RSSIf they wanted my workplace to be fashionably decorated, they'd call it the fashionplace
By Angela Gunn | Published June 12, 2009, 4:53 PM
This episode of Recovery is brought to you by the Bing "search overload" commercial and the genius at Woot who thought to take a camera to E3 and document all the Woot T-shirts on the show floor: One of them looks like the inside of my head, the other looks like the outside of the rest of me.
So tonight's the night: Facebook vanity URLs for everyone! The digital switchover is upon us. As Tim told us yesterday, about 2.2 million people aren't ready; as you see from the comments on his article, some folks have valid tech reasons for that. Ready or not, you should cruise by YouTube and enjoy the four classic-TV episodes they've put out front for you today.
The laughs you'll get (and why has more not been written about how Sam Raimi's the true inheritor of Alfred Hitchcock's gift for mixing comedy and horror, not to mention all those director cameos?) are a lot healthier than those from the video from The Rubicon Project that's making the rounds. I don't know what the heck Frank Addante was thinking when he made his video tour of corporate HQ, but dude, no. I like the idea of the credit card you spend on other people and whatnot, but generally speaking the visible stress and the politicking and the my-god-will-the-boss-stop-narrating-already and oh, god, the "speed lunching" -- this office has too much character for its own good. (And though Addante notes that the space is a former set for 24, I swear it reminds me of a tour I took of DEN back in the day. And along with the rest of the Net I need never be reminded of DEN again, kthx.)
I'm lucky; my boss not only doesn't seem to believe in an open-floor layout, he's seated 1868 miles away. His boss is 2329 miles away, except when he's traipsing around Eurasia, at which point who cares, it's the moon. But I wonder, looking at this video and thinking about the Googles and first-wave dot-coms the Rubicon environment emulates, whether tech folk miss the point when we try to make office environments too much like the Student Union.
Quit crying, put down the hackysack, and hear me out. (And if you're someone who currently would like to be in any work situation, please forgive my employed-ism. I hope things work out for you soon.) I appreciate that some people really want all that -- dogs in the office and videogame nooks and the ability to buzz the HR department with a paper airplane right from your desk. Shine on you crazy, de-cubicled diamonds.
But there are many coders whose optimal work environment is dark, closed-off, questionably ventilated, and filled with the soothing thrum of speed metal. Many who deal with regulations and standards -- I'm looking at some of you security auditors now -- need maximum quiet and minimal distractions, or they'll spend all day dodging the GAO reports in favor of surfing /b/ and sending each other midget porn. We've all had that co-worker whose desk was apparently made of dirty coffee cups and stale pastries; I will say no more about the need to contain that person. And for walk-and-talkers (people like me, who get up and pace around while on the phone) an open-office layout is an invitation to commit impromptu performance art, and a sure way to cause your co-workers to start stringing tripwires between the cubicles.
So I'm looking at that video and wondering why we've decided that the "cool" tech offices are not just furnished by Ikea, as Addante proudly notes his is, but designed by Romper Room. Are we trying to convince ourselves that we're having fun? Because other than on television, where set designers use traditional office design as shorthand for bad / boring / bureaucratic and funhouse moderne as shorthand for creative / cool / innovative, I don't buy it -- co-workers can be a happy experience, but most offices function better when there's some structure to keep them out of your face when necessary. (And I say that as someone who took a year off to temp, strictly so I could get some perspective on how other people spend their workdays. Nothing worse than a journalist who thinks that the journalism business is normal, trust me.)
So how about it, tech folk? No one's commented over at that Rubicon video, but you can tell me: Where do you do your best work? What office comforts can't you do without? I promise I won't judge you if you tell me that Rock Band and flat-panel monitors displaying Yammer stats are what make your workplace work, but can I get a witness for the beauty of coder caves and doors that close? For knowing that your boss is contained behind an architectural element that blocks grumbling and dirty looks? For occasionally letting the coffee-cup situation get out of hand without getting a lecture from a random co-worker on aesthetics?
Let your geek flag fly and have a good weekend.
I've found my favorite environment is when my team has it's own room with the cubes against the walls with the area in the middle open. I like being able to turn around and talk with other people rather then yelling over cube walls, and I like being able to talk with my teammates without other people ease dropping.
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|On good days, BG, my 6 year Maine coon, dictates the evening activities. On bad days, for some reason, I am drawn to my library and the poetry area and a poem by A. Rich called "Diving into the Wreck" I am sorry as it will take up space but I am sure there will be plenty of room to slam me:)
At various times in my life this poem has spoken differently to me. tonight, maybe because of this past week, it speaks in a way that I won't remember tomorrow.
Diving into The Wreck
First having read the book of myths,
and loaded the camera,
and checked the edge of the knife-blade,
I put on
the body-armor of black rubber
the absurd flippers
the grave and awkward mask.
I am having to do this
not like Cousteau with his
assiduous team
aboard the sun-flooded schooner
but here alone.
There is a ladder.
The ladder is always there
hanging innocently
close to the side of the schooner.
We know what it is for,
we who have used it.
Otherwise
it is a piece of maritime floss
some sundry equipment.
I go down.
Rung after rung and still
the oxygen immerses me
the blue light
the clear atoms
of our human air.
I go down.
My flippers cripple me,
I crawl like an insect down the ladder
and there is no one
to tell me when the ocean
will begin.
First the air is blue and then
it is bluer and then green and then
black I am blacking out and yet
my mask is powerful
it pumps my blood with power
the sea is another story
the sea is not a question of power
I have to learn alone
to turn my body without force
in the deep element.
And now: it is easy to forget
what I came for
among so many who have always
lived here
swaying their crenellated fans
between the reefs
and besides
you breathe differently down here.
I came to explore the wreck.
The words are purposes.
The words are maps.
I came to see the damage that was done
and the treasures that prevail.
I stroke the beam of my lamp
slowly along the flank
of something more permanent
than fish or weed
the thing I came for:
the wreck and not the story of the wreck
the thing itself and not the myth
the drowned face always staring
toward the sun
the evidence of damage
worn by salt and away into this threadbare beauty
the ribs of the disaster
curving their assertion
among the tentative haunters.
This is the place.
And I am here, the mermaid whose dark hair
streams black, the merman in his armored body.
We circle silently
about the wreck
we dive into the hold.
I am she: I am he
whose drowned face sleeps with open eyes
whose breasts still bear the stress
whose silver, copper, vermeil cargo lies
obscurely inside barrels
half-wedged and left to rot
we are the half-destroyed instruments
that once held to a course
the water-eaten log
the fouled compass
We are, I am, you are
by cowardice or courage
the one who find our way
back to this scene
carrying a knife, a camera
a book of myths
in which
our names do not appear.
Each of us has a "wreck inside us and life and education unhampered by such things as DMCA or other nonsense or lies our government tells us, has the chance to explore that wreck and come away with. as we break through the surface, the knowledge, the creative genius and the insight and, ultimately, the answer that needs to be spoken.
To the Betanews staff, I complement you for taking the dive and trying to make BN a better place. to MZ. Gunn, I complement you for having the courage to say what needed to be said about the 'wreck" we call the DMCA. To Mr. Fulton and the others I complement all of you for taking the plunge and the hits but making Bn a better place.
Finally, to the posters and I include myself, I withhold complements because unless you see yourself as part of a community called BetaNews only then can you make BN the most thought-provoking forum on the net or what we saw in the moronic posting on the winners. Within each is a wreck full of knowledge and as you break through the surface, you can be both a teacher and inspiration for creative thought. Respect the differences- respect the person behind the SN. Because only in this way can the creative genius break through to takes us to the next level.
So, To steal a line from Mr. Fulton who stole a line from Chevy Chase-
I am blt30 and you're not
goodnight and have a pleasant life.
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|oow, doesnt' she look lovely in the picture? :)
ahem... is it me or the article is... like those things that happen when you have too much spare time?
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|Eh! The nature of a Friday-afternoon column: You start thinking about the thing that's been nagging at you all week and suddenly you're on a tear. And it could have been so much worse this week -- heaven help me but I've had Boom Boom Pow stuck in my head since last weekend. You try writing tech articles with that menace rattling around.
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|Hi Angela,
Umm...
It's been over a week now and I (we) have not heard from any of the Betanews staff with regard to our having won the "Suggest Another Name For Bing" contest and I was wondering what's happening ??
Thanks
PS - My workspace has always been, is now, and will always be, a complete mess. ;)
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