Cool? Certainly.
Tool? Noooot so sure.

Still want one, though.

All good karma if your cyberpunk lifestyle includes an extra $530 for an unpadded laptop bag. If so, you aren't worrying about karma. Love Gibson (his novels in cheap paperbacks on real-life cybersubways), hate this.

OMG ... could you be any more pedantic?

What a motherlode of snotty vanity that was! How disgusting.

What ever happened to brief - concise - and utilitarian?

"genuine horse leather"

The human condition in three words.

What the hell did I just read? I don't think it's a cool tool- it's more of a rich niche.

I also have a laptop bag. It's made from bald eagle feathers and Californium. It's only $56,750,000 but man, it is totally worth it. You just can't get it wet or let it be exposed to air or it degrades considerably.

Pedantic? Absolutely. Isn't there an editor to keep this sort of drivel from ever appearing on this site?

This is not what I read cool tools for. I appreciate the work that the new editor has done in the past; but I go to this site for new cool tools, not advertising for other science fiction writers. Perhaps this post would have been more appropriate in a different category, 'Silly writing about stuff that is not interesting' would be a good one.

So it's twice the price of its most prominent competitors, but "it doesn't expand;" "you can overfill it with very little effort;" "the exterior paper pouch cannot be closed over an 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of paper;" and it "does not have the extra protections of many other laptop bags: padding, waterproof liners, hermetically sealed pockets within pockets".

But none of that matters, because (a) laptops are cheap and disposable now (really?) so laptop bags no longer need to actually protect their contents, and (b) it has "the William Gibson name carved into the horse-leather, in a perfectly incongruous Japanese designer simulation of your second grade teacher's perfect cursive."

Glad we got that straight.

that was horribly overwritten and pedantic. how is a not-very-good laptop bag a cool tool?

$530 for a bag? Come on! Get serious! Something like that is for people who only pretend to work.

As for the review itself---- it was a love letter to a briefcase. too long, learn to cut to the chase.

My word, what ghastly writing...

Have to agree with the emerging concensus. This review was unreadable. After struggling to make sense of the writing, I paged down to see how long it was (4 screenfuls), spotted the $500+ price tag, and skimmed what was left. Then shook my head when the review actually compared it unfavorably to other laptop bags.

Here's the laptop bag I made for my XO Laptop:

http://home.comcast.net/~stefan_jones/case_above_lo.JPG

The shell is a heavily modified toddler's sweatshirt I bought from the Goodwill Industries of the Columbia Valley thrift outlet.

The padding is duct insulation edged with Gorilla(tm) brand duct tape.

The straps and handle are a nylon dog leash and a nylon collar from Dollar Tree.

The pocket formed by the collar can be used to store freebie pens given out by the company vision care provider, those cheap pads of notepaper that charities send you, and ethernet cables. Also, packets of sugar and granola bars left over from the Jet Blue snack service.

The buttons and thread were provided by Jo-Ann's Fabrics of Hillsboro, Oregon. I had a coupon so they were really cheap.

Kevin Kelly: Cool Tool
Bruce Sterling: just a tool

If this is what we can expect from CT from now on, you just lost a looooooooooooot of readers.

#15, that was uncalled for. I didn't like the review either, but there's no need to be a prick about it.

This review is so completely removed from what I've come to expect at Cool Tools that I think it may be a joke. Please let it be a joke.

whoa, is it april's fool ....

This will go great with my baseball cap designed by Neal Stephenson (only $175.96) and my Oscar Wilde T-shirt (vintage).

"At $530, it's at least twice the cost of any of its peers." More like 3-5 times, I'd say. While I'm sure Tumi or someone does make a $250+ laptop bag, the vast majority of bags from good, solid manufacturers like Timbuk2, Waterfield, and Tom Bihn are in the $75-150 range, and most of these feature things like, you know, actual padding and comfortable shoulder straps. Useful functionality, capice? Toolishness.

I tend to agree with the above, but I have a different complaint as well (just what you needed to hear, right?) (smile). Why review a tool that is almost impossible for any of your readers to actually acquire? The San Francisco shop mentioned is out of them, the Japanese Buzz Rickson people don't sell it.. whether this is a "cool" tool or not is hard to say, but it might be purely a "virtual" tool if none of us can buy and use it...

"Nowadays Gibson makes stuff like bags, including this one..."

A tip of the hat to you, Mr Sterling! The pact you formed with Mr Stephenson to fight Gibson is apparently a strong and ongoing one. Sun Tzu proposed irritating an enemy that was already angry, and I can see that exposing this nonsense should accomplish that mission quite well. But it was not overly subtle - Do you not fear either retribution from Gibson's minions or the collateral damage that could be caused among this site's readers? Either way, a nice stroke. Well done!

What a crock! What a waste of our time!

If this is the new direction of Cool Tools, be prepared to lose a lot loyal followers.

Shame.

In his book "A Severe Mercy" Sheldon Vanauken describes how he and his wife took a hammer to the side of their new car so they wouldn't become too attached to it. Somehow this comes to mind as I think of Mr Sterling's grace period coming to a rude ending. And I do mean rude. Posters to this site will say that their criticism is free and impartial, but I think it goes beyond that. It is rude and unbecoming. But at least now you know the lay of the land.

I clicked through via RSS specifically to leave a comment to pan this review.

$530? Tokyo and Pacific Rim? Come on. This post is self-indulgent to absurd extremes and the product absolutely does not belong among the practical, joyous treasures of cleverness and workmanship that have brought me to love this blog.

Wrong direction, Bruce.

Two thumbs down.

$530 for a bag of questionable utility? Hah.
It better come with a $499.00 laptop inside it.

One thing that has been missing from the definition of "cool tool" from this site is value. This has been a problem with a number of recommendations.

I can think of a few sites where this article would have been appropriate (e.g. http://thecoolhunter.net ), however KK's Cool Tools is not one of them.

I loved Pattern Recognition, am a Gibson fan, and occasionally succumb to style over substance, but this bag fits substance with concrete shoes and dumps it in the Moskva.

"to tote the laptop computer that is my principal interface with the world in which I exist."

Is there any other?

"It includes a custom miniature MAG light attached to the zipper, to help one navigate through Gibsonian mapless territories"

you mean 'the dark'?

"I was elated at this opportunity to personally possess tangible proof that the cyberpunk narrative has thoroughly overtaken consensus reality."

That is so yesterday!

"a pack of American Spirits, a compulsively accessed Blackberry, or a tattered paperback about the flagellant messiah"

WTF?

"Several carabiner-friendly exterior folds, one of which is pre-occupied by a leather strap dangling a key-ring. Perfect for carrying a hand grenade, a Make magazine IED, or a Paul Virilio postmodern information bomb."

Attention: Homeland Security

"Mine survived a trip to Mexico City for a conference on parallel worlds (at which the bag also served as a useful prop for illustrating the infiltration of consensus reality by imagined cyberpunk worlds)."

Attention: Bellevue Hospital

Boooo!

On the upside: we do get valuable Cool Tool info from #14's post. Find a khaki toddler's terrycloth sweatshirt for raw material, build in a sheath for your black titanium-nitride-coated tanto sword, and you've got a Cyberpunk Edition right there!!!

What utter crap. I just read a love letter to a valueless status symbol that is neither cool nor a tool. What is this, BoingBoing?

Boot this editor before he does any more damage to KK's reputation. Ugh.

Well, the new editor still has to get used to things.

This one missed the point completely and should have been cut down to a tenth of the original, but everything's a learning process.

This item doesn't fit into Cool Tools at all! Thumbs down.

I enjoyed reading the review, it's just not what I come to Cool Tool to learn about. A laptop bag should protect your laptop and the other bric-a-brac you need to tote around with it while making everything easily accessible. Cool Tools normally features things that are very good for what they are supposed to do. This is almost unavailable, horrifically expensive, under featured, and well... not very good at what it's supposed to do. It would make a great post on a number of OTHER websites. Poor choice for this one.

Wow, everybody, don't wear out your FLAME buttons, now. I did find this review a little strange, more along the lines of a "kind of insane but cool-in-a-way" Gizmodo blurb than a CT contender, but heck, no need to go crazy, folks.

One funny thing, at the end:

"Sometimes available from Self Edge"

Self Edge is a boutique clothes shop in San Francisco, filled with all kinds of niche stuff that annoys, like $400 jeans that can't be washed, $250 western shirts, and $300 belts that can't fit over 30 inch waists. This bag does kind of fit right in.

I just bought a CountyComm Bail Out Bag for $39 that is stupidly tough, holds a lot of stuff, and looks the business. It, too, isn't padded or terribly waterproof, but it certainly would help shepherd me through a whole lot of tough times with nary a scuff, if needed.

Overpriced and overhyped. This does not belong here. Real geeks get bags based on functionality, which is why I have more Timbuk2 bags than I care to admit to in public. Stick to writing books, W!

I think most commenters here are missing the point: perhaps what we're asking laptop bags to do (i.e., fit mountains of stuff) is the wrong problem to solve, and this bag is asking us to rethink our approach to the problem.

I for one have done significant injury to myself by stuffing my laptop bag with too much useless crap, often stuff I never even pull out on trips. Maybe I need a bag to keep me from making this error.

Also, style *is* a function in clothing and accessories. People don't buy Jimmy Choo shoes because they're comfortable, they buy them to convey a message about themselves to observers. The message conveyed by this bag is significantly different than that conveyed by your Timbuk2 bag -- and "I am a person who lives a minimalist 21st century lifestyle with high-quality accessories" may be a profitable message to convey.

Not that I'm dropping half a grand on a laptop bag. But I would love to carry this one.

And I thought my comment (#2) was rough!

Bruce S. has now twittered that we are Philistines for dissing this. This is resembling a TechCrunch flamebait article to drive traffic. Too bad really. Hoping Bruce and the reviewer come clean that it is all a joke.

Lasser, the point is well made. But it's not really the sort of thing that seems to fit with the mission of the blog. This isn't a blog about making a statement, it's about things that are fundamentally useful. I'd love one too, but that's a cheap laptop, forget a bag! Not to mention that it's not AVAILABLE!

Greetings fellow philistines.

Disappointed to see such a great as Mr Sterling resort to a this type of post. A sorry combination of PR, 'bug is really feature' rationalization and verbosity.

I expect to see this damage controlled as link-bait soon.

Lasser, do you know what a lackey is?

I like the bag and I understand why it's cool, and I enjoyed reading the article. I think calling something "self-indulgent" is kind of an empty criticism these days, meaning in reality "I have a dislike for this (item, written piece, etc) for reasons I cannot articulate clearly, so whoever created it is clearly a boob". Especially when passages are quoted in comments so that the commenter can reply with "ugh!" or something equally meaningful. Maybe the flamers here ought to have been less vituperative and more specific.

That having been said, the main problem with this bag is that it doesn't fit my needs for the dystopian cyberpunk present. I deal with a climate that is progressively becoming wetter, and I walk (through various urban hazards) to work at a job for which I am underpaid. Last year, I actually spec'd out an ensemble that would fit my daily needs (since backburnered due to cost):
* 1 waterproof padded backpack with roll-top velcro closure, made in some Northern European country where it rains a lot and where they extol elegantly minimal design - metallic silver, <$200
* 1 pair surplus British Army waterproof sniper's pants, camo - <$20
* 1 deep-sea fisherman's overcoat, slate grey, made of an alarmingly durable plastic material, possibly kevlar, <$60
*black-on-black Converse Chuck Taylors (since they might actually fit my grotesque feet, plus they are congruent with my own imaginary cyberpunk aesthetic, and they dry out somewhat quickly once removed) - $30
* etc etc etc
...so it's not really enough that a bag offers (admittedly amusing) literary allusions, it's got to be tough as steel on the outside, supremely soft on the inside, waterproof to the point of allowing total submersion, and affordable enough for, well, me. I think this bag is entertaining but is maybe somewhat out of touch with how real people approach the everyday problem of "how the hell do I keep my computer safe on the way from point a to point b?"

LMAO.
Wow!
Humor is most definitely lost upon this whiny audience.

@meatbag: I take your point about "self-indulgent" being over-applied in general, but I think it's bang-on here. The review is clearly not written for the benefit of informing the reader: it's written to indulge the reviewer's love of pompous, overblown verbiage and name-dropping. Thus, he indulges himself in his awful, bloated writing habits at the expense of his readers, who have to wade through paragraphs of tripe only to find that the reviewed item is not worth a tenth of the asking price.

Well, the author must be beaming after that exhaustive review. Do cyberpunks beam?

I agree with many of the comments here; mine is added not to be original, but to add quantity. Please don't let this be the new direction of Cool Tools.

If the point is that it's a niche product designed to let us leave our paper world behind, the review shouldn't include that the pockets are perfect for letter sized papers, a checkbook (seriously?), the Financial Times, or tattered paperbacks.

Show me a review for a superior cyber-tech bag, that's lightweight, yet durable, slim and stylish. This five-hundred-and-thirty-dollar tote fails to be a Cool Tool.

What's so annoying about this review isn't just that it's about an item of questionable utility and value. The bigger problem is that it is several hundred words of pseudo-philisophical babble. It should not have been published in it's present form because it contradicts so many of the given guidelines for a Cool Tools review, such that the review be concise, that the item be chosen for it's utility, not design, and that it be significantly better than the competition for the purpose used.
I agree with other posters that this may be a hoax.
The question is then, what was Mr. Sterling's part in this? If he let this review pass at face value, and then is making light of the negative response to it, then that is disappointing. Yes, the job of editor is done remotely, but no, you can't just phone it in.
If Mr. Sterling was complicit in publishing a review that he knew to be either intentionally or unintentionally farcical, that is also disappointing. This is not The Onion, or CollegeHumor. I don't expect him to use this as a platform to get a few yucks.

I walked into the lonely hotel and there she was - long, lithe and lips that could stop a cardiologist's heart. She glanced my way but I knew I had no chance. So I angled over to the front desk. Still, I felt her eyes on me. Or rather, not on me, but on my William Gibson Aviator Briefcase, She licked those luscious lips as her eyes caressed the Cyberpunk Black satchel and her chest heaved as she stared with wabi-sabi devotion to the perfection and fine detail of my superlight bag. Her eyes widened as I pulled out my laptop, 3 pens, several electronic devices but the illegally procured Atvian I drew out dragged her over to me like a slug to beer. Only the slime trail she left behind was drool after eying the classic rip-stop fabric. At that point, I knew I had her.

$530, available at J. Peterman. And, well worth every dollar.

@Moon#49: Thanks, I was waiting for one of those.

But will an Ono-Sendai deck fit in comfortably, and is there an outlet for the leads? Don't want to be fumbling with keyrings when trying to jack in while on the run...

My favorite is still the Ortlieb messenger bag - $150.00. (http://bicyclehabitat.com/itemdetails.cfm?id=1996) It's basically a huge waterproof top loader with backpack straps. It's not padded, but you can buy a 6 foot length of closed cell foam at a department store for $10 and make your own padding. It's more than big enough for even 2 laptops, plus all the other crap you have to haul around. Comfy on or off a bicycle. Why sling that weight over just one shoulder?

Also, back in the 60's when I was young, we didn't call them "cyberpunks". We called them "virgins". You kids!

A bit pricey, but the right idea. I have a Timbuk2 that quickly got overfilled...so for days when just don't need to carry that much on my bike or my back, I picked up (for $15) a Tamrac 5106. Since I had been reading Pattern Recognition shortly before that, I stripped it of its logos, and it really looks pretty generic. But it holds my Acer Extensa 14.1" machine with just enough room to spare for a pad and paper, power supply and a few other things. And when I ride, I can stuff the whole bag into a pannier. And I saved over $500 :-).

FAIL.

1. Obnoxious.
2. The bag is not "made by Gibson."
3. Bring back an editor who understands cool tools.

Bruce Sterling sent me, said the philistines were bashing WG's bag. Can't see but what the bag's a bit pricey and the writing over the top.

The review is too long. I see nothing "tried and true" about that bag. Not the direction I want the site to go.

Selling your pals bags, Mr Sterling? How gauche.

@ VEKTORRUM #56 If Mr. Sterling really is refering to the readership here as Philistines, it's not cute. It's condescending and should stop immediately.

LOL. And the pathetic hits keep on coming. Hilarious if it weren't so sad.
I'll spell it out for this cluster of whiners:

*************
Sterling is making fun of the bag.
*************

The logic of this humor for those who still fail to keep up: The bag is an absurd, over-the-top idea unto itself. So the review is appropriate.

@Secretsquirrel: nobody cares whether this godawful review is written by a genuine toss-pot, or whether Nakashima-Brown is taking the piss, or whether Sterling's invented him as a postmodern gag, or whether Sterling is making fun of the bag or the (possibly fictional) reviewer.

If this *is* an attempt at a joke, it's even more depressing. I mean, if it were a genuine review there would at least be some hope that it's a one-off, and reviews of more useful items might come along later. If, as you imply, this site is now publishing hilarious parodies instead of tool reviews, I'm sure it will find an appreciative audience as some kind of slightly more techie "Stuff White People Like". However, it will lose most of its current audience, who -- bafflingly enough -- come here for tool reviews.

it's a shanzhai version of a popular porter bag... design is a total rip-off, down to the mag-lite on the zipper. though technically not shanzhai since gibson has the balls to sell it for about 5x more than original

17 paragraphs of flapdoodle about a ridiculously overpriced piece of luggage?
Egad...
What is this site becoming?

Much amusing and totally appropriate snark about this silly bit of overpriced luggage porn.

No doubt a symptom of the gradual Boink Boink-ification of Kewl Tewls, mon. Soon we will learn that, just as on BB, all you need do to rate a mention here is to boink all or some of the correspondents.

Or perhaps this is a datapoint for a previously-unknown corrollary to Gibson's Law about "The Street": The internet-famous find their own commodities to fetishize. I'm sure Burroughs would be proud, Bill.

Didn't get past the seventh paragraph.

I too was moved to comment for the first time here: I've been following KK's tools for a long time, never with an eye for fetish-candy like this. Boing boing bait indeed, but if you think this is a cool tool -- wtf happened to J Baldwin?

For indestructible, hyperfunctional toting gear, I second the recommend for Tom Bihn's thoughtful, elegant designs. Bomber, low-key and hella waterproof.

If this is a joke I guess the blog is going in a different direction and looking for a different readership.

That would mean I'm out and will check back after a couple of months to see what's what.

If it's just a mistake it's fine, I don't mind mistakes.

A great review. Even if the product did not exist, it would still be a great review. Now, if only you were able to provide a shanzhai version of a gun that runs "caseless [ammo] through a floating breech", my life would be perfect.

Ignore the 'tards and let them ooze back to the XXth century.

This post has all the problems of Boing Boing -- it's childish drivel that appeals only to a self-obsessed celebrity sect. Cool Tools has a well-established track record of concise, insightful reviews of products that work for people who do real work. Read this review and then any other review on this website and you'll see the dissonance immediately.
Readers like #59 and #67 have a point, there are definitely good things about this review. It's funny, creative, and it's interesting to know that Gibson is designing stuff. But there are lots of blogs out there for people who want to read about amusing consumer junk (Boing Boing).

Long time reader, first time commenter.
This is even more asinine as a 'cool tool' than the bulletproof backpack.

If it was a too-subtle-and-clever-for-me-to-catch-on satire, then perhaps the overwrought prose should be peddled in a different venue?

Can't help but wonder what the lurkers here are thinking.

I suppose I understand the several complaints about this post - not that I agree that there's anything wrong with the review (which I quite liked), but I know both Kevin and Bruce, and they're culturally, stylistically, and personally different. Reading a Sterling "Cool Tools" will clearly be a different experience from reading at Kelly "Cool Tools," but no less fun or fascinating. And no less useful, though there will always be products reviewed you wouldn't use.

re #41 and the Bruce S. Philistine twitter:
Wouldn't we more properly be called Bohemians?

I visit this website nearly everyday.

Not concice, Not Cool, stop wasting my time...

1 day boycott

A summary of what a Cool Tool should be is at http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/003672.php. It seems clear to me that this post doesn't meet the criteria; it's faddish and it's not significantly better than the competition.

If the bag didn't have a sci-fi author's name attached to it, if the editor of Cool Tools weren't a sci-fi author, and if the original poster weren't also a sci-fi author and a friend of the editor -- would the bag be considered a Cool Tool on its own merits? Clearly not.

Attention Cool Tool readers! This is your captain speaking. Please remain in your seats.

I'd like to cool down the temperature of the current hazing for the new guest editor of Cool Tools, Bruce Sterling. A little background: Cool Tools is going on its seventh year. It kind of knows what it is by now. I am heartened by the many readers who also have a sense of what a cool tool is or is not. Nothing is more gratifying than to see a creation take on a life of its own.

I selected Bruce as guest editor knowing that his version of Cool Tools would not be exactly like mine. I felt Cool Tools was mature enough to withstand being interpreted by another impressario. (Just as Wired magazine was a big enough idea to be re-interpreted by a number of other editors beyond its founders.)

This is Bruce's first week. He's trying some stuff out. This item was not a joke. Here is what Sterling wrote me in my own questioning of the item:  "The review is long and artsy, but  that's a very detailed, factual discussion  of a  genuine laptop bag. It's not that this bag doesn't exist, or that it isn't a good bag, or its vaporware. Sure the reviewer is a rich artsy lawyer, but he's doing the classic Cool Tools thing of talking about something he uses every day that he likes to use and is good. The bag does exist and it's pretty nice; I saw the thing." It was not meant as humor, or parody.

Ok, it bombed. So if Bruce is smart -- and he is -- he'll take this outpouring as a verifiable data point and adjust his steering.

My request to the regulars here (you 1,000 True Fans) is to give him a couple of weeks to get oriented, find the limits of what is a tool, and keep us surprised with cool stuff. I didn't hire Bruce to be boringly predictable. As he tries to explore what works a bit, he's bound to make a few more blunders. By all means let us know in the comments what is working and what is failing. But I ask some patience. He's repainting the color of the padded cell we are in, so don't freak out.

Yet.

Possibly the weirdest and definitely the most pathetic collection of comments I've laid eyes on today.

Maybe reading a few Youtube comments will salvage my dwindling esteem for humanity. Thanks a lot.

Folks, a nice laptop bag can be quite a useful tool for a Texas lawyer.
You ever see a lawyer show up at trial with a bag made of duct tape?
Not that there's anything wrong with that! Your Honor.

This is a design review, by a science fiction writer, of a product designed by a science fiction writer. Every gadget site on earth features laptop bags. Nobody but us has got one of THESE kinda reviews. Man, reviews like this didn't even used to be possible.

I'm not gonna do this every day. There aren't that many opportunities for me to have this much fun. And, yeah, this is linkbait. I confess, it's true. I put it in here specifically to make Boingers jump up and down. I love those guys, okay? Your former editor is Boinging right now. I'm practically a Boinger myself. Boingers are all over the place now. Try to understand that.

Please do not handwave and class-war here, scaring off potential contributors who happen to like expensive, toney couture items. Because some of my other best friends are European designers. Do not alarm the delicate, easily-wounded CoolToolers who use cologne and five-bladed vibrating razors. They're like shy woodland creatures.

I know that Cool Tools is the ultimate in West Coastie granola -- because I've been reading this site for day one. But if you've never seen haute couture -- if you're all fussy about that, because, you know, nice stuff seems too fancy for you? -- well, you're missing on very interesting parts of life. And given that I teach design school -- I'm thinking, well, not TONS of design on COOL TOOLS, but, okay, really, gotta have some design. Great design is very cool. I promise.

This site is entirely built on people's personal testimonies. I'm not writing the text around here. It's not a Bruce Sterling site. I already got one of those. I don't even much want to comment here on Cool Tools. I intend to keep quite a low profile. This is a marathon, not a sprint.

We run real testimonies here about real stuff that people use every day. That's the plan. Some of those testimonies might be provocative. Don't jump up howling because you've met some strange guy whose tastes and values clash with yours -- what's "cool" about that? What you want to do then is to assert your own values, not flame about his. If you own something cool, and you really use it, you know what you're talking about, hey, I'm all ears. I'll run your text. Love to have it. Truck it right over.

We're running 'em every weekday here. Got plenty of room here in cyberspace. I'm not judgemental, I'm not gonna bite ya. Let's chug right along.

Oh, and yeah. One more thing. Gibson makes shoes and coats, but I once designed a super-expensive, semi-practical lamp. I got three of 'em in this apartment. The lamps work. Sorta. If you own of my lamps, I'm keen to have you review it.

Better a misstep than a joke, but I tend to think that an editor should mercilessly edit. The job should be to set a tone, not run a spell-checker.

Worse, I've tried to read the article several times. I made it through all the unpleasantly rude and personal comments, but I still have no idea why on Earth I might want such a bag except that it has an author's name badly printed on it.

Direction and distinctive style are fine, but the result still needs to convey information. And quickly, since I don't have a day to kill reading one article about something I'm probably not going to care about.

So the definition of a "cool tool" now includes things that have no merits except an interesting design?

That's just cool, nothing tool about it.

It's humorous? Oh, well - haha!

It's a real item? Gosh!

It's haute couture, and therefore elevating and enriching to read about? Merci!

All that may be true, but I wouldn't have read any of it, if it had been published in a more appropriate venue. It's not my cup of twee, and I hope I don't see any more of its kind - especially not here.

Thanks to toyo (#20) and pimon (#65) and Ra McGuire (June2003) for suggesting Tom Bihn bags! Quality stuff made in the US of A it looks like (based on what I see at www.tombihn.com).

Thank you for that review. I enjoyed it.

And, while I have no plan to buy that particular bag, I am glad to know that it exists. It makes the world a slightly stranger place.

All in all, an interesting day. The post drew a lot of comment which clearly showed the level of ownership that the readers feel with a blog they identify with. The actual owner shows that he's got his feet solidly planted on the bridge of the ship and will tolerate no abuse of the guests at his table.

The guest editor himself shows that despite his celebrity status he can take a punch and come out smiling. And most interesting to me, he did exactly what I used to do when I'd take over management of a new store. Rearrange the office furniture. It's the best way to throw the incumbents off guard a bit and let them know that there's a new hand on the helm.

Again, well done. However I do caution that although rearranging the furniture is a good thing, care must be taken not to move it into a position where it impedes the day to day tasks but if possible, to aid them instead. Form for form's sake is for those who can afford it. For the rest of us, it's all about function and value. I think Bruce is up to the challenge, and I'm looking forward to see if future selections can add form to that function and value rather than just replace them.

I read every one of the comments, including Mr. Sterling's defense and Mr. Kelly's apologia. I still stand by my original post: regardless of the price of the bag, its features and performance, the turgidity of the prose in the review (or lack thereof), etc. etc... why review an item that is pretty much unobtainable? We will all have different notions of a tool's value, its price (not the same thing), its functionality, its looks... and I think it is fair of CT to stretch the range of our comfort levels with these attributes. But I do think it is unfair of CT to put up something that one just cannot buy without either leaving the country or hitting a boutique website at the right second. If CT includes many more items like this, it becomes not a site for guiding people to tools they could use, but a site for viewing them from afar. A tool that can't be acquired is a tool that cannot be used, and a tool that cannot be used is not... a tool? (Better stop now before I collapse into a verbal black hole.)

Quite an interesting pair of responses from the local authorities. I, for one, certainly enjoyed being a granola-eating liberal xeno-thought/product/person-phobe. Must be a Texas thing, huh, Bruce?

One question left unanswered: What relative share of the market for valorizing "good design" (whatever TF that is) over absolutely every other value does CT plan on cornering? Considering that www.coolhunting.com already does such a great job at it (and even sports that Pattern Recog tie-in)?

OK, I initially thought that Kevin's "just a mistake" was sufficient, but Bruce's defense, while probably intended as entertainment, comes off as insulting. What, we're provincial dimwits if we don't rave about substanceless style? We're babies for not wanting to slog through five pages of unreadable prose extolling the virtues of a piece of crap?

Sorry, I admire nice things, but I do that elsewhere. And I don't need to be told what I need in my life.

That doesn't excuse the commenters who blithely toss off "dat ain't a cool tool" without explanation or grump that--my god--something about the site has changed. But seriously, if this is going to be an unedited platform for whoever catches the so-called editor's attention, with a bonus of name-calling of anybody who disagrees? Well, no. Just no. Other sites do a far better job at that sort of thing.

I hope that everybody is just overreacting, because this is generally an enjoyable read EVEN when it's showcasing things I would never consider buying.

I work for a lot of lawyers. Let me just say I'm glad I don't work for the one who wrote that review. The ones I work for are windy enough!!!

:D

Sterling: If you've truly been reading CT since "day one", then suggest you go back and do so again. CT is for people who do actual *work* and want tools that will help them that represent an excellent price point for what they allow us to accomplish with them.

Your overpriced POS ripoff of a laptop bag that does nothing better and most things worse than my 5x cheaper Tom Bihn fits nowhere on this site and doesn't so much alienate the readership as make them wonder whether the tubes have gotten crossed and they read some self-indulgent hipster useless shit gadget blog ("ZOMG someone made a steampunk iPhone mod!!!1one! where can I buy
one????") instead. Blarf.

You're right, this is a gadget site and we like laptop bags - like my Tom Bihn that I bought SPECIFICALLY because it was featured here - literally, "If it's on CT then Bihn stuff must be good, I don't need to shop around".

Kevin: Solely as a result of this blog, I've bought more than 500 bucks of gifts for friends and family through your Amazon affiliate links (even though I could have found it elsewhere for cheapers, I wanted to support your effort). I consider(ed) this site the best source bar none for finding unique stuff that my family loved to get as gifts. Don't fuck it up.

@dingo: Indeed. I am THE most avid Cool Tool True Fan.

If nothing else, this post has generated what is by far the most entertaining Cool Tools thread I've personally bothered to read. Good work, people.

>Nobody but us has got one of THESE kinda reviews.

For an overpriced, under-performing product that's not even available at the linked vendor.

>Please do not handwave and class-war here, scaring off potential
>contributors who happen to like expensive, toney [sic] couture items.

For God's sake. If anything should be clear by now, it is that the people who come to this site don't come here for expensive, toney [sic] couture items. We come here for tools that really work, that are tried and true.

>Don't jump up howling because you've met some strange guy whose
>tastes and values clash with yours -- what's "cool" about that?

This has nothing to do with "some strange guy whose tastes and values clash with" ours. His taste and values clash with the stated purpose of the site.

This is Kevin's site, and he's free to change its direction as he chooses. If his definition of a Cool Tool has become "expensive, toney [sic] couture items," that's his right. But in that case, Kevin and Bruce should tell us that it will no longer be the Cool Tools that we've come to admire.

And spare us your fucking condescension.

DGF

>And given that I teach design school -- I'm thinking,
>well, not TONS of design on COOL TOOLS, but,
>okay, really, gotta have some design. Great design
>is very cool. I promise.

I agree. Great design is very cool. But according to THE REVIEW, this bag barely holds what the reviewer needs, doesn't protect his computer from bumps, and its cost is way out of proportion to its value. Not cool, barely a tool.

If anything, it's not design, it's fashion.

Also, J. Lasser: I don't want a tool to ask me to "rethink [my] approach to the problem." I want it to do what I purchased it to do. And I DO NOT purchase my tools to "convey a message about [myself] to observers." Again, that's fashion, not design. And fashion, no matter how cool, is not a tool.

DGF

I just deleted a comment because it was derogatory and unconstructive. You can criticize an individual's actions but not their being.

Hmm... OK, your BEING is all good. Still, this is not a tool cool, more like a fool tool... I suppose with so many people really hurting in these times touting a $530 bag (plus i suppose about $50 in tax it being california so lets just call it sub 600) indicates a certain kind of tone deafness if you will. My Targus case is a lot cooler. $28 bucks, iifetime guarantee, and I have the other $500 bucks invested in an MLP that pays me 16% interest... Now THAT is cool. Anyway, I have enjoyed so much great stuff here I will come back, but I do have to say I am used to a rather pragmatic and utilitarian editorial viewpoint, which I suppose is "granola" according to Mr Sterling. I guess I will stick with granola rather than effete and profligate. I will try to raise my sights to accomodate the new dress code in here.

This review has generated the most responses of any review I have seen! Let me see if I can boil this down... this review is bad because:

Form + Function = Good Design

Form - Function = Bad Design

This bag is not cool and not a very effective tool.

The old reviews were interesting, concise and enjoyable to read about even if I didn't need the item. The last few weeks Ugh!

Hey I just thought of another cool tool to review. Hermes Scarves! Only about 2000 bucks apiece, and they are "expensive, toney couture items" AND we have the added bonus of some of Hermes "best friends are European Designers!!". Wow that is really impressive! OK, back to my granola.

I think that's ridiculous, $530 for a fancy "laptop bag" that you could probably get a better one for <$20 at Goodwill.From the review it sounds like it doesn't stand up at all to a timbuk2 bag in durability or function(which can easily be argued is the benchmark for laptop and commuting bags). Sure the leather will cost the extra over a plain ballistic nylon, and if it really improves the quality of the bag than it's worth paying for, but not being able to fit a letter sized sheet of paper in the paper pocket...really?

But on the whole I think this is just exploiting steampunk fanboys and girls. Never really got charging HUGE amounts for "designer" products. Especially when I see things like a bag at my college w/ a polished ANCHOR SHACKLE on the straps...like the kind that you use w/ chain, and a boat anchor... So imagine this http://www.foreandaftmarine.com/50-43151.BMP w/ white leather...and the person carrying it thinking it's high fashion.

But on the other side I do like some of the design ideas of steam punk with the fusion of 1800's and some art deco styles. And they really got a boost from the release of BioShock which I've noticed from personal experience is what lots of people think of when the word "steampunk" is mentioned.

I'm sure some of my sentence structures are garbage...I went back and added some stuff. Sorry :P

Oh yeah and WTF Bruce Sterling

"Great design is very cool. I promise."...this is far from a great design, this is fashion trying to spew out something function...which is normally an epic fail.

I would much rather spend the $530 on 3-4 messenger bags that I KNOW are going to last (Timbuk2 and Chrome FTW).

And haute couture....are you kidding? People are scrambling for the aforementioned bags in my post to seem high class/ hip. That and all of Timbuk2's bags are handmade (in SF) and can be custom made. Also I would be willing to put down good money on a real life test of this nylon and leather designer sack vs a timbuk2 bag.

You want great designs? Look at some of the "granola" crunching northern California companies that are basically setting the bars in their fields. Like Timbuk2 and Apple, both very cool and great designs.

I really do get why the reviewer likes his bag. I still think the review needed a good work over for the sake clarity and brevity. As for the bag itself, well you know what they say, a weed is a flower in the wrong place. I don't think all the complaints here can be dismissed as class warfare. I think if you polled the people who complained about the review, you will find among them professionals who wear cologne and own nice suits.
Let's talk about the bag itself. It's a mistake, and just fuels the fire to label it haute couture. This bag is a speciality item for sci-fi fans who will pay a premium to have a good quality working replica of an item they have read about in a book or seen in a movie. The reviewer himself refers to this as "the simulacrum premium." This is for the fan who wants more than a halloween costume or a toy. These items are expensive because they are either custom made, or made in small quantities, I first came across the William Gibson aviator jacket a few years ago. Why? I had just seen The Matrix Reloaded, and I wanted a jacket just like Neo's. Not a halloween costume, I wanted an actual coat I could wear everyday if I dared. A google search turned up the Japanese shop selling the Gibson Jacket, and also a very good custom shop in Canada which sells high quality made-to-measure replicas of the clothing worn by characters in sci-fi movies and anime. The items weren't cheap, but they were comparable to what it would cost me to have a suit made by a custom tailor. This isn't even all that new. 15 years ago at a Star Trek movie I saw a guy in a perfect Star Trek the Next Generation Starfleet Uniform. I could see that it was made of a wool felt and properly tailored. I asked him how much it cost him, but he refused to say. Right now you can go to Roddenberry's site and get patterns for Starfleet apparel and a referal to someone who will custom make it for you. In the premium customs section, you can buy a precise replica of Captain Kirks command chair. Sure, the chair is a fine example of 1960's futuristic design, but the people who buy furniture like this are not buying it just for its slick design.
Did I ever get my Neo coat? No. At around $600, the premimum was too high for me, but I was still glad to know I could get one if I wanted too.

I'm a Product Designer who specializes in backpacks and outdoor softgoods.

This bag is 100% sh*t.

Dumb, pointless, useless.

Can't store 8.5x11" paper.
(are you kidding?!?!)

Isn't padded for a laptop.
(??? thats its purpose!)

Costs $500+
(appallingly ridiculous)

The ripstop is not special, it is generic
(don't think this bag has any "special waterproof ripstop" / its all from the same factory, and its the same stuff on most other bags)

The absolutely best review I've read on here so far!

True, it's not getting me excited about spending money on a useful object, but that doesn't mean it "fails" in the cool tool sense.

Hey, the coolest tool is still the human brain!

I was totally not expecting to come across what amounts to an amazingly allusive [and funny!] commentary on post-modern consumer culture, so the surprise was delicious!

Come on people, lighten up! Let the ideas of some of our favorite writers intersect with the "real" world. It's entertaining and enlightening.

I love the craft of this review, but I am in complete agreement with the dissenters about its subject. Nonetheless, while I don't expect to find such dichotomies at Cool Tools, I'm happy to face one every once in a while. I think the titanium Halligan bar was the last overpriced, under-useful implement review I read, though that didn't attract anywhere near as much vehement objection...

Kevin: As long you're not going to be treat us to a compulsory session at The Teresa Nielsen Hayden School of Ladylike Blogging, I'm certainly willing to keep coming back.

Bruce: I think you may have underestimated the level of sophistication in your audience:
- I'm a het male, my razor has five blades, I wear a cologne I guarantee you've never heard of, and my wardrobe includes colors not found in nature. I'm also a carpenter and a welder.
- My laptop bag is designer and cost more than Gibson's POS, and I own three suits made for me in Hong Kong. The tailor was recommended to me by a former ops guy in the US DIA.
- I spent close to 30 years living in Manhattan, where my wife worked on 7th Avenue.
- And just to close out with a Gibson reference: I have a pair of beautiful shoes, handmade for me in India, that are probably older than you.

So please try not to condescend quite so much to your audience. Some of us probably understand both "cool" and "tool" at least as well as you do. And coming from the author of "Artifical Kid", thinness of skin really comes off kind of ...disappointing.

Far be it from me to "condescend" to anybody, but I seem to be the only commenter here who has actually seen and handled that Gibson bag. It's not Star Trek memorabilia. The thing is made by top-end Japanese craftsmen and with fanatical attention to detail and amazing materials. It's as indestructible as a titanium Halligan bar.

Thanks for dropping by, "willibro." Please tell me more about this Hong Kong suitmaker recommended by the Defense Intelligence Agency.

It's pleasant to see some lively airing of the issues here, but I'm your editor, I'm not your dad. I can only publish the product recommendations that people send to me. You wanna see some particular kinda product reviewed? Then send me some product recommendations. Don't be too lazy to stand up for the stuff you like! Get out of the armchair, critic.

Ladies: we got about a ton of rough-tough beardy welder-guy geodome-builder granola laptop bags on this site, yet as far as I can tell, we've got one purse. ONE purse?! And it's ugly.

http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/002693.php

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE COOL TOOL BLOG???

Seriously.

And if you wanted a bag with better material, you could get a Filson for under $200.

Golly gee, "Mr. Sterling", sir, your reference to being the only commenter to actually see and hold such an esteemed article of retail fluffery might be due to the fact that, as a few "lazy, armchair critics" have already pointed out, your laptop-bag-of-the-Gods isn't readily available.
Oh, and as for you not being our dad -- to tie our shoes for us, and to hold our hands when we're scared, and to guide us through this hectic and confusing life, and to recommend Cool Tools that your friends write reviews for -- I think we'll manage.
Maybe we can reach a deal of sorts, Mr. Sterling, sir? We, the lazy armchair critcs, will send you items to review and edit (but not any more rough-tough beardy welder-guy geodome-builder granola items, 'kay?), and you'll quit alienating all the readers on this site?
Are you listening Kevin?

Mr. Sterling, I'm sure you understood the central point of my previous point. I did not dismiss the bag as cheap memorablia. I am willing to acknowledge that the bag is a nice well made bag. However, by the reviewer's own words, a large part of the appeal to him of this bag is it's association with the world of Mr. Gibson's imagination.

What CR Banks said, and JCW too (Hermes scarves, mmmm. I'd put in a blurb for Harry Winston jewelry, too, but that way lies the circle of hell reserved for gourmets).

So OK, Pop, since you asked, here's your "product recommendation":

"Danny Liung, Good Time Tailor, 3-7233731, in Wan Chai. An elegant, polished and gracious gentleman who visits and works with you wherever in HK you happen to be. He has some kind of special arrangement with the genuinely exceptional HK Peninsula Hotel, which I'd recommend you stay in even if you're not buying a suit. When I met him in the late 1970s, he was planning a California branch, so look around. (My acquaintance also recommended David Cheng at Manning Tailor, across from the Prince Hotel. But never having met either of these gentlemen before, I picked Danny for his amusing "Hello Sailor!" DBA name alone.)

"Danny is a courteous hyper-pro who offers great advice to offset his frightening array of fabric choices, and is as gentle as a mother's kiss with people ignorant of these matters. He's not as expensive as you'd think. Even if he were: Anybody needing to wear suits needs to invest in tailored suits, because a tailored suit in a decent fabric wears like a diamond drill bit. It's not just a comfort thing; it's because *you* are also not chafing *the suit* in the wrong places. I wore all three of my Good Time suits every single week over the entire course of a 7-year stretch at a vile corporate job near Wall Street. I had to alternate them with an ever-growing pile of off-the-rack suits, many as expensive as Danny's, from name brands like Brioni and Brooks. I still have all three of the HK suits (now lovingly preserved) and all the others wore out."

Do feel free to put that on the main page and annoy the stonking shite out of my fellow CT readers, who up until now have, I think, relied on the site not for some sort of generic "product recommendations", which are pretty easy to find all over the web, but for Cool Tools, which are really hard to find (and probably why you're having so much trouble as the FNG).

An HK tailor's product -- fine as it may be -- just does not constitute a Cool Tool. But I would compound that basic error greatly if Danny Liung were also a personal friend of mine, a fellow tailor, and a collaborator on one or more suits. Then I would appear to be doing what is known as logrolling, which is daily practice at Boink-Boink and one reason why that site is now a joke to a lot of people.

Look: I know it's standard practice among successful published authors to do circle-jerk jacket blurbs for each other and then think nothing of it. But a lot of the public consider the practice dishonest crap, done out of the most suspicious motives -- something we'd expect from used-car dealers or Halliburton contractors, not people whose products and viewpoints we admire and respect. You might want to consider avoiding the appearance of that, no matter what your actual motives.

I hope that's clear and non-threatening enough. BTW: The best welders I know are all women. And I still have my receipt from Danny and my scanner works fine. I believe the bet is to you.

I know its been said before...
$530 for a laptop bag. Such a waste!

A waste a time to include this, Kevin.

I love it - where else on the intertubes can you see a bona fide celebrity (who seems to have started to believe his own hype a *little* too much) get completely slapped around in such a thoroughly entertaining fashion? Bravo, willibro.

Again, this bag is an exercise in retail onanism, and belongs at a blog with readers that engage in that practice - BB has been suggested.

Some choice quotes:

"retail fluffery" - spot on.

"The Teresa Nielsen Hayden School of Ladylike Blogging" - resulted in coffee up nose.

"the simulacrum premium." - Good term, perfectly encapsulates the meaning.

"I'm a product designer, [t]his bag is 100% sh*t" - 0wned.

Hey, Bruce... where are you going?

"Where am I going?" I'm going to work on next week's posts, dude. I'm going through the email submissions. I got a couple-three here that look pretty straight-ahead, very CT traditional, and I plan to run 'em. But the others look kinda weird, and they seem to be getting weirder.

*Like this $75,000 pair of chromium-titanium speakers. Reviewed by a cop.

*I don't wanna allege that the self-appointed conservatives here are getting all old and crotchety, and are more eager to complain and reminisce than to help other people find cool tools. But: I can only judge the moral atmosphere around here by the people who are doing some work.

*Dingo: you are complaining about Chris Nakashima-Brown's post, at the same moment that you praise his words "the simulacrum premium" as "a good term that perfectly encapsulates the meaning." Wake up, Dingo. You are lost in a cut-and-paste haze here. Write me something original, that is perfect and encapsulated. I'm sure you can do it.

*Willibro, I am totally digging this Hong Kong suit review of yours. I like everything about it. Thanks for taking the trouble. I do think it might be improved by one small mention of the Defense Intelligence Agency. Maybe that's not totally kosher in a brief, crisp, entirely factual review, but, yeah, I'm an author. A little yarn-spinning, a vivid sense of engaged personality: I'm inclined to tolerate some trace of this in Cool Tools. So I'm liking what you're pitching here.

*One small technical matter -- people are supposed to personally sign Cool Tool reviews. So, although "Willibro" is a great handle, I will need a real name before I can post that, Willibro. It's policy. What can I say.

*"Dexm," where is your Filson bag review? It's not news to us that the world has cheap bags! We reviewed .99-cent recycled Ikea tote bags on this site!

http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/000594.php

*You need something to say about the merits of your favorite cheap bag there, don't just inform us about its existence! That's what eBay is for.

*Okay, one last thing, since I'm sitting here typing. Etsy. I know that the stuff on Etsy is "handmade" and therefore "NOT readily available." We don't review much craft stuff here. So I'm interested in Etsy *services.* Or Etsy-style services, Ponoko, that ilk. This new digital-craft hybrid stuff, it's coming on strong right now, and it seems well suited to a modern daily life in a New Depression.

*So I would look with editorial favor on anybody with kind, enlightening, knowledgeable things to say about the goings-on in this sector. Thank you.

Thank you very much, dingo. But despite being (I think) actively provoked, it wasn't really my intention to slap anyone. As I tried to indicate with my dopey tailor post, I think things like this bag post are an easy mistake to make even when you're not actually logrolling. It's possible "Cool Tool" has roughly the same coordinates as "art" or "pornography": easy to recognize, impossible to define. If that's true, then the job is really a lot harder than it looks, and any FNG attempting it deserves some ramp-up time. KK very politely asked for that, so he'll get it from me.

Bruce:
I made a point of mentioning "simulacrum premium" because now that it's been extirpated from the vain verbal haemorrhage that was the OP and explained in context (not by the author of the OP, of course - that bowl of crap had the purpose of obfuscating rather than educating), it makes perfect sense now and is a good term to use.

And spare me your synthetic I-don't-care condescension. "I'm sure you can do it" Whatever, Brucie. :) You post junk, we call it like we see it. We bruised your ego, we know. No need to broadcast it.

willibro:
Point taken. Let's hope they err on the side of stuff that is definitively CT instead of trying to educate us as to what our tastes in design should be.

Getting nowhere with your tailor's Hong Kong phone number from here in Italy, Willibro. Also, no sign of "Good Time Tailor" on Googlemaps or any Hong Kong blogs or media.

I hope your 70s pal hasn't shut his spook-suiting shop and gone to points wherever, because your review is full of good sense. A shame to miss it.

The hotel where he worked looks incredible. Got website photos by no less a woman than Annie Leibovitz.

And in this slide, we see Chi-Master Sterling assuming the posture known to adepts as Moving Mountains By Not Getting It. While his form in this kata appears (to the untutored) to be as dumb as a bag of Halligan bars, it actually emulates the powerful density of the black hole, capable of sucking the entire blog and all of its readers across the event horizon into an alternative universe of Expensive Crap for the Desperately Hip. In this context, the kata carries the implied threat that this fate is a certainty unless, like lovers of Tinkerbell, we all Clap Real Hard for the Stuff We Like Best and send him the wav file. Thus transmuting shit from unhappy readers into blog shinola, and saving Chi-Master a lot of hard work for which he is not getting paid enough.

Well, anything to free up KK's time up for things like trips to Jaisalmer, and to liberate CT from carpetbagging Texicans. Aux armes, mes enfants! Stop facepalming while you wait for the poor old sod to figure out that the blog collects your email every bloody time you post.

Huh, willibro, interesting how these things can come across so differently. To me it looked more like Chi-Master Sterling calling your bluff and you, busted, flailing back with some highly conventional internet fanboy-style shite-flinging.

Yes, interesting how that works out, isn't it?

After several decades and a forced national reunion, it's quite possible Danny's moved on. As many HK Chinese did, and as Mr. Sterling is aware. It also seems interesting that the other tailor my acquaintance recommended (Manning, Pak On Bldg, Tsimshatsui, Kowloon (3427 9296) is still there, and not far from the Prince Hotel (2113 1888‎). Now isn't that just really interesting, how completely peripheral parts of your story can just sort of gel with reality even when you're dreaming up stuff? I mean, who would have *guessed*, right?

But far more interesting to me was the fact that I could say something like "An HK tailor's product just does not constitute a Cool Tool" and then have the editor of Cool Tools think I actually want to submit a review of an HK tailor's product as a Cool Tool. I guess I could be alone in finding this ironic. But then, as you correctly observe, and as Mr. Sterling has written, We See Things Differently.

Despite Kevin and Bruce's posts to the contrary, i still find it difficult to believe that anything subtitled "Cyberpunk literateur bag" can be anything but a joke!

I certainly see a place for fashion and art, and even artsy collectibles with an author's name on it--what makes it cool is that it provides with me with entertainment and insight into something that might make my life more interesting.

So, review of Neal-Stephenson-designed implantable bluetooth headset: Cool

Review of the latest going down the runways in Paris: So long, thanks for the memories.

I'm with you Willibro. Old Bruce's problem with your tailor post wasn't that he mistook it for a Cool Tool Review; it was that you showed him up as being more of a globetrotting gent than he. I do believe you dented his pride! So he not only attempted to tear your post to shreds, but he tried to discredit you personally -- and in doing so, he showed us his true colors.
Bruce, your thinly veiled, snide attacks are rather irksome and juvenile. You're better than that, or you wouldn't be where you are today. Please let's get back to the task at hand. And notice, that is my real name.

"I could say something like "An HK tailor's product just does not constitute a Cool Tool" and then have the editor of Cool Tools think I actually want to submit a review"

*Of course I want you to submit a review. Look at the review, man:

Expensive, Durable Suits That Fit
Good-Time Tailor

"Danny Liung, Good Time Tailor," 3-7233731, in Wan Chai, is an elegant, polished and gracious gentleman who visits and works with you wherever in Hong Kong you happen to be. He has some special arrangement with the genuinely exceptional HK Peninsula Hotel, which I'd recommend you stay in, even if you're not buying a suit.

My acquaintance from the Defense Intelligence Agency also recommended David Cheng at Manning Tailor, across from the Prince Hotel. But never having met either of these gentlemen before, I picked Danny for his amusing "Hello Sailor!" name.

"Danny is a courteous hyper-pro who offers great advice to offset his frightening array of fabric choices, and is as gentle as a mother's kiss with people ignorant of these matters. He's not as expensive as you'd think. Even if he were: Anybody needing to wear suits needs to invest in tailored suits, because a tailored suit in a decent fabric wears like a diamond drill bit. It's not just a comfort thing; it's because your body is not chafing the suit. I wore all three of my Good Time suits every single week over the entire course of a 7-year stretch at a vile corporate job near Wall Street. I had to alternate them with an ever-growing pile of off-the-rack suits, many from name brands like Brioni and Brooks. I still have all three of the HK suits (now lovingly preserved) and all the others wore out."

-- name unknown

Related items on Cool Tools

Hand-Made, Custom-Fit Shoes
http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/003006.php

Aerostitch suits
http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/000639.php

Grizzly-Proof Suit
http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/000323.php

*So, that piece would have worked out just peachy. A review of which you could be proud. But, unfortunately, this HK guy seems to have joined the Tailor's Choir Invisible.

*I don't mind running items with a high price-point. I'd love to run a knowledgeable review of (a) Lord Foster's latest zillionaire superyacht and (b) a privately commissioned and manufactured Babbage Difference Engine. Granted, we'll never afford those. But grapes one cannot reach should not be automatically defined as sour.

*Running items that are "unobtainable" because they are vaporware or extinct, that is more problematic. However: manufactured items often fade with the generation that consumed them. The half-life of software? Maybe 18 months.

*You look in the archives of Cool Tools and we got cool stuff dying all over the place. It's vanishing. Go read a back issue of WHOLE EARTH CATALOG. It looks like Dorothy's Oz.

*Plus, we're in a major world financial crisis. A lot of the small-scale, bespoke, artisanal stuff reviewed on this site is going to go the way of a Hong Kong tailor-shop -- and in short order. Seriously. We're looking at a decade here which is gonna be like the 1970s without the bellbottoms.

*I want this site to be useful, unique and up-to-date for real people in genuine contemporary circumstances. I want it to be a place where knowledgeable people go to help each other out under conditions they've never seen in their lives. That's the task at hand.

*It's gonna be a little hairy in spots, but, like I say, it's a marathon.

*Mr or Ms Banks, you're not lookin' up from your screen here. "Globetrotter"? I'm in Torino today, where the Italians wear bespoke suits as a matter of everyday life.

*And they're tear-gassing student protesters in my neighborhood, because of the Meltdown. The kids were tossing rocks and the cops were throwing canisters over here this morning. I haven't personally seen that happen to students since 1973.

*And the banks were bolted shut with private cops in front of every one of 'em.

Welcome users and visitors.

I have decided to make this the locale where people can drop lightning on the new editor. I don't wanna blather on within this blog (because I have another blog where I do that endlessly) but clearly there's a lot of "Bruce what on Earth are you doing" here, and "Bruce by no means should you ever again" over there, so, this should be the handy spot where one opines about what Bruce is doing.

There will also be a groundswell of people complaining about the complainers, so, this space is for you.

All the top Bruce complainer/anticomplainers will be in here, and you will enjoy their company even more than you do mine. Plenty of room here in the Cyberpunk Literateur Bag. It's ballistics-proof, all horsehide, etc etc.

I'm not Teresa Nielsen-Hayden, but please try to avoid calling one another "Nazis" for as long as you possibly can. That's so Usenet and 1990.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law

Bring the noise.

I think what we've witnessed the last few days is an interesting (albeit annoying) manifestation of mob psychology. Once the sharks sense blood in the water they are driven into a frenzy. It's as though a lot of the posters are old school activists who miss the excitement of bringing down the man.

Gary's post to the Tersano post was right on target: "Haters, go back into your troll holes. This site has always had good products AS WELL AS duds. Take the good, leave the bad, but please keep yor whining to a minimum."

I also think there's an undercurrent of envy. "How dare this Bruce Sterling celebrity type come into our playground?! We had successfully accommodated our egos to the realization that we weren't as famous as Kevin, but it is his site, after all. But this Bruce Sterling disrupts the "we're just guys" ethos of the community."

(Sorry for bringing up envy, the last taboo of Western culture.)

*Gonna get things rolling by trans-posting a gripe from Julian Cullen
over in the white-hot "does ozone ever clean anything" topic.

"KK: please, give Bruce a month's severance and bid him arrivederci. He obviously doesn't undersand the job, and the arrogance and condension directed at the readership have grown intolerable."
Julian Cullen

*Please don't snottily tell Julian that he misspelled "condescension." Again, I'm not Teresa, but spelling-flames are right out. Seriously: you start spelling-flaming each other in here, I'm gonna cut that post. Last taboo of Western culture.

Ladies, still looking for a purse review.

Got a mop today. Awesome mop out of Eugene, Oregon. Loving the mop. Send more houseware please.

PaulD, thank you for your fascinating and insightful post. I am grateful to enjoy reading a comment I recognize clearly the insight of, while still reserving my own opinions of dissent. Here is my take:

Envy may well be our last unspeakable taboo, but it is not the last offense. Perhaps the greatest offense we still cling to is pride, which works as a double-edged razor. While pride may serve as a tool in cutting through dross and remaining free from the clinging remnants that would collect on the easily encumbered, it also cuts as a weapon when perceived as hubris. I suspect that the vehemence of the readership comes from a stung sense of self. On one hand is an established expectation that contrasts with the culture embodied by the Literateur bag. On the other hand is the necessary pride of an editor who is able to distinguish this particular item and review as noteworthy and pass over so many "apparently" similar useless and overpriced fashion accessories. There is a certain talent that I respect in that, even as an uninitiate sci-fi reader and intentional non-member of the cyberpunk class. When we look with eyes of accusation, the talent passes easily enough for hubris, and our voices rise in opposition.

The next weeks will be interesting at CT; I suspect we may lose a few hardcore utilitarians (though I don't know where off to). I also suspect my previous casual glances will be challenged to an intentional reading of the reviews (and comments). And I am waiting to see whether the integrity of CT established by Kevin holds up to both the necessary editorial pride of Bruce and the essential personal pride of the readership.

Bruce, I know you have access to 'em so please please please read every copy of the Whole Earth Catalog and *then* come back and be the editor.

Yes there's nothing wrong with "comedy" reviews...when they come from a source that is known for it. Most of the folks here are just looking for some great, interesting, and (hopefully) cheap tools that help them out in everyday life. Reviewed honestly by someone not looking for "teh lulz."

This is like Fight Club, only nerdier, and with overpriced man-purses. Huzzah!

Look, "Anonymous," not only did I read the Whole Earth Catalogs, I'm in them. I edited the final issue of Whole Earth Review myself. And quit telling me not to be funny, dang it. This from some clown named "Anonymous"? It is to laugh.

Last 48 hours, very gratifying. Tons of new CT recommendations. I'm swamped, but it sure beats that tear gas I was breathing this morning. Wait till you see next week's entries; I just completed them, and there is scarcely a word from me in that entire cavalcade of practicality. Okay, I did make one tangentially funny remark. If you look hard you may be able to find it.

This is the Complaint topic; if it goes silent, I plan to vanish into the woodwork. And man, we've got woodwork like nobody's business around here.

Guys -- Belated comment from the possibly fictional author of the offending post. Just back from a trip to Northern Mexico, yes, with the offending bag having now endured a midnight lucha match and a literary reading in a Mexicali brothel.

I am a longtime reader of Cool Tools, and I grew up reading my parents' dog-eared copies of Whole Earth Review.

A couple of months ago I presented a rather theoretical essay at a symposium in Mexico about, among other things, the intrusion of science fictional narratives into tangible reality. That essay included, as an illustration of the collision of real worlds and fictional ones, a version of the first part of this review. In that context, it was more to make the point (somewhat tongue in cheek) about the wonderful bizarreness of the very existence of this product—a cyberpunk version of the Borgesian encyclopedia entry that remakes the world.

Bruce was there, and checked out the bag. He was also present at a meal where it endured a major waterproofing test and came out thumbs up, and asked me if I would write a review of it for Cool Tools.

So I thought about this weird overpriced thing I had bought, and been carrying around with rigorous use daily for six months, and tried to recast my estimation of it into Cool Tools standards.

In writing the review, I tried to convey both the irony of the thing and my own opinion as an experienced user of it that it really is a good bag. "Genuine horse leather" and all that is meant to acknowledge the "give me a f***ing break" that must be overcome, while the subsequent descriptions of its actual utility is meant to be sincere, if laden with commentary about the semiotic triggers the thing elicits for me in its role as one of the tools I use as a writer and as a lawyer. And it really is a very solid bag, better (if smaller) than the runner-up, the basic Timbuk2 bag I carried for 6 years and just gave to my son.

I suppose the most obnoxious thing about the bag to most folks is its price. I myself was kind of shocked when I went back to look that up. For me it is worth the price, because it really is the perfect tool for what I do every day. But perhaps that is the more fundamental problem—that I am a particularly unique user when it comes to something like this.

I would encourage you all to cut Bruce some slack for trying to elicit fresh takes on what constitutes a Cool Tool, and to consider whether the semiotic qualities of the things we carry aren't an important component of their role in our lives. I have always read Cool Tools from that point of view, but perhaps that is just further evidence that I don't belong here. Trust me, he did his best to edit my "grapevine prose." As the one who introduced me to this site, I am confident no one has more fidelity to the idea of an honest catalog of utilitarian things than Bruce, but perhaps he shares my (maybe heretical) view that the idea of utility has dimensions beyond the mere tactile.

Thanks for your patience, and your indulgence, and my apologies for any offense to loyal readers caused by my oddball approach to meeting the guidelines for material on here.

Chris N-B

Chris N-B, your clarification makes me feel better about the original post. I'm willing to consider that the cultural implications of a product can be part of what make it work -- it's not a position that I agree with yet, but I can see that you believe it and that it motivated your post.

But Chris, are the "semiotic qualities" of a thing different than its role as a status symbol, or as fashion? Even if these are the same, maybe you're right to say that we should consider style part of the function of a tool like this one. As Bruce rightly pointed out, we have very few reviews of womens' handbags, but if we did I would think appearances mattered substantially (and quite rightly so).

In any case, fashion (or shall we say "design" for the architecturally inclined, or "consumer semiotics" for the philosophical) nearly always causes a disconnect between price and value. I think that is a strike against fashion items as Cool Tools, though not an absolute exclusion.

Bruce, well done for creating a burn ring around this thread (by consolidating meta-discussion here). It shows a thick skin and good sense.

I agree with Ash's sentiments, Bruce. Oh, it's Mister.
Though your heart may have been in the right place, at times, the words flowing from your sharpened tongue exacerbated more than assuaged.
So, in an effort to more forward and doff my chapeau to you, I've composed a double limerick in your honor.
(Let's see if my humor can stand the test, eh?)

There once was an editor named Bruce,
Who's definition of "tool" was obtuse,
a flame war did ensue,
o'er the bungled ballyhoo,
and the readers cried, "Get a noose!"

But, our Mr. Sterling didn't flee,
made of sterner stuff was he,
though his humor was dire,
and riddled with ire,
He assured us, "I was only being funny."

One last point before I fade off into oblivion; Bruce, you mentioned that "I edited the final issue of Whole Earth Review myself". After what's happened here in the last few days, I can't help but wonder why that sentence sounds so fatalistic?

Just kidding. Carry on . . .

Nobody seems to be touching on the actual objections, however. It's not the expense. It's not even really the availability (though that is, in fact, an irritant).

- The alleged review is meandering and nonsensical. It needed a severe edit, because it doesn't convey information. It conveys a love of typing and a lack of editorial backbone or ability.

- After reading the review through (and that after several aborted attempts), I still don't know what might be good about the bag. It's described in a pulpy novel?

- The downsides of the supposed tool are extraordinary. It doesn't really fit a laptop or papers, and isn't particularly protective, making this UNsuited for the job.

- Bruce is digging himself deeper, showing--all but stating--that he just wants purple prose about crap that people can't get.

- Bruce is also trolling where he can, which is shameful. I mean, seriously, "spelling flames are right out"? Because your bringing it up wasn't one, I'm sure, especially since you couldn't possibly have paraphrased the poster's objection without carrying the typo across. And, of course, you're not enjoying the bickering among the readers at all, which is why you didn't bring it up in a different comment thread to direct it here...

Let's grow up, shall we? Stop going on the defensive to tell us why you're really right and let your work speak for itself. Stop listing your credentials and let your work speak for itself. Stop pretending that we're all savages who won't appreciate fancy things and...well, you get the idea. And if you don't, you have my e-mail address, and I can write you a fifty page treatise using seven-syllable words and packed with allusions to the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs (who's just as outdated but more interesting than Gibson) to make you feel more at home.

I get that you want your own voice. But yet one more overwritten blog about pretty things? Even occasionally? That shouldn't be the target voice unless you're fifteen and Nobody Really Understands You(TM).

Readers, let's also grow up a bit. The man has a job to do, a paying job, at that. Help him do it well through direct, clear criticism with constructive suggestions, not grumps about how many more times he has to shape up before you unsubscribe. Most of us, I'm sure, don't care what's in your RSS feed. We also don't care whether you think Bruce has read the Whole Earth Catalog, or whether you have.

All that, and I forgot to be constructive.

I do appreciate the idea of looking at services at tools. I hope that search pans out.

I'd say more, but that's the world I live in, currently. While I think my system would fit in here, I'd rather it be found and presented, rather than me shout "hey, over here!"

Maybe one of my happier users can take a few minutes to give you a review.

my heart is now broken; one of my favorite authors ever has basically outed himself as a douchebag. decrying people for choosing anonymity and using that as a basis for rebuttal?

had i provided you an email link or even a name would your response have been actually thought out and logical? would you have been more understanding of the issue and not flipping out like you sucked down a pint of buttermilk? would you not have thrown a "i've got authentic OG whole earth street cred yo yo yo yo?" somehow i doubt that.

this' is all kinds of wrong. i'm gonna crawl into my lobster exoskeleton and surf the cosmic radio instead.

or course this could all be one more for 'teh lulz', but again...4chan does it better bruce.

"Flipping out like you sucked down a pint of buttermilk"

The laugh I got out of that makes this whole long mess worth it.

This has turned into a writing contest for amateurs.

Can't you just tell us where to buy the best fly-swatter?

Ash - For me, the "semiotic qualities" of the thing are very different than fashion or status. I shun status, and well-design utility is my idea of fashion. What I am talking about is not the display of the thing to others, but the effect the thing has triggering thoughts and referents in the mind of the user. So, in the case of this bag, it is really its very existence as an actual product produced by real-world Gibsonian characters (the Japanese designers), inspired by a fictional work, somehow finding its way into existence, that is the most utilitarian aspect of the thing for me as a writer who tries to deal with just those sorts of topics. Evaluating it independently of those considerations, I still find it to be one of the best laptop bags I have owned, despite some of its Japanese-scale quirks for an American user, though I certainly think one can reasonably question whether it would quite merit the list price absent the aforementioned odd quotient (which may only be worth it to a weird user like me).

Thanks,

Chris

"A douchebag?" the formerly-favorite author asked delicately. Lemme see -- have we ever reviewed a "douchebag" on this site? Any useful and sanitary feminine hygiene product of any kind? No, it seems we never have.

That may account for the testosterone among the swaggering trolls in here. I'm just sayin'.

Not that you tough guys need to mellow out; I wouldn't ask for such behavior inside a Cyberpunk Literateur bag. My wife, the dainty feminist peacenik, has her own Balkan weblog. The biggest fans in her comment section are slit-eyed global guerrillas from the killing-fields of Srebrenica. You see that stuff in practice, and it'll readjust your blog flame-o-meter.

Douchebags have far too many semiotic triggers. Especially those digital age noir douchebags with carabiner-friendly exterior folds.

*I appreciate the comments here; it's flattering to see people taking such a keen interest in what I'm up to. A good Cool Tools editor would be more low-key than this; I tried that, but I'm famous, so people found me out.

*Authors generally like a good cracking controversy; it shows that people care, and that issues of substance are being addressed. Controversy sells for authors - it certainly did for us cyberpunks. Controversy is a tool for us; it's like a cooking thermometer.

*The people on Cool Tools are harmless, well-meaning types. These aren't livid partisan flamewars, even though they're a departure for Cool Tools.

*This seems to be the longest discussion thread Cool Tools has ever had.

*I consider the level of discourse in here about right. There's a nice steamy heat in the kitchen and the stuff on back burners is bubbling away. However, it is gonna offend people. It'll be more than many people want to handle. Normally nobody has yelled in alarm at the editors, nor have the editors grinned with joy about that and thrown little coals on the fire.

*I'd love to see some of the buried issues here dragged out of the shadows and really blown up to large-scale dot-per-inch proportions. Seriously. Every community has its sore spots and unresolved issues. You get to where you can smell them.

*For instance : what *about* tool function versus tool appearance? Form vs Function, oldest design controversy ever? Are we Modernists in here, are we Amish? Or do we really like a carnival?

*Is "fashion" never "cool" -- or, is ONLY fashion "cool?" In which case, what "fashion" are we? Personally, I tend to live in Cool-Tools recommended 5.11 cop shirts. A science fiction author who looks vaguely like a cop, only with a Missoni tie. It's a super-functional shirt (and the 5.11 pants are great too), but in reality, that's entirely about the semiotics, am I right?

*Do you really want to follow along when I explain semiotics like a contemporary design professor, or does the very idea make your head explode? If so, exactly how ignorant would you like to remain about tools, and why they behave like they are and look like they are? How much do you really wanna know? It's a very deep subject. It gets batty and gloomy down deep in there.

*When we say a tool is supposed to "work," what kind of "work" do we mean? Blue-collar work? Manual work? "Authentic" work? Piloting a fancy yacht, that isn't "work"? Do rich guys "work"? Who gets to judge whose work isn't 'working"?

*Are we Marxists? Seriously. Do we genuinely hate consumption and capitalism? Are we actively working to undermine all that, or do we just dislike commercial hype?

*Are cosmetics "tools?" Cosmetics sell like crazy and billions of people use them every day. Cosmetics have very practical purposes. Why don't we review cosmetics?

*What does "obtainable" mean to us? 20 bucks? Thirty? Five Hundred? Freegan stuff out of dumpsters, and open-source-everything? Suppose an astronaut wants to tell us all the best things about the International Space Station. We're not gonna buy the thing, we're never gonna go up there. We're not astronauts. Are we supposed to ignore that guy? He sounds fascinating.

*Is this site really Californian, or is that a historical accident? Do we want to learn about obscure tools in the polar regions, like say an Eskimo harpoon? Kevin's other site STREET USE is cram-full of that stuff and it's awesome.

* Do we want to ship tools across continents? if Amazon.uk is okay, how about Baazee in India or the Chinese and European e-commerce sites?

*And what about dead tools -- Cool Tools that we used to adore, that just aren't around any more? Should we hunt for those and maybe try to revive them?

*How about antiques? How about vaporware announcements?

*How about our *creating* some tools? There are tons of participatory sites where people get excited and make stuff. How come we don't make cool tools? MAKEzine is going nuts just a few electron-pulses over from here.

*Are we a site about "tools," or are we really a site about people? People who are conventionally unemployable, really want to be jacks of all trades, earn very little money and that rather precariously, always want and need a bargain, and yet are insatiably curious. And consider themselves hip know-it-alls. That would have been the Whole Earth Catalog. But (a) we're missing the drugs, the nudity and the mysticism and (b) that was forty years ago. Is the Cool Tools community really wedded to that self-concept? Are you actually Whole Earth in drag, only Bush and the neocons were never supposed to know?

*In order to be Whole Earth, we would have to amputate our Robot Catbox contingent, everybody who grew up in industries that simply didn't exist in 1972. Although Whole Earth lasted an incredible thirty years, at last it died. Do we also wanna die? Rather than changing our basic character, should we die with our boots on and our values intact? What ARE those values? And for that matter, how about those boots?

*Are we a site for old people? There are Cool Tool reviews for baby gear and grandbaby gear but nothing much in here for teens. Are online teens more trouble than they are worth? Maybe teens don't have "tools." But if we have no young people where is our future coming from?

*Where IS our future coming from? The USA is near the ropes financially, but California, usually the richest and most technically advanced of all American states, is now the most nearly-bankrupt of all American states. California is over the ropes and bleeding from the eyes and ears. The State of California runs out of money in two months.

*California is the poster-child for real-estate bubble collapse, stock market kiting and massively dysfunctional polarized state politics. It's a fact. What is the role of a site like Cool Tools when people are not just cruising by for neato bargains, but when Cool Tools users are genuinely desperate, when they're broke, homeless, unemployed, deprived of vital government services, when they've got no health insurance, no fixed address?

What happens if people show up here, not because they WANT to live like hippies, but because they HAVE NO CHOICE but to adopt a dropout lifestyle?
When they are making stuff for themselves -- not because they want
to do it -- but because they have no other alternative?

*So: these are some of the cogent issues your editor rather has on his mind.
And you know what these issues are? They're LOUD. These are loud, big,
tumultuous, rambunctious, controversial, scary issues.

*I didn't want to yell 'em out like a fire alarm here -- frankly, I was just quietly thinking about 'em. Like I generally do. Kinda gearing up. But, you know, people naturally brought 'em up. Loudly. It could not be helped. It was natural.

*Editing COOL TOOLS was never that a job that I looked for. I picked it up because my guru Kevin was in a deadline pinch, and it looked like fun and a learning experience. It sure *is* a learning experience; it's like a month in a design lab. It's fun, and it's also hard work. REALLY hard work, you have no idea what meticulous transpire behind the scenes here to keep you guys entertained. Or rather, *I* had no idea. Now I got a much better idea, and I also have carpal tunnel.

*When I mess with Cool Tools, it gets LOUD. And given my head, and given the way that people react pro and con to the stuff I have to offer, it's just gonna get plain hot in here; like, literary-movement controversial, kind of a culture-war
smell. People are gonna start talking and cross-linking to items, newbies are gonna start parachuting in, people will be Twittering stuff.... I dunno, for most common gadget sites that would be Oz. However.

For Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools, I don't think so.

Bruce,

Methinks you doth protest too much. This thread is not about you, your alleged fame, or the meaning of Cool Tools. It's about a bullshit-laden review of a product with no demonstrated value.

I really thought you were going to give it a rest and let the "dissenters" rant it out amongst themselves. Why is that so hard for you? It is ego, isn't it? We know what this site is. That's why all the falderol kicked up in the first place. You want to redefine Cool Tools, go start your own flog (fool's blog). You can even name it after yourself, "Fool's Tools".
Oh, and Anonymous was wrong to call you a "douche bag" -- douche bags are a useful part of society.

Bob, you can relax about the evil bag now. People who disagree with you have already bought all the Gibson Aviator bags. There is no danger that you will accidentally be harmed by a bag you cannot have, and have never seen.

I think maybe you wanna mosey over and denounce the Catbox Robot instead, because it looks like some actual commerce is threatening to break out over there. I mean, if "bullshit-laden" is your thing, that is a robot catbox. You won't wanna miss it.

We're just shooting the breeze in here now. The bag controversy had some nice legs, but later I'll be discussing my own designer lamp, which cost three times as much as Gibson's bag, works much less effectively, and is much harder to obtain. You're gonna wanna drop by for the fireworks there later. About the end of the month.

The "alleged fame" thing was great, Bob. "Alleged fame" is likely more demonstrably valuable than actual fame. Imagine a guy who was hungry for "alleged fame" and actively avoided any "fame." There's a short story in that.

I am now reliably informed that there are two feminine hygiene products reviewed on COOL TOOLS. I stand corrected, and yeah, they look like pretty good tools. They may lack demonstrated value for some users, however.

Bruce,

Look, I don't mind that you want to start a conversation about what fits here. However, you're not conversing. You're taking potshots at people for being uncultured or cheap or not interested in giving you their e-mail address. How the $*#%, please, does that encourage conversation?

You're also showing a passionate disinterest in editing, which is an irritating trait in, y'know, an editor.

The readers here are not exclusively Californian--I might even hail from an entirely different coast, not to mention those who aren't American at all. I'm a consumer, too, as my dozen or so full bookshelves will attest.

And again, I think you're missing the point that the astronaut story would be good. Why? Because, well, did he select his equipment? Did he try out the competing solutions? Can he be objective in the analysis? No on all counts. Some bureaucrat picked something that fit the budget. I don't care that he "has mnemonic sensations regarding the EZ1701-XT Peril-Sensitive Digital Crescent Wrench (As Seen on TV!) during the entirety of planetfall (that's the event, not the Steve Meretzky game)," because the review is no more useful than if I reviewed oxygen--there's no choice in the matter, and the fact that it works doesn't mean it's good.

So my advice to you is to quit reminding us about your credentials and edit the blog as if you were an editor rather than a fanboy. If you could also see it in your heart to quit insulting the readers and maybe not bitch so much about how obscenely primitive we are than you (seriously, do you really think none of us have ever dealt with tear gas in the neighborhood or studied semiotics?), we'll stop thinking of you as an arrogant poseur and perhaps join that discussion of yours.

(Uhm, and maybe it'd be easier to join a dicussion with a different interface. Needing to retype my name and address and type quickly enough for the friggin' Captcha to stay up to date isn't conducive to a polite chat.)

Mr. Sterling, you raised a number of good questions. Forgive me for not addressing them directly. I have a couple of questions for you though, that I'm curious to hear your response to.
1) What did you think about FaceBook making itself over to directly compete with MySpace? The original FaceBook was an online analogue to the printed student directories you get in college, and had a membership that was restricted to college students. FaceBook dropped its original unique purpose to gain access to a wider market.
2) Do you worry at all that what happened to cable tv will happen to the bigger online blogs and services? With cable tv ,what starting out as speciality channels showing music videos like MTV or cultural art performances like Bravo, eventually all became general programming networks, and ultimately all ended up scheduling reality tv shows.

On another note... I had stopped reading this thread when it became the place to rain lightning on the editor, since it was never my desire to harass. Also, I do not cynically address the editor as "Mr. Sterling." I do not know Mr, Sterling personally, and out of respect, I address him as such until he asks me to do otherwise. I am also following the lead of the New York Times, which refers to everyone, even rappers, as Mr. FamilyName.

*Holy cow, I just found a much older mention of the Gibson *jacket* in Cool Tools. The woodwork in here is like something out of Piranesi. It's
like a fantastic series of ramps, crypts and narrow passages.

http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/003558.php

*Everybody in here who's still hot and bothered about Gibson bags needs
to rush over there and buy the cheaper non-Gibson jacket just to spite the
Japanese.

"How the $*#%, please, does that encourage conversation?"

*Pull up a chair, John. Let's get after it.

"I think you're missing the point that the astronaut story would be good. Why? Because, well, did he select his equipment? Did he try out the competing solutions? Can he be objective in the analysis? No on all counts."

*Okay, I follow your reasoning. So: you're telling me that users here have more to say about tools than astronauts do? Really? How about Rusty Schweikart, the ultimate WHOLE EARTH REVIEW astronaut? The guy is like, what, a brainwashed fed of some kind? The gentleman has no serious experience with any real-world hardware? His cramped orbital astronaut view of the world is a minor subset of your view of the world? Rusty can have nothing of any Cool Tools interest to say?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rusty_Schweickart

(seriously, do you really think none of us have ever dealt with tear gas in the neighborhood or studied semiotics?)

*Of course I never said that, John. You're projecting that, because I habitually write with a kind of aerial authorial majesty, instead of writing like I just Tweeted all of this. It's irritating, but it's a matter of tone in prose. Whenever you open a novel, you don't want it to read like a long, chatty series of blog posts. I'm a novelist. I can write like a series of blog posts if I have to, but most people pay about as much attention to that as they do to actual blog posts.

*Semiotics is roughly as common as tear gas. They might even overlap in usage. You're into it, I'm into it, it's not like they give us medals.

*A deeper issue is, like: how about if a cop offers to tell us about his hands-on use of tear-gas. Not an astronaut: just a cop. Blue-collar guy. Very street-level. "Yeah, there were, like, all these hipster kids in dreadlocks trying to block the streets outside the G-17 meeting, so, me and the boys had to start tossin' the canisters. Some teargas canisters suck, but let me give you the positive review of my favorite, fully-functional tear-gas hardware."

*So, let me poll you about this. Is that, like, A-OK with us at Cool Tools? And if not, exactly why not? I mean, obviously you and I have both seen some tear gas, but what about the human experience of people *tossing* the tear gas our way? Do they know nothing useful, just like astronauts? Would that be your contention in the discussion here?

*Would it surprise you too much if I told you that there were people
writing for Cool Tools who were cops -- and astronauts?

"(Uhm, and maybe it'd be easier to join a dicussion with a different interface. Needing to retype my name and address and type quickly enough for the friggin' Captcha to stay up to date isn't conducive to a polite chat.)"

*Now we're talkin,' brother. You oughta see this new interface I just got
for my WIRED blog. And I'm filling out that captcha here myself. We may differ in philosophy, but we are brothers in digital misery.

*I hate captchas. If I were hanging around in here longer than the end of this month, I'd be commissioning pieces on cool tools that do cruel, permanent things to blog spammers. I mean, there are many laudable things to be said for being a hick, a philistine, a cop or a semiotician, but spammers are the common enemies of all mankind.

I have a couple of questions for you though, that I'm curious to hear your response to.

*Curiosity, our stock in trade!

1) What did you think about FaceBook making itself over to directly compete with MySpace? The original FaceBook was an online analogue to the printed student directories you get in college, and had a membership that was restricted to college students. FaceBook dropped its original unique purpose to gain access to a wider market.

*Well, I'm no TechCrunch. I think you wanna get a little closer to the Web 2.0 fire there than some novelist guest-editing a tools site. But I can give you a short answer. They die. FaceBook and MySpace both die. They're primitive social-web technologies, they're as frail as Friendster or even CompuServe, they're way overextended in a massive global financial crisis, and they regard their users as harvestable eyeballs to be surreptitiously datamined. So they die.

2) Do you worry at all that what happened to cable tv will happen to the bigger online blogs and services?

*Yes. Absolutely.

With cable tv ,what starting out as speciality channels showing music videos like MTV or cultural art performances like Bravo, eventually all became general programming networks, and ultimately all ended up scheduling reality tv shows.

*The 20th century television model is doomed.

*I'm liking Discovery Channel. MYTHBUSTERS. Did you know Adam Savage is on Twitter? He's a rockin' Cool Tools kinda guy, Adam Savage. @donttrythis

Just so you realize, Bruce (and to make Greg's point differently, I call you that because my tone makes "Mr. Sterling" sound like I'm an ass) we're not that far off on the pragmatics. I just think that this space is unique in that it doesn't focus so darn much on the person's story as the thing itself.

I didn't say that the hypothetical astronaut wouldn't know his stuff. What I'm saying is that they don't fit the "I tried this, that, and the other thing, but this guy wins hands-down" model that Kevin set forth. How much input do the Mikes have on the choice of suction toilets, d'ya think? If they have an on-model story, rather than merely gushing praise about something that happens to be part of their kit, I'm all for it.

In fact, read your astronaut hypothetical and then read your cop hypothetical. One is a Popular Science article. The other is a Cool Tools article. There's nothing wrong with the former, by any means, but it better belongs AT Popular Science for that reason. (Things change if our astronaut was part of the selection process, of course, but I'm pretty sure that NASA hasn't work that way in eons; nobody but a bureaucrat would've picked the shuttles, for example.)

As to your other hypotheticals, things that are outdated, handcrafted, found, unavailable, or whatever? Yes. I would very much like to see that sort of material. Would the cardboard bicycle be at all useful beyond disposability? Where can I find cattails on Long Island and how would I cook them? Are there reasons that I would prefer a telegraph line over other forms of communication? By all means, I'd think that the answers to those questions (phrased carefully) would make excellent articles, here, even where they stretch the theme. Something fancy and expensive? Maybe, but it needs much more of an upside than merely that.

(And I want to emphasize again that I only really take significant issue with this review, and not even the bag. Chris sounds like a good guy, but his review is overwrought prose that completely fails to show me why I would ever want the bag and, in fact, scares me away from ever seeking out his writing. I would bet a fair amount of money that, had the review concisely explained what was good about it, and had those points not been drowned out by all the BAD things about the bag, nobody would've complained much about the price--you would've seen "gosh, that's expensive" over "that's overpriced crap." The jacket review you indicate is a very good example of what I mean.)

And I do get that you're working with tone. We all do so, whether we realize it or not, and you do so for a living. However, tone needs to be chosen with much more care in an interactive environment. You were thinking about this long before I was, of course (I was in college when you released your light-sensitive book, I believe--if I'm thinking of another author, I apologize), but I think you may want to give some extra consideration to the point in this context. Whether it works in a novel, here, it makes you sound a lot like you're ranting in your journal about how nobody understands you and you'll show them all one day. You can defend it as choice, if you want, but it's still probably the wrong one if you want to supply and get information.

Hopefully, that clarifies my stance a little bit better. Or will, once I resubmit this five more times.

What John said.

Mr. S, have you ever considered that you may be displaying a touch of editorial ADD? I know that If I had just written something as speculative as "Designer Futurescape" (http://www.make-digital.com/make/vol18/?pg=30), I would have a real tough time shifting over to the narrow object focus of a humble little one-horse shay like "Cool Tools". Especially if I also had a lifelong predeliction for restless revolutionary thought and reflex shit-disturbance.

Narrow isn't bad, or even conservative. Any poet or painter will tell you that formal limitations are often vital to the success of the work. Skillful means are the value, in a poem or a Cool Tool. "We don't have any art. We just do everything as well as we can."

Otherwise: Your last few posts are enough to convince me that your intentions are honorable even if your approach seems ham-handed. Agree with you about MYTHBUSTERS. About the only cable TV I watch anymore other than BBC world service. Don't forget Grant Imahara: A mean robot maker, and his welds look to be shapelier than anybody else's on the program.

*No need for five resubmissions, because I hear you clearly, John.

"I didn't say that the hypothetical astronaut wouldn't know his stuff. What I'm saying is that th don't fit the "I tried this, that, and the other thing, but this guy wins hands-down" model that Kevin set forth. How much input do the Mikes have on the choice of suction toilets, d'ya think? If they have an on-model story, rather than merely gushing praise about something that happens to be part of their kit, I'm all for it."

*Okay, John, this is an entirely logical objection. So, let's consider the International Space Station. There are not fifty rival commercial competitors of the ISS. There's never gonna be a wide spectrum of consumer choice up in orbit. But our hypothetical astronaut Cool Tooler (I like this guy) may have spent fifty DAYS up in there. Under some service circumstances, the Statiion is very on top of its game. Under other service circumstances, the Station sucks. Right?

*So: that would be an entry about *experience design* rather than industrial design. Our imaginary friend could talk to us about the different *interactions* that he experienced. I know this sounds like logic-chopping, but design is moving strongly into this area now. Just
Google the terms "Interaction design," "experience design." These design experts are not charlatans. They are doing a lot of useful work for the rest of us.

"In fact, read your astronaut hypothetical and then read your cop hypothetical. One is a Popular Science article. The other is a Cool Tools article. There's nothing wrong with the former, by any means, but it better belongs AT Popular Science for that reason. (Things change if our astronaut was part of the selection process, of course, but I'm pretty sure that NASA hasn't work that way in eons; nobody but a bureaucrat would've picked the shuttles, for example.)"

*Okay, that's also pretty good stuff, but I've got two names for you here: Mark Shuttleworth and Charles Simonyi. One pushes free software, while the other has got his own blog. Are these two "astronauts" somehow alien to us? Nothing to do with us around here? We look in the Cool Tools mirror, we never see them at all? Their wallets just too big for us? Do you have a good stout crowbar to pry them off of us?

"As to your other hypotheticals, things that are outdated, handcrafted, found, unavailable, or whatever? Yes. I would very much like to see that sort of material."

*A useful data point. Thank you.

"Would the cardboard bicycle be at all useful beyond disposability? Where can I find cattails on Long Island and how would I cook them? Are there reasons that I would prefer a telegraph line over other forms of communication?"

*Not the peak of CT bargain practicality here, but I totally get where you are coming from. Very good, sound, basic research questions here. The passage of time is sure to favor your concerns.

* I'm concerned about the muscular gearheads on Cool Tools whose favorite "practical tools" are gonna be deader than Moses in ten years. These people are not strangers to me, because I've seen legions of them. They're not looking over their horizon -- they're like Chrysler guys with their heads bent low over the assembly line. Of course they're working very hard -- NOW. In ten years, what will they do with themselves?

* I've met many Communist technicians, engineers, who were pragmatic and practical and sensible men - within their own circumstances. When their tablecloth got yanked out from under them, they were worse off than most teenage girls. That's a cruel and ugly thing to say, but it's also the truth.

* I didn't just see that with my own eyes: it's all there in the mortality statistics. I don't blame those men for their own fate - as long as things went entirely their own way, they were optimized and efficient and dutiful. But once world events went into a channel that they had never foreseen or imagined, they were DONE. They were toast. Nobody engaged in any amusing online flamewars with those poor guys. They were capable, trained, tool-using technocrats who were beyond any debate. They became objects of charity.

* I know that sounds quite extreme to an American audience, but my father-in-law was one of these men. He was a well-trained, very capable engineer, and he had some very cool tools. I took pictures of those tools. They were really nifty. It was not any lack of solid hands-on practicality that sidelined him. He had all of that stuff in spades. His Yugoslav society was just not sustainable. He just plain outlived it.

*COOL TOOLS may not be the proper venue to address matters of such gravity, but I know that it's happening anyway. It's happening now, right now, all over the world. Our global crisis is not some option on a pull-down menu. It's a fact on the ground.

"By all means, I'd think that the answers to those questions (phrased carefully) would make excellent articles, here, even where they stretch the theme. Something fancy and expensive? Maybe, but it needs much more of an upside than merely that. Chris sounds like a good guy, but his review is overwrought prose."

*You need to cut our Chris a break here. He's not an astronaut, he's a lawyer and a promising short-story writer. Chris is a literateur, and he has a proper literateur bag. Becoming a literary figure, believe it or not, takes a whole lot of dedicated practice. You don't make witty comments on blogs to achieve this.

*It takes time for an author to find her voice, and when she does find it, through sustained effort, she may well find that her true voice drives most people away.

*Fighting with authors, because authors seem wrongheaded, is not a smart long-term idea. Blogs are like hamsters. Authors persist for entire human life spans. You don't wanna look at yourself in a mirror ten years from now, and say, "Gosh, why does this Wayback Machine reveal that I hastily blurted many stupid, ill-informed things about some Pulitzer Prizewinner."

Chris hasn't written a whole lot of his unique purple-crabgrass prose just yet, but the literary critics already love that guy. You don't wanna spend the next decades of your lifespan bitching about the purple crabgrass. It's just not worth it. Literary innovation comes under the door like black water. The smart guys would back off early.

"that completely fails to show me why I would ever want the bag"

*Try to relax. You are not just older than laptop bags, you are older than laptops. Laptops are dying already. Google "netbooks".

*Anyway, even if you feared/hated/wanted that bag, it's out of your reach. Live with it.

"and, in fact, scares me away from ever seeking out his writing. I would bet a fair amount of money that, had the review concisely explained what was good about it, and had those points not been drowned out by all the BAD things about the bag, nobody would've complained much about the price--you would've seen "gosh, that's expensive" over "that's overpriced crap." The jacket review you indicate is a very good example of what I mean"

*Five years from now, this will all be clearer. Imagine that, five years from now, you go to a WIRED Nextfest. I'm not saying you want to do that now -- it's a hypothetical.

Somebody says: "You could subscribe to the corny paper magazine, but that's so 1995. Over here, the 2015 WIRED-branded *car.* Five thousand bucks drives it away, and it runs on ethanol booze and lightning."

*OK, maybe you lay down your cash there, maybe you don't, but do you grasp my drift here?

*Go onto Google. Look at all the consumer goods that boil
off of LORD OF THE RINGS, STAR TREK, and even BUFFY. Do you think that is some random cultural accident? You totally dig solid duct tape and crescent wrenches, those give you a warm safe feeling, yet you have no idea why consumer goods are jumping off movies, books, comics -- even sordid Britney Spears perfumes?

*I'm not saying you're a hopeless hick bllnded in your duct-tape --
but if you don't yet get it about the major change-drivers in modern material culture, you're just not clued-in! Not at all! No amount of tactful courtesy can ever help you, dude! The stakes are perilously high now! It's not like you get to drop-out on acid over at the ashram. You're gonna be roadkill. Something like Lehmann Brothers in blue jeans.

*Okay, time for a deep breath here. I know this is heavy stuff. Let's get down to brass tacks.

*The editor of WIRED magazine, a guy who once would have been the immediate boss of Kevin Kelly, is selling *freeware chip-controlled inflatable blimps.* Right now! LOTS of them. Do you imagine that a William Gibson laptop bag is somehow "less practical* than Chris Anderson's inflatable blimps? How is that possible?

*Look in the mirror now. What year do you live in? Do you suppose this some exotic coincidence, that a bestselling SF novelist and the editor of a Conde Nast flagship magazine are both moving into material goods? I know you might not be used to thinking in this way. The blog here, which we both adore, may not be the proper venue to bring up this subject. Yet it is happening. Right now, and fast. I didn't invent any of this. It's not my big personal fault. I get no lucrative kickback from any bags and blimps.

*If you can't grasp this yet, you are like a deer in the headlights. Yelling at me is never gonna bail you out. You've got a pair of pliers, and I've got some ultra-cool Leatherman pliers over there on the shelf. If we pinch each other, do we wake up in 1967? 1977? 1987, '97?

*Sorry pal, no. We don't.

"And I do get that you're working with tone. We all do so, whether we realize it or not, and you do so for a living. However, tone needs to be chosen with much more care in an interactive environment. You were thinking about this long before I was, of course (I was in college when you released your light-sensitive book, I believe--if I'm thinking of another author, I apologize),

*That light-sensitive guy must be pretty good.

"but I think you may want to give some extra consideration to the point in this context. Whether it works in a novel, here, it makes you sound a lot like you're ranting in your journal about how nobody understands you and you'll show them all one day. You can defend it as choice, if you want, but it's still probably the wrong one if you want to supply and get information."

*I hear you, pal. It's like my Cassandra thing. It's as old as the Iliad. A better spinmeister would have been much more tactful, sugar-wrapped the message, and ducked all the trolls, but an effort like that would have taken me over a year. The community here doesn't have a year to give to anybody. They're a very special group of people. It's wrong and cruel to force communities into places where they don't want to go and they CAN'T go. All you can do is appeal to certain people who WILL go. And they do. "Wait a minute? Huh?" They say that at first, then they go when it is time for them to go. They do go. They stampede when you least expect it.

*Nobody rushes over to the American Library Association and shrieks, "It's time for you librarians to go combat the torture in Guantanamo." The world needs its librarians. There are other proper places for other proper concerns.

*Sometimes there are mismatches between means and ends. That's
not anything to lament about. You make the necessary gestures,
you lay the cards on the table, and you just go. If nobody wants to hear any more, then you had nothing useful to say to them.

Dude! No wonder you have carpal tunnel syndrome. Have you considered Dragon Naturally Speaking? (6-20-06)

Maybe it's too late to mention this, but I *MADE* my messenger bag out of twigs that I found in a state park, held together with a mixture of reduced wolf urine and bat saliva. All of these ingredients were *FREE*, although I did spend 17 months in hospital after being bitten repeatedly by both wolves and bats. ****ing wolves! You'd think none of them had ever urinated into a plastic cup before! I mean, IT'S A STATE PARK!!! Where the hell are my tax dollars going!!!

My stay in hospital was very expensive because "the man" did not accept my health insurance policy. It turns out that if your health insurance policy is made out of twigs it "cannot be processed". And while I was in the hospital, the mixture of wolf urine and bat saliva that I used went bad, so I had to go back to the park and get more. And then I was in the hospital *AGAIN* after that. But unlike *SOME* people on this site, I am totally down with the dues-paying concert.

Also, I wear a cologne that *NONE* of you have ever heard of ... unless you've heard of wolf urine being used as a cologne. In that case... you would have heard of my cologne...

Freakin' left coast crunchy vegans, man, I tell ya. Always wandering around starving to death, but can will they even *discuss* skinning the wolves and bats for some decent manpurse materials? Nah, too un-PC for them. And the fact that bear whiz is the clearly superior cologne just never enters their minds. Heh, wait till they hear about Bear Whiz microbrew....

For me a cool tool is

1. Something someone uses often and loves using.
2. Something which works well

Here's what I don't really want

A. Something which the user thinks makes him look cool
B. Something making inflated unsubstantiated claims

It looks to me like the cat litter tray fits '1' and '2'. 'A'. might also apply but on balance for me it's a cool tool

Since I don't want to spend my time deciphering someone's wordy prose it's helpful if the description is reasonably simple and clear. If there is something cheaper that does the same job as well and as elegantly then that's the cool tool. This would rule out the Gibson bag for me. It's not that it's too expensive. It's that it isn't better than cheaper bags.

Mr. Sterling, thank you for answering my questions. In return, I offer to comment on any of your open questions if you would like to pick one.

I’m glad you found the previous mention of the Gibson Flight Jacket. I had read that review, but had forgotten that it mentioned the Pattern Recognition branded Buzz Rickson version. So you haven’t said what you take away from the previous appearance of a Gibson x Buzz Rickson. product which didn’t elicit howls of protest. There were just six comments to that review. Only one of them mentioned the Gibson angle, and then only to say that he thought it odd that Gibson liked the MA-1 flight jacket so much. Is this evidence that the Cool Tools community can indeed handle something like an expensive Gibson x Buzz Rickson product without gagging when it is introduced in a different manner?

The USA agent for Buzz Rickson products described how the collaboration with Gibson came about to produce the Pattern Recognition branded version of its jacket. http://www.historypreservation.com/hpassociates/detailpop.php?uniqnum=59
Fans of Pattern Recognition came looking for the black version of the jacket that they had read about in the book. There wasn’t a black version available, but the producer and distributor saw a ready market and worked with Gibson to produce a special edition. To me, this seems like pretty standard licensing and movie/book tie-in stuff, and not a reality tearing event.

I offer some feedback from a reader to Mr. Nakashima-Brown. Give your readers a fighting chance; define your terms, and explain how you are using them. I could not understand this phrase from a recent post, “a cyberpunk version of the Borgesian encyclopedia entry that remakes the world.” The problem was not that it was too theoretical. Even after searching online for a reference, I could not find out what a “Borgesian encyclopedia entry” was. Does it refer to the Argentine writer and poet Jorge Luis Borges, and if so, what’s the significance? Without knowing what a “Borgesian encyclopedia entry” was, I couldn’t tell if all such entries remake the world, or if the Gibson bag was a particular entry that did remake the world.

Greg:

Chris was referring to the Borges story "Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius", in which a secret society writes an encyclopedia of Tlon, an imaginary planet. The encyclopedia is accepted as truth by the credulous public. Eventually, artifacts of this other world start to spontaneously appear in our own, and the narrator suggests that Earth may soon remake itself into Tlon.

I appreciated Chris's allusion to the Borges story, hinting that the Gibson bag is a manifestation of another reality into our own. Of course, one might also make the same point about pointy Vulcan ears.

Tools make my life better

Drama makes my life worse

Enough already

Cool tools really work. A cool tool can be any book, gadget, software, video, map, hardware, material, or website that is tried and true. All reviews on this site are written by readers who have actually used the tool and others like it. Items can be either old or new as long as they are wonderful. We only post things we like and ignore the rest. Suggestions for tools much better than what is recommended here are always wanted. Tell us what you love.

Far out. I guess Cool Tools is changing. My bookmark stil says recommendo but for now won't feel great about recommendo-ing what used to be my favorite daily site. Darn.

(*No need for five resubmissions, because I hear you clearly, John.)

I was ragging on that dang Captcha thing again after it rejected me. This time, I'm working in a text editor and pasting back in. Take THAT, blogging platform!

(*So: that would be an entry about *experience design* rather than industrial design. Our imaginary friend could talk to us about the different *interactions* that he experienced. I know this sounds like logic-chopping, but design is moving strongly into this area now. Just Google the terms "Interaction design," "experience design." These design experts are not charlatans. They are doing a lot of useful work for the rest of us.)

Oh, a good friend is a software interaction designer, and I agree that the field is interesting and useful. But...well, again, that seems like something other already people do far better than any crowdsourced solution.

(*Okay, that's also pretty good stuff, but I've got two names for you here: Mark Shuttleworth and Charles Simonyi. One pushes free software, while the other has got his own blog. Are these two "astronauts" somehow alien to us? Nothing to do with us around here? We look in the Cool Tools mirror, we never see them at all? Their wallets just too big for us? Do you have a good stout crowbar to pry them off of us?)

I'm not quite sure that I follow. I'm familiar with Simonyi's Microsoft-era papers, and he's one of the very few researchers who "gets" programming, but I'm not quite sure what either contributes through their identity alone.

I admit, the cult of personality and the cult of the expert are somewhat alien concepts to me, so perhaps I'm just not seeing why a big name would necessarily make for a better product review. Do we trust the polo shirts worn by Billy Mays, just because he screams at us every night?

(*Not the peak of CT bargain practicality here, but I totally get where you are coming from. Very good, sound, basic research questions here. The passage of time is sure to favor your concerns.)

I picked the examples arbitrarily; they're not, say, my current research projects. But I think it illustrates my point and hopefully yours: It's not the availability or price point that's at issue, but rather whether someone in the right situation would be thankful knowing which choice to make.

And I think today's nail holder shows that it doesn't even need to be flashy, and probably benefits from NOT being flashy. The flashy stuff is in our faces all the time, but the more modest products are nearly unknown.

(*COOL TOOLS may not be the proper venue to address matters of such gravity, but I know that it's happening anyway. It's happening now, right now, all over the world. Our global crisis is not some option on a pull-down menu. It's a fact on the ground.)

I don't doubt it. In fact, currently at various stages of development, I'm working on management, economic, and credible journalism frameworks that can be deployed in an emergency.

(*Fighting with authors, because authors seem wrongheaded, is not a smart long-term idea. Blogs are like hamsters. Authors persist for entire human life spans. You don't wanna look at yourself in a mirror ten years from now, and say, "Gosh, why does this Wayback Machine reveal that I hastily blurted many stupid, ill-informed things about some Pulitzer Prizewinner.")
(Chris hasn't written a whole lot of his unique purple-crabgrass prose just yet, but the literary critics already love that guy. You don't wanna spend the next decades of your lifespan bitching about the purple crabgrass. It's just not worth it. Literary innovation comes under the door like black water. The smart guys would back off early.)

Unless I've terribly misused the word "wrought"--Mr. Webster seems to back me up--I think I'll take my chances. I don't know what Chris's fiction looks like. It might be brilliant, dismal, merely trendy, or some combination of those. But the review doesn't convey information, and it fails to do so over a looooong stretch of opaque prose. It's ornamental without regard for anybody who might be interested in, say, buying a bag, so I have to stand by "overwrought." But maybe that's because I chose the term less hastily than you might imagine.

Not that I'm making a direct comparison, by any means, but Bulwer-Lytton was the darling of the critics, in his time, as well. Surely, you wouldn't advise me to avoid knocking some piece of Georgie's ephemera on that basis.

On the other hand, if Chris becomes EiC at Consumer Reports, I'll rethink my position.

Besides, there are so many more stupid things I plan to say in that next ten years that this'll be dwarfed...

("that completely fails to show me why I would ever want the bag")
(*Try to relax. You are not just older than laptop bags, you are older than laptops. Laptops are dying already. Google "netbooks".)

I'm typing this on an XO Laptop. I know the drill. But then, I also remember when hard drives and desktop machines were dead, dead, dead fifteen years ago. The industry runs in cycles on the idea as the limits of the current model show up. In 2015, "the cloud" will dissipate once again, and we'll be back on desktops for a few years.

But still, as I read the review, it doesn't fit his computer or his papers and is somewhat fragile. That's hardly a glowing review, for all the praise heaped upon it.

(*Go onto Google. Look at all the consumer goods that boil off of LORD OF THE RINGS, STAR TREK, and even BUFFY. Do you think that is some random cultural accident? You totally dig solid duct tape and crescent wrenches, those give you a warm safe feeling, yet you have no idea why consumer goods are jumping off movies, books, comics -- even sordid Britney Spears perfumes?)

To me, that's not the trend. That's the END of the trend. Since the dot-com bubble, we've had unlimited amounts of imaginary money zipping through the Western economies. It has to go somewhere, since otherwise we're courting literal hyperinflation. So, we're given these "money sinks" to push more money to the banks.

Once someone figures out how to make a quintillion imaginary dollars go away without the real owners calling in all their real and imaginary debts simultaneously, the last thing you or I will want are shoes with Hugh Jackman's face on the sole or a hat that smells like Simon Cowell.

You might disagree. You might think that we're heading for the world of the Jetsons, where no product has any substance or use, and maybe that's even how the entertainment industry intends to dodge the piracy bullet. But I think those days are mathematically certain to come to an end soon, whether by collapse or simple consumer distrust of credit. Or rather, if you care about who produced your stuff, it'll be because you know it personally.

I mentioned the XO Laptop above. I sometimes consider submitting a review for it, because it suits my needs well. However, I always stop myself, because it makes the same philosophical mistake that I'm accusing you of making: People who need to forage for food are not going to be uplifted by the ability to play SimCity, read the Wall Street Journal, and post "FIRST" on blogs at all hours of the night. Likewise, they're not going to continue to pay for brand names if the supply lines collapse or nobody trusts the money in their pockets.

But hey, you grew up reading "Whole Earth," while I grew up reading the Loompanics books...

(*The editor of WIRED magazine, a guy who once would have been the immediate boss of Kevin Kelly, is selling *freeware chip-controlled inflatable blimps.* Right now! LOTS of them. Do you imagine that a William Gibson laptop bag is somehow "less practical* than Chris Anderson's inflatable blimps? How is that possible?)

Actually, I would imagine that, beyond the fact that flying toys are fun, there'd be a strong practical market for people interested in aerial photography but don't want to run around with a kite. Among other things, that is.

(*That light-sensitive guy must be pretty good.)

Hm. I wonder who that was, then. It was an artsy piece, obviously, the idea that the book could never be read the same way twice, having been exposed to light. And of course, the search engines are no help at all.

But I think I see where we part intellectual company, basically. You seem to think that an endorsement is, by nature, more interesting or useful because it comes from a famous name or a credentialed person. I'm not nearly so much a fan, having seen that sort of blind faith go dismally wrong too many times. Neither extreme is probably particularly healthy...

John, Bruce is having you on a bit here, given that "that light-sensitive guy" was William Gibson.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agrippa_(A_Book_of_the_Dead)

*I'm not "having him on," for heaven's sake! We're trying to have a discussion here.

*Look, John: we've got a paradigmatic clash here. It's not a new clash, it's the Two Cultures CP Snow thing. It's an art/technology divide.

*There are some artists who are very into technology. All my novels have tons of tech in them. Megatons. So much so that people are commonly wigging-out trying to find the plot. But they're literary exercises; they're not about how much the raygun weighs and where you buy it, they're about literary questions. Structures of meaning and feeling; what are the moral implications of this, what does this say about us politically, what does this imply about what we are doing to ourselves, is this the way forward and/or a new map of hell, that sort of thing.

*There are also technicians who are super into art. They've come to realize that you can design gadgets that express artistic statements. You got your device artists, you got installation art, you got open-source technicians who are radically opposed to intellectual property and fiat scarcity, etc etc.

*We're starting to see some real bleed-over here. In my opinion, mostly because we're all using the same hardware now: laptops.

*It's not exactly a new thing: a postage stamp makes all kinds of explicit statements, once you know what you're looking at. But it's being framed in a new way. By a lot of different people in different places.

*Okay, this link I'm about to give you? The purple crabgrass (c) (tm) of Chris Nakashima-Brown is like the picture of lucidity compared to this. If you hang out on Cool Tools because you want a cheap ergonomic way to replace a watch battery, you really don't wanna click this.

http://www.nearfuturelaboratory.com/2009/03/17/design-fiction-a-short-essay-on-design-science-fact-and-fiction/

*Oh, and that reminds me. I gotta go post something on my author-celebrity blog. The thing just went through a blog-platform migration, so it's kinda
trembling on its legs. Hold on, I'll be back later (probably)

*Okay, I'm back, but thanks to editorial ADD and my polymathic tendencies, I've lost the thread.

*So, let's change tack. I want to show you a flamewar on another site that's just the same as this flamewar on this site. However, it takes the exact opposite approach. Instead of a literary guy who really appreciates pastiche-laden, heavily symbolic, make-a-statement products (like Chris Nakashima-Brown), it's a guy, Randy Nakamura, who is a design critic and who therefore hates them.

*What gives with the strange Nakashima and Nakamura coincidence here, that's
beyond me. But: the interesting part is that it's the same argument breaking out. This is the famous "Design Observer Steampunk War" from almost exactly a year ago.

http://www.designobserver.com/archives/entry.html?id=38776

*That's kind of a lot of flame to read (and the temperature of the quarrel is much hotter than it is here in solemn, librarian Cool Tools). However, if you do that, you can see that all the same issues are being re-hashed over there -- or rather "pre-hashed."

*It's hokum, it's humbug, what the hell is this doing on our beloved site, we don't come here for this, we shouldn't even be talking about this, steampunk is self-promotion by a clique, they don't really know what they're doing, the top-hats and brass goggles look ridiculous, my brain hurts now please stop trolling, that's not real technology, they need to back away from the anvil and let us real he-men make real industrial products, please make them go away, no make them come back I want more and so do all my friends who aren't stupid like you," etc etc etc.

*And that was just the *regulars* on the DESIGN OBSERVER site. Mind you, this was posted on the Internet, so the brass-goggles contingent got wind of it and they ran over them en masse to tear 'em a new one.

*I've been reading DESIGN OBSERVER since they started. That's the first time I've ever seen DESIGN OBSERVER apologize to anybody. Admittedly, they weren't apologized about the crisp traffic that the controversy drew to them. They were apologizing to a steampunk about swiping an uncredited photo, something we at COOL TOOLS do every freakin' day.

*But, well, still. A formal tip of the hat from DESIGN OBSERVER to a steampunk motorcycle-maker? Kind of awesome. In fact, steampunk got kinda big after this. New York Times dropping by, that sort of thing. Nice little round of buzz there. You could can it and use it to cook tomatoes, once you know how to deploy that kind of thing.

*Okay, William Gibson is not a steampunk. Gibson is like an astral intellectual figure to whom all proper steampunks gaze in awe. But Gibson does design products. Not with his own hands crafts-style, he's not on Etsy. Yet the products exist and they are authentic commercial successes. There's LOTS. A whole product line. The guy has actually become a *couturier with brand extension,* like Alexander McQueen or the late Yves Saint-Laurent. He's got the jacket, the shoes, the bags, who knows, maybe even the *fragrance* someday.

*Maybe if Gibson's name was "Tom Sepes" instead of "William Gibson," those items wouldn't be exactly hopping out of Japanese workshops into the closets of the well-heeled. Maybe. You could argue that the guy is merely trading-in on his considerable alleged-fame as a novelist, that he's a celebrity billboard like Jennifer Lopez. But, hey, Buzz Rickson's didn't fall off the turnip truck yesterday. You didn't see them rushing off to stitch up any jackets for Stephen King, Neil Gaiman or Terry Pratchett.

*Or at least, not just yet, anyhow.

*Now -- John, if you're still out there -- one might argue, as you do, that this is a decadent practice, that it's an unhealthy trend and that the brisk return to poverty we're facing is gonna make it go away. As you imagined, no, I don't think so.

*I think the means of production are changing radically because of factors that are deeper than you realize. A lot of the things we are used to thinking of as fripperies, such as e-commerce sites, are becoming central to survival even for the poor, and maybe even *especially* for the poor. Not only do "poor folks love their cellphones," as I was recently flamed for saying, but poor folks are extremely fond of personality cults.

*It's not just about where we get the cheapest sturdy pliers. It's about crowdsourcing, it's about disintermediation of earlier value chains, it's about offshoring, it's about small-scale electronic markets, it's about niche long-tail culture. It's about "global microbrands" such as Kevin Kelly, who somehow emanated a site crammed with tens of thousands of ultra-practical tool freaks while he was busy writing visionary, out-of-control theory books.

*Just a theory of mine, and I could be wrong about it, but it's a whole set of buzzing issues which really needs some extensive discussion. Just, not around here, however.

Still here, since this is one of the more interesting discussions I've had in a while. Though I should be messing around with barbecues and the like (shhh). Or maybe hacking at the Facebook API so I can pay the rent.

I read the suggested links (and no, a jab at mistaking Gibson's book as yours was on target, no offense taken), and I'm not sure about the intent. I appreciate that science fiction feeds science; that's been true since Cyrano at the very least, because science fiction breeds scientists and engineers. However, it doesn't mean that every such transition is a winner, and not all innovations are cause and effect. As a silly example, neither computers nor even magnetic poetry owe themselves to Jonathan Swift's Laputan automated book (Book III, chapter V).

And the Design Observer issue, I don't think relates here. I see how you might, and I might be wrong because I don't know the community's usual voice (and a quick perusal didn't help me find it), but it sounds like an established, external community screaming that they should be taken more seriously. But with more personal attacks, because apparently (some) steampunk designers treat an attack on their precepts as personal. Coming from a programming background, it's word-for-word identical to shouting that Visual Basic is a misbegotten piece of excrement. It might be true (it's not that bad), but man, the people who grew up on it are going to want you dead.

Here, sure, there have been a couple of people who were jerks. I assume that they're gone, because it's been quiet since. They shouldn't have attacked you or Chris or acted like spoiled brats, and where they expressed dislike, they should've indicated WHAT they didn't like. So this is less "flame war" than "minor hissy fit." Otherwise, I think this has been a civil and interesting discussion--if I didn't, I probably wouldn't have made my first post.

As to the direction of the economy, I guess we'll have to see. From my point of view, the age of "everybody can be CEO" passed, and we missed the opportunity. The companies who seemed really good at producing on demand have died, raised their prices prohibitively, and/or tried to become a "community" instead of a service. DeHart's is probably the big exception, but they've never been well-structured for just anybody's use.

Maybe they'll come back, or maybe I haven't looked behind the right corner to find them. Those are reviews I'd like to see as well.

Meanwhile, overseas outsourcing is becoming more problematic as workforces saturate and taxes increase. It's no longer nearly so cheap to hire a team in Mumbai to roll out your website or have Ecuadorans making your sandals. It also doesn't feel as right as it once did, since nobody in those countries is being pulled out of poverty, but that's another issue entirely.

However, despite the trend of (western) lower classes to be more involved in status symbols and "micro-brands," as you put it (have you read Ruby K. Payne's books, once reviewed here, #461? They're a bit off-color, but touch on this idea quite well), I still don't quite see that Captains of Industry are suddenly going to be those folks with the most social media buddies. It's just too...well, Cory Doctorow. And that's problematic. After all, where is iJustine going to get her seed capital to float until personal credibility becomes a magical economic force? Also, can the economy lurch from control by untouchable robber barons to control by untouchable media personalities?

Anyway, you're right that this bears further serious discussion in some other forum. So, I'll probably drop things here, but if you find, have, or open the right spot for it, I'm there.

Recommendation: Kill comments on Cooltools--at least for a few months.

Cooltools was great before comments were added, and most subscribers probably date back from then. When comments were first added, they were concise, constructive, and enjoyable to read.

I think this whole era of Cool Tools should be archived to a "lessons learned" section, but deleted from the main body of Cool Tools. Please do a "purge", Kevin, and get Cool Tools back to what it was.

I would rather see less frequent, but truly cool postings, than rapid-fire stuff that I end up just having to sift through.

The comments section is GREAT, though. I love the fact that others say, "Yes, this is cool, but I've used this tool myself, and found this other alternative to work better for me."

I love cool tools, and have for years. Here's to many more years, but please, stick to the knitting.

Maybe paying Bruce by the word was a mistake?

@ Secretsquirrel "LMAO. Wow! Humor is most definitely lost upon this whiny audience."

Agreed.

@Bors Morsgen : "If nothing else, this post has generated what is by far the most entertaining Cool Tools thread I've personally bothered to read. Good work, people."

I think the OP dropped out of Grad School before going to Law School.

Brilliant review.

Filson: American-made. Vertically-integrated: the materials and cloths are fabricated by them. Good enough for those who hit the Alaska gold rush. Good enough for you.

http://www.filson.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2801887&cp=2065674.2065687.2808456&parentPage=family

http://www.filson.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2092394&cp=2065674.2065687.2065708&parentPage=family

http://www.filson.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2092402&cp=2065674.2065687.2065706&parentPage=family