s-expressions?! Crikey, was this made in LISP? :)

I agree with your points, and realistically it's not going to be an issue. I wish you luck with the new SQL implementation!

There is minimalism, and there is minimalism. I completely get where the article is going, but the design aesthetic of the last 10 years, lead by companies like Apple, does not encompass all of "minimalism". Not by a long shot.

Yes, there is definitely a move away from the contrived set of glossy surfaces, bezels, curved corners, and plastic and chrome which characterise most Apple products recently. I think that's a good thing.

For example, look at this and tell me it doesn't make you drool:

It would have looked odd 10 years ago. Now, it looks futuristic again. More to the point, retro-futuristic. kleinbl00's comment about embracing the Akira (and Bladerunner) kind of thing definitely has legs. In a way, we've been living in a kind of Jetsons-esque world, a 50s american futuristic view, where everything is molded plastic and rounded and smooth.

I'm more than ready for beautiful lines, the stylings of 60s and 70s futureperfect and the minimalism of the 60s to take a hold.

Personally I'm refurbishing a flat right now, and I'm really taken with the 60s minimalist aesthetic - Eames and Wassily chairs, minimalist clean-lined leather sofas, large wood tables with interesting geometries, futuristic lighting. Here are a few examples.

Sandstone and blue and white colours. Natural material with clear lines. Carbon-fibre. It doesn't have to look like Akira, but it's going to be a new minimalism and be cool as hell.

I completely agree with this - nascent technology (both in terms of our childhood, and the adolescence of home computing) evokes powerful feelings for those who were there, and is as "comforting" as an old book, a favourite sweater, a photo album full of 1980s polaroids.

I went through some alienating times recently, and watching old video games that I used to play growing up was an easy and pleasant form of escapism that both brought back good memories and allowed a return to simpler times, forgetting the present issues for a little while.

I say "watching" them because I found some longplays of them on youtube - I am not nearly as good or as practiced as I was when I was 14 or so - those games were damn hard!

Ghosts and Goblins, Pool of Radiance, The Immortal (on the amiga), Barbarian (Psygnosis), Super Hang On, Lemmings, Choplifter, Green Beret, Xevious, Terra Cresta... some great memories and fun to relive again.

Sounds like a good move, though I don't know how the site's data was structured before (though from experience I'd hazard a collection of different and interlinked pieces...)

Having a single database for everything can cause its own issues too, particularly when scaling enormously. Happy to discuss "data as a service" and other concepts if that will help - one thing at a time though!

Thank you!

Hi there, this seems to be a de facto introduction thread so I'll add to it myself.

I'm in my 40s, I live in Europe (3rd country so far), and a lot of my life is currently taken up adjusting to a recent move, getting into hiking and trying to furnish a new flat!

I used to be a professional musician, though now that's just a hobby. I work in biopharma, trying to find better ways to help people primarily with neurodegenerative diseases. The rest of my background is in heavy IT and business transformation.

I've been on the net since before the web, and helped build some of the largest early ecommerce sites, after an early focus on AI and gaming. I've been through most of the big discussion sites from slashdot and livejournal and SA through to reddit and ello. I found I increasingly removed chatty / meme-heavy content from my feed and found there was little with more consideration, hence me having a look here. Look forward to some good discussions and a bit more thought.