What were the best tech stories of 2006?
I’ve agreed to edit the next version of Best Technology Writing, an annual compendium of the top journalism in the field, published by the University of Michigan Press. (They have a new imprint called “Digital Culture.”) The is is a torch passed to me by Brendan Koerner, who did an exemplary job editing the premier book in this series.
So now I’m asking for your help. The good people at Michigan are collecting nominees for the best writing on tech subjects in the year just passed. This could include magazine, newpaper or online articles and columns, and certainly includes blog postings. Don’t think of “tech” too narrowly– I won’t! Ideally, though, the choices will be grokable by a general audience, and no longer than 5000 words. So please rack your brains and scan your memory circuits to recall the best stuff you saw–or maybe even wrote yourself.
The place to send your nominees is here. In addition, feel free to post your faves in the comments area below. But be sure to fill out the nomination form in that previous link. The nomination deadline is February 11.To get the best book possible I’d like to cast a net as wide as, well, the net. It would be great if you bloggers who read this would get your readers in on the hunt, and perhaps have some fun discussing some of the tech writing in 2006 that changed your thinking, told a great story, or simply was great journalism or commentary.
I nominate Peter Gutmann, for his piece “A Cost Analysis of Windows Vista Content Protection,” which is detailed and technical but readable, and may have a substantial effect on the industry as a whole. It can be found at http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html
Some weeks ago I wrote this verses, in spanish, and thought you could find them interesting:
If there was digital bread,
what would happen?
let us be good and say
that The State would “pirate” it
they were posted in this blog (http://chhaval.blogspot.com/2006/08/no-slo-de-pan-vive-el-hombre.html); thanks, bye
Anyone but Cory Doctorow.
I’d nominate “Daring Fireball” (http://daringfireball.net). John Gruber has an excellent writing style as well as a remarkable ability to drill through FUD to get to the real issues.
Critiquing the iPhone from a different point of view: usability.
http://www.excal.on.ca/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2858&Itemid=2
I nominate Ted Goranson’s About This Particular Outliner series (for About This Particular Macintosh). Goranson gets beyond just software reviewing and into something we might call software criticism: analyzing the philosophies and assumptions that are implied by interface and feature decisions. Almost every bi-monthly column is fascinating, but if I had to point to just one from the previous year, it would be either May’s “Outlining Workflows and ConceptDraw” (http://www.atpm.com/12.05/atpo.shtml) or July’s “Outlining Interface Futures” (http://www.atpm.com/12.07/atpo.shtml).
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