Nathan's Possibly Interesting web site
Commonsense design blog
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of everyday product design
Most cafeterias sell water to their thirsty customers in plastic bottles full of mineral water. The water is no better than the tap water in most countries, its environmental impact is dubious, and of course it turns a tidy profit for the business. As a customer I find it annoying to pay for one of … Read more
Check out this humble black marker pen. What about it, you ask? Well, look at the close up: this marker marks most surfaces, is waterproof, practically odorless, safe… and has a cap off time of up to two weeks without drying up. What about it, you ask? Just think of the hi-tech perfection that this … Read more
I’ve written before about the use of tactile sidewalk strips to help the blind, as seen in Japan. Well, now we have them in Israel too! I was walking under the Calatrava bridge in Jerusalem, and saw this: At first I was puzzled, but then I noticed this led towards the Jewish institute for the … Read more
Here is the Physics and Mathematics faculty building in Bashkir State University, in the city of Ufa, capital of the Republic of Bashkortostan, Russia. See what it looks like? Depends on your age or your affection for the history of computing, I suppose. This building looks like a logarithmic slide rule, the icon of the … Read more
I happened to look up and noticed this against the evening sky: These skewed towers with the broken antennas on top used to densely decorate every city rooftop when we were kids; every apartment needed an antenna, and the taller its tower, the better the reception – less “snow” and other interference in receiving … Read more
The art of Gauging and Ullaging, i.e. assessing the quantity of liquor, beer or malt in a barrel in order to tax it properly, used to be an important application of mathematics, and resulted in the development of some intricate computing devices over the last few centuries. Check the new article on my History of … Read more
This is the Ashtanur pencil case. Once you see it, you can’t help wanting one: it is simply too cool! So I got one, and here it is. These are made by two designers, my friend Ido Mohar and Baruch Mogilevsky, in mimicry of the local flat pita bread – called Ashtanur in Jerusalem, but … Read more
Here is a photo I snapped in a kitchen area in a company I visited. See what’s wrong? The refrigerator sits close to the wall on the left, and its door opens to the right (handle on its left side). Which means the person opening this door has to do a little dance to get … Read more
I was at a fancy home and kitchenware store and saw the box in the photo here, containing – it says on the front – “Salt & Pepper Napkin Rings”. This sounded weirdly intriguing, like “Oregano & Thyme Spark Plugs”, so I took a closer look. Turns out this is one of the stranger design … Read more
When Elisha Otis invented the ‘safety elevator’ mechanism in 1852, elevator crashes have become a rare event indeed. But these days “crash” has a new meaning, which Otis couldn’t have foreseen. Consider the elevator in the photo, from the Azrieli towers in Tel Aviv. It has a wonderful new control system with a large computer … Read more