over her voice; in a world of Pro-Tools’ed singers, Newsom was just too different at first. But when I heard her new album had Van Dyke Parks (Beach Boys collaborator and composer in his own right) doing the orchestration, and consisted of only 5 songs (that add up to 55 minutes!), I couldn’t wait.

There’s little to add beyond the heaps of praise that she’s gotten for this album – it’s beautiful, heartbreaking, clever, and intricate, and has lyrics that could only work with this music – and music that could only work with these lyrics. Every time she throws a tiny squeak into the beginning of a phrase, one can’t help but give a slight shiver of surprise (and also can’t help listening for it the next time around). And every time the 16-minute epic “Only Skin” wraps up, the feeling isn’t relief, but desire for just a little bit more of the song.

The worst part of an album like this is how some of its listeners will use it as a litmus test for music taste – “Oh, you don’t like Ys? You must not get it“. Of course, that’s ridiculous. There’s a good chance you’ll fall in love with it and listen over and over again, “Emily” to “Cosmia”, and wonder why music like this doesn’t get made more often. There’s also the chance that it won’t resonate with you – and so what? There was plenty of other great music this year.

The Long Winters – Putting the Days to Bed – link

The Long Winters’ 2005 Ultimatum EP, a short but sweet run of songs that sounded as autumnal as their cover, seemed to point a new direction for the band – open tunings, strings, less rock. Putting the Days to Bed makes it seem like that EP wasn’t as much a new step, as a clearing of the decks, as if the band were saying, “now that we’ve got that out of our system, what’s next?” Instead, they pick up where When I Pretend to Fall left off, tighten their sound, and record the best album of their career.

There’s nothing radically different about this album – “Pushover” is a heavier run through “It’ll Be A Breeze”, right down to the ringing G Am C progression, and the title track of the Ultimatum EP is included in an amps-to-11 rendition. But nowhere in the Long Winters’ career so far did the elements that could make them great – lyrics that manage to avoid the traditional love-song cliches, John Roderick’s ever-characteristic voice, and melodies that stick for days – actually come together to fulfill that promise. The one-and-a-half hour light rail rides that took up a part of my summer almost always included one run through this album (which also has some great photography in its liner notes), and I only regret that I wasn’t able to see them live in San Francisco when they played late September.

Technorati tags: music, 2006, joannanewsome, longwinters, astallaslions

Colin Meloy (solo acoustic) – January 20th – Great American Music Hall

My first Decemberists show was last September, at the Fillmore. After braving a combination of Caltrain and SF buses, Dave and I arrived halfway through Petra Haden’s barbershop rendition of The Who Sell Out (cute, if a little tiring) and weren’t able to get anywhere near decent places to see the show. Though the band played great (and even performed The Tain!) I left feeling a little disappointed; it’s hard for me to enjoy shows from that far.

We weren’t going to let the same thing happen this time around; when we heard Colin Meloy (Decemberists frontman) was coming through SF on a solo tour, we bought tickets the second they were available, and drove up with hours to spare. We were right up against the stage (or better, right up against the circular tables they have at the GAMH…) and this made all the difference. Colin was funny – asking us to name his onstage props (which included a ship, a skull, and some wine) and the venue was perfect for setting the mood. We couldn’t have asked for a better selection, either – he even played “Oh, Valencia”, which Dave and I had heard from a 2005 concert bootleg, and dutifully sang along to. He treated us to a cute song about his newborn baby, and then to his infamous “worst song ever” – “Dracula’s Daughter” (you can watch him perform it with a few other musicians at one of the 867 Valencia benefits from earlier this year). It was a great start to the year, and an unforgettable show.

Dirty Pretty Things – August 8th – Slim’s

About as different from that Colin show as is possible was DPT live at Slim’s later in the year – they were loud, their banter was unintelligible (mixing a British slur with whatever pain medication Carl Barat was on for his broken arm), and they had a pretty limited palette to draw on – their first album, along with any Libertines songs Carl saw fit to resurrect. This was, however, the most fun I’d had at a show in a very long time.

I’d always heard that the album recordings didn’t really do the Libertines justice; while I’ll probably never know if that’s true for the Libertines, it’s most definitely true for DPT. Their debut album had been on constant rotation on my way to work over the summer, but I hardly heard it after the show. It’s hard to go back to the studio recording after you’ve heard Anthony Rossomando raggedly play the trumpet riff to “Bang Bang, You’re Dead” right before the crowd explodes in a mass of jumping, moshing and singing. I couldn’t hear properly for a few days (and the car we came up to SF in was broken into!) but it was one of those shows where you’re absolutely sure whether it was “worth it”.

Technorati tags: music, concerts, dirtyprettythings, colinmeloy, decemberists

One of my good friends, Greg H, runs zoo-m, and they’ve just launched TimeToMeet after its beta period. TimeToMeet is a beautifully done webapp that solves a simple, yet recurring problem: scheduling meetings or meet-ups with multiple people’s schedules. It integrates with Google Calendar, iCal and Outlook (and actually enables viewing Outlook and iCal calendars in Google Calendar as an added benefit) and doesn’t require your invitees to sign up – they just follow a link in an email.

One nice feature is the ability to set-up a “Personal Secretary” URL so others can schedule time with you of their own initiative; for example, mine is here. The application uses a “painting” metaphor for adding and removing time slots for which you are available. All in all, TimeToMeet really nails the simplicity / power balance, and does so while looking pretty great.

Technorati tags: timetomeet, scheduling

As we prepare presentations – and all the assorted multimedia accessories that accompany them – it’s easy to lose focus of the main message we’re trying to communicate in the first place. 10 or 15 minute presentations (especially academic ones) might state their purpose early on (“what I argue is that…”) only to then bury that core nugget in an information avalanche. The next time the idea is even mentioned is when the conclusion rolls around – a rescue operation is attempted: “and as stated in the introduction, I’ve argued that…”. This kind of framing is a sure sign that the presentation isn’t communicating a core idea effectively.

I’ve seen the same thing happen with idea pitches to project competitions or investors – the core idea behind a venture is stated in the first 20 seconds, and then only mentioned at the end, while in the middle are details of implementation or strategy that – while important – are meaningless unless they are used to reinforce the idea or story that drives the pitch in the first place.

Fixing this problem – in either the academic or business domain – involves a simple realization: every piece of your presentation – audio, visual, rhetorical, etc – should revolve around your core idea. If you’re showing a video, ask yourself: how does this video help the audience understand the focus of my presentation? It may not be an immediate connection, so additional comments from you before or after might be necessary, but the connection should be clear by the time you’ve moved on the next stage.

All this may seem like “overdoing it” or beating the audience over the head with the same idea. In fact, it may come off this way to your audience – but not if each piece of information and multimedia you add to your presentation enhances your audience’s understanding of that core idea.

So, next time you’re getting ready to put together a presentation, stop for a minute and think: what would I want my audience – who will often be subjected to several other presentations in the week following yours – to take away weeks and possibly months later?

tags: public speaking, presentations

tags: Google, Writely, Bookmarklet

WordPress doesn’t seem to allow javascript links, so the code itself is after the jump

javascript:(function() {function getSel(win) {if (win.getSelection) return win.getSelection(); else if (win.document.getSelection) return win.document.getSelection(); else if (win.document.selection ) return win.document.selection.createRange().text;} var frame = document.getElementById('wys_frame'); var content = getSel(frame.contentWindow).toString().split(%22 %22); alert(content.length + %22 word(s) in selection%22);})()

Copy paste into a bookmark’s location field (only tested in Firefox; Writely isn’t quite there yet for Opera) and invoke whenever needed. Many thanks to Ben Newman for help with getting text selection.

https://addons.mozilla.org/thunderbird/152/

New in this version is the ability to look up contacts from selected messages (with the option of adding any entries that aren’t found in the lookup to the addressbook). Shoot me any comments or suggestions.

tags: addressContext, Thunderbird, Mozilla

For a run-down of what I worked on, check out the PPT/OArt team blog – they were terrific all summer long and even dedicated a post to what I worked on.

More broadly, it turns out that the Program Manager role – which my friend Boaz recently described in a unique way – is one that fits me very well. While I enjoy the occasional programming class – and spent a few units each quarter last year working on an AJAX front-end to the ButterflyNet digital ink HCI project – my strengths and passions are closer to other areas: coordinating teams, developing a consistent vision across different features, and seeking empathy with the end-user. I got to do all of those at Microsoft, and worked on a few features that are already in the Beta 2 Technical Refresh.

Summer internships, I discovered, are a somewhat surreal experience both at the beginning and the end – you arrive, eager to learn, and are instantly thrown into a world where decisions really matter (for more than a letter grade), your projects will wind up in the hands of masses of users, all while working with people who will listen to and act on any good ideas you might have. And then, only three months later, it’s back to dorm life, back to school. The transition back was a bit difficult – motivating myself was much easier when working on end-user projects, rather than a weekly problem set. Fortunately, I’m in a great dorm this year, and a few weeks was all it took to get into my classes again.

A few things which seemed daunting, pre-summer, turned out to not be so bad: biking to work was relaxing, and I got to bike through a portion of the Stevens Creek trail every morning – there’s nothing like breathing fresh air right before arriving at work. Living on my own was made easier by being in constant touch through the phone, and frequent visits back to campus. Cooking for myself was made possibly by learning how to cook pasta properly, how to use the frying pan, and even how to prepare chicken.

All in all, a great summer – learning, working, and meeting some terrific people.

tags: stanford, microsoft, internship, powerpoint, office

First, we have the academic side – every quarter I see great presentations created for the classes that I tutor (often I’ve seen the PowerPoint deck evolve from “I don’t know what my topic really is…” to the finishing touches right before the students’ final presentations) and these presentations are often shown once or twice, then never again. While many students don’t have the time or inclination to turn these presentations into videos or flash files, getting them to upload these files to a server so they could ‘live on’ after the class (perhaps all the presentations from a class could be tagged with the class name and quarter) would make sure that they would be seen outside the relatively limited scope of their class.

Also, for very basic presentations, SlideShare is a nice alternative to a PowerPoint viewer, with the added bonus that it can be embedded in a web page – presenting can be as simple as opening a browser. Of course, for multimedia presentations the software is far from ideal, but if text and bullets are your thing, it might fit the bill.

Finally, I’m excited to see how SlideShare evolves in the coming months to incorporate audio into their software – this would be one step closer to allowing presentations to live on after conferences, or provide a recap to conference attendees who were interested in the topic but might have missed some slides. Similar software – such as Microsoft Producer – exists, but SlideShare has a far lower barrier of entry, cost, and easy redistribution.

Please let me know if you’re interested in checking out SlideShare – I have a couple of invites for the beta and would love to hear more about other uses that you might think of for it.

tags: web2.0, captology, stanford, slideshare, powerpoint

Can you hear me in the back?

The topic I’d like to start with is volume – Human 1.0 unfortunately comes unequipped with an automatic volume control, and judging the correct volume (whether using a microphone or not) can make or break a presentation. Today I’ll cover approaches to being heard without a microphone (I’ll hopefully enlist the help of some podcasters when writing the future article about working with microphones).

Microphones can be a great boost to your voice – they can help project it in huge auditoriums, or record it for posterity. Two catches, however: there are situations where the microphone is completely inappropriate (smaller rooms, informal presentations), and microphones cannot make your voice stronger - just louder. Thus, I think any speaker benefits from learning how to handle a microphone-less situation – so when the microphone comes on, it’s a boost rather than a crutch.

Presenting without a microphone, the burden of volume falls entirely on the speaker and the space. I’ve found the best way to approach the situation is to imagine your voice as actual sound waves coming from your body outwards (as many people can attest, I often use somewhat cheesy but, in my humble opinion, effective physical metaphors). Now, find the back of the room – and when you talk, make sure your voice projects not just to the wall, but all the way back too. This is a quick way of adjusting to different room sizes which scales pretty well for medium-sized speaking venues, and I find the visual element of imagining the bouncing waves is helpful.

Now, most speakers I’ve worked with speak too quietly rather than too loudly – only to be told by someone (someone critiquing their rehearsal, or even a rude audience member) to speak louder! which of course works for about two sentences, before they fall back into their not-loud-enough previous tone. When working with this, I’ve found it’s far easier to scale down than it is to scale up, and trying to work upwards will lead to endless frustration. Instead, find a space to make some noise, and go all out – without screaming or shouting, see how strong you can make the sound waves. Now, take it down a notch – and then another. Going from 110% to 100% isn’t so hard; it’s the 70 to 100% jump that really strains. Try arriving a bit early at your venue and seeing if you find the sweet spot by starting a little louder than you’d think, and toning it down until it feels right.

Since we usually don’t spend our time talking at such a loud volume, many times the exercise above runs into a blocking problem – the muscles we use to project are out of practice, and need a day at the gym. If you can, find a friend that sings, and watch how they use their diaphragm as an impulse to their voice. Even if the actual technique is not something that can be captured in a day, if you can internalize the section of the body that the sound is beginning from, you can try to replicate that in volume exercises.

Great, so we’re speaking at the right volume – but staying there ’till the end of the sentence is as important as getting there at the beginning. How many speakers have you heard Start Off Strong only to fade out by the end of the sentence? (apologies for overcute font sizing)

We’re usually dealing with a mountain of cognitive processes while speaking in public – am I standing in the right place? Am I making eye contact? What’s coming up next? How much time do I have left? We tend to trail off for two main reasons: we’re out of breath, and we’re thinking about what’s already coming next. Breathing and pace warrant their own article (to be written, soon) but they have an impact on volume, too. Make sure you’re getting the air you need to start off each sentence, and if you need to recharge halfway through, take that half a second to do so. And while it’s great to have the next phrase in mind as you wrap up the current one, don’t drop the current sentence just because the next one is waiting. You can combine both of these tips into one – if you take a breath right before the crucial sentence-closing turn of phrase, you’ll help drive your point, and do it at a clear volume.

Finally, there are speakers whose volume problems don’t come from projecting incorrectly or using their head voice – instead, it comes from shyness or fear of public speaking (we’ve all heard the “People are more afraid of public speaking than death” line) – I’ll make sure upcoming articles tackle this issue of shyness for the glossophobes out there.

In the meantime, thanks for reading, and please let me know if you find the tips helpful – or if you’ve found they don’t work at all! ‘Till next Wednesday – in the meantime, also make sure to check out the public speaking tips at lifehack.org for some more general tips.

tags: public speaking, speech, volume

Videos:

1. Interactive Gigapixel Prints: Large, Paper-Based Interfaces for Visual Context and Collaboration by Ron B. Yeh, Joel Brandt, Jonas Boli and Scott Klemmer
2. Wizard of Oz Sketch Animation for Experience Prototyping by Bjorn Hartmann, Scott Doorley, Sohyeong Kim, Parul Vora

Posters:

1. PALette: Connecting Kids Through Tangible Color-Mixing Nan Gao, Ben Ilegbodu, Nundu JanakiRam
2. LightCast: A Tangible User Interface Creativity Support Tool for Visual Design June Zhang
3. Reducing Clutter on Tabletop Groupware Systems with Tangible Drawers Björn Hartmann, Meredith Morris Ringel, Anthony Cassanego
4. Diamond’s Edge: From Notebook to Table and Back Again Michael Bernstein, Avi Robinson-Mosher, Ron Yeh, Scott Klemmer
5. FlutterbyNet: Distributed Logbook Collaboration Isabelle Kim, Lora Oehlberg, Ashley Rayner

Awesome work coming out of the CS294H class last quarter – that’s four posters from one class! Maybe we should have submitted our real-time calendar system. Congrats to all. Check out the work going on at the HCI lab for more.

technorati tags:stanford, hci, ubicomp