All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you.

My career has taken me from a place that used to be highly technical and is now swinging more toward the creative end of the continuum. That isn't because my interests have changed, though. Indeed, I've always loved doing creative work, but I couldn't pull it off on my own.

Side projects were my typical outlet for experimenting with my creative abilities, and they kept getting stronger and closer to what I wished I could do. My interactions got more elegant, my typography stronger, and my layouts followed suit. I got to the point a few years ago where I could be happy with my interaction design work, and moved into that role.

These days, there's still a gap, mainly on the visual side, but it improves with every project I undertake. As the only full-time designer here at Posterous, I'm doing a lot of visual design work, and I'm becoming a more capable visual designer in turn. The work I was cautiously proud of in 2010 is embarrassing now in 2011, and I hope I feel similarly next year. It's still not quite to where my taste demands, but I know my taste is more discerning than others', and for the vast majority, my work cuts it.

It's a long path, but Ira's right, the path to doing great creative work is a simple challenge: strive to satisfy your own sophisticated taste.

Speechwriters know that cadence is the lifeblood of a great speech. When the speaker is gifted, they'll understand how to bring out the speech's best through pauses and timing. For other speakers, it can require practice and a few tricks.

This article takes a look at a few of these tricks, and shows how they can be the difference between inspiration and a flop. For instance, audiences understand that lists of items in speeches usually come in threes, so they know when to start applauding if they agree.

Better still is to get the audience to start applauding early, because it gives the impression that they're so enthusiastic and eager to show their agreement that they can't wait - and the speaker ends up having to compete to make himself heard above the rising tide of popular acclaim.

One way to do that is to use a three part list, in which the third item is longer than the first two.

Love it. I've used the three-part list tool a lot, and liked the last one being the longest, but had never thought about it this way.

Meanwhile, I’ve grown more particular about the kind of news I want. I want a reading experience that defends the news from the circus that online advertising creates. I want good storytelling and analysis, not naked facts. I want news that admits and defends its point of view (and acknowledges that there is a truth to be uncovered), not news that parrots the party line while making claims to objectivity. I want long essays on the events at Fukushima and the consequences for nuclear power going forward, not shrieking dispatches of each new fire or setback. I want a history of American engagement in Libya, putting the events of the past few weeks in context. I want twenty thousand words on the recession and its effects on the middle class, not another lone statistic about the unemployment rate. I want thoughtful, investigative journalism that exposes the ways in which our government is failing us, so that we can make it better.

Read the whole thing, but I'll keep it short: amen.

Folks have been wondering why the new F-22 fighters aren't off in Libya shooting things up. An ex-Harrier pilot explains the difference between the combat capabilities of different aircraft.

What most non-tactical jet pilots don't know is that air-to-air and air-to-ground cannon are mounted differently. An aircraft with an air-to-mud cannon is at a gunsight depression disadvantage in a dogfight, and the opposite is true for fighter pilots who wish they were heroic attack pilots. Consider for a moment. If your primary mission is to make earthmen miserable, the axis of your cannon will be depressed from the longitudinal axis (fuselage) of your aircraft. This allows pilots to enjoy a more shallow dive and therefore leisurely opportunities to perforate the rabble and break their toys. Fighter pilots, conversely, have cannon that are biased above the longitudinal axis, because most of our enemies don't like to get shot and are pulling as many G's as they can to keep from getting their jump wings. If your gun is pointing up a few degrees, you don't have to pull your nose all the way to the bogey's jet before your glowing "death dot" is resting on the back of his helmet. This also means that F-16 and F-22 pilots have to strafe in a steeper dive and shoot quicker to keep from suffering cement poisoning.

It's a crash course in aviation combat euphemisms.

Seeing a space shuttle launch from the air is certainly a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and amazing to even watch on YouTube.

But what really locks in the victory is the flight crew announcing, "oh, and drinks are on the house too."

Former Chicago Bear Dave Duerson killed himself last Thursday. Unlike the stereotypical suicide, though, Duerson shot himself in the chest, ensuring that his brain could be studied for evidence of effects from his football career:

Duerson sent text messages to his family before he shot himself specifically requesting that his brain be examined for damage, two people aware of the messages said. Another person close to Duerson, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that Duerson had commented to him in recent months that he might have C.T.E., an incurable disease linked to depression, impaired impulse control and cognitive decline.

Once a successful businessman and NFL alumnus, Duerson had been privy to claims of dementia by other former players, and had been on a downward slope in his personal and business life in recent years.

If you know me personally, you know that I've had a lot of trouble watching or supporting football for the last two years. While I think it's a fun game to watch, I now believe that it's reprehensible that we encourage children to take part in an activity that can so seriously impact their future. Just as we look back on Roman citizens as barbaric for cheering on the death of gladiators, I predict that future generations will see today's football culture in a similar light.

Again, better helmets won't solve this problem. At its root, this seems to be about a game that inherently encourages the head to be used both as protection and as a weapon dozens of times every game.

It's just terrible that people who signed onto play this game thinking the largest risks were to their knees and ankles are now finding out the much more dire consequences.

The two said they decided to fly to Malta after being ordered to bomb anti-government protesters in Libya's second largest city of Benghazi, the sources said.

These guys should not only be given political asylum wherever they want, but they deserve a medal. Despite having their eyes covered by their military duty and decades of living in a dictatorship, they recognized an illegal order and took the weapons out of the hands of war criminals. I can't imagine how tough it must have been to make that decision, but these guys were obviously brave enough to do it.

On the steps required to adequately execute evidence-based medical practices:

If we assume, fairly generously, that you'll be 80% successful at each step in this chain - which really is pretty generous - then with 7 steps, you'll only manage to follow the evidence in practice 21% of the time (0.8^7=0.21).

I feel more and more like there's a lot of opportunity in the medical space for information services that treat medical professionals more like consumers.

Instead, it seems like the 1990s: territorial publications keep their research behind paywalls, researchers publish immature findings rather than collaborate or "perish," and searching what is available is closer to using a card catalog than a modern search. Consequently, doctors either ignore the resources that could be at their disposal, or they spend countless hours learning the tools rather than practicing better medicine.