Tuesday, January 27, 2009

The first two chapters of Weinberger's Everything is Miscellaneous were really interesting (and not just because they provided me with fun new vocabulary words like "antialphabeticist"). I've never really considered carefully the methods we use for sorting. I tend to be a "sorter" and an "arranger," but I've never tried to figure out the method to my madness, it's just something I do.
I've always accepted alphabetical order as the "scien
tific" way of doing things, but I really don't know why. I rarely arrange things alphabetically for my own use. When I sort, I do so according to importance, frequency of use, etc.. What I like so much about my own exclusive corners of the internet, is that I can arrange them in ways that make sense to me. When I open my browser, my homepage is iGoogle. It looks like this:







                                                                                                                                                               Arranging items to suit my needs/habits is easy enough, all I have to do is drag them around. I find myself changing things up frequently, depending on my current needs. Google reader is almost always located at the top right, because it's what I check most frequently. The window for Gmail is closed because I forward emails to my Mac Mail, and read them there. I still keep the Gmail window, though, because sometimes Mac Mail doesn't work and I like my account to be easily accessible. Weather, a calendar, and news headlines are prominently positioned, as well, while the distracting stuff (like Youtube, iTunes, and the NY Times crossword) are labeled as "less important," by me, but still visible.