These are my recent Pinboard.in links:

• The new user story backlog is a map

  "I find that the big things on the top of the story map look a little like vertebrae. And the cards hanging down look a little like ribs. Those big things on the top are often the essential capabilities the system needs to have. I refer to them as the "backbone" of the software. I stole this term from Dr. Dan Rawsthorne who might use the term slightly differently than I do.

  When it comes time to prioritize stories, I don't prioritize the backbone. It just "is." I do prioritize the ribs – the stories hanging down from the backbone. Place them high to indicate they're absolutely necessary, lower to indicate they're less necessary. When you do this, you'll find that all the stories placed high on the story map describe the smallest possible system you could build that would give you end to end functionality. This is what Alistair Cockburn refers to as the "walking skeleton". I always try to build this first."

  planning agile-practices card-sorting project-management techniques

• Last Gasp Books – AMERICAN SURREAL

  "This is the latest collection of paintings by one of contemporary surrealism's most influential artists. American Surreal picks up where Dreamland, Schorr's previous bestselling collection of mind-bending paintings, left off. The viewer can look forward to countless hours of eye bulging investigative thought while examining the impeccably rendered subject matter that has become the hallmark of Schorr's outrageous vision."

  surrealism art collection want

• Twitter Engineering: Faster Ruby: Kiji Update

  "0.11 is a much more performant and operable runtime than Kiji 0.10. However, through this work we identified a practical strategy for making an even better, fully-generational version that would apply well to Ruby 1.9. Time will tell if we get to implement it."

  Ruby software-engineering interpreter performance

• iPad Usability Study Reveals What We Do and Don’t Like In Apps Apple News, Tips and Reviews

  "What users find very annoying according to the report are splash or loading screens. No matter how clever, or how easy on the eye, splash screens and animations become annoying very quickly. Startup sounds, in particular, are singled out as especially bad, because of the potential they have for unpleasantly surprising people who open apps in surroundings where noise might not be appreciated.

  Also, almost universally, apps will benefit from having back buttons on nearly every page, and should aim for a simple homepage-like table of contents over more complicated navigation schemes. Users prefer a home base from which to operate without having to hunt through carousels or wade through long columns of thumbnails, and they always want the option to go one step back from their current position, because of accidental taps or to refer back to something they just saw."

  user-experience usability interface iPad iPhone design

• The Unwisdom of Elites – NYTimes.com

  "Does any of this matter? Why should we be concerned about the effort to shift the blame for bad policies onto the general public?

  One answer is simple accountability. People who advocated budget-busting policies during the Bush years shouldn’t be allowed to pass themselves off as deficit hawks; people who praised Ireland as a role model shouldn’t be giving lectures on responsible government.

  But the larger answer, I’d argue, is that by making up stories about our current predicament that absolve the people who put us here there, we cut off any chance to learn from the crisis. We need to place the blame where it belongs, to chasten our policy elites. Otherwise, they’ll do even more damage in the years ahead."

  financial-crisis macroeconomics public-policy Bushism conservatism

• Finch, The $99 Robot That Makes Computer Science Fun | Co.Design

  "I'm jealous of high school computer science students these days. I had to tap out my GOTO 10 commands on a crappy CRT monitor; they get a cheap, rugged robot to play with. The Finch, as it's called, costs just $99, so every student in a classroom can have their own. And its design was rigorously based on educational research that uncovered the five key attributes to making the perfect educational toy."

  robotics education Making gadgets

• Poor Mojo’s Newswire: Krugman: Seniors, Guns, and Money

  "Anyway, the truth is that older Americans really should fear Republican budget ideas — and not just because of that plan to dismantle Medicare. Given the realities of the federal budget, a party insisting that tax increases of any kind are off the table — as John Boehner, the speaker of the House, says they are — is, necessarily, a party demanding savage cuts in programs that serve older Americans.

  To explain why, let me answer a rhetorical question posed by Professor John Taylor of Stanford University in a recent op-ed article in The Wall Street Journal. He asked, “If government agencies and programs functioned with 19% to 20% of G.D.P. in 2007” — that is, just before the Great Recession — “why is it so hard for them to function with that percentage in 2021?”

  Mr. Taylor thought he was making the case for not increasing spending. But if you know anything about the federal budget, you know that there’s a very good answer to his question — an answer that clearly demonstrates just how extremist that no-tax-increase pledge really is. For here’s the quick-and-dirty summary of what the federal government does: It’s a giant insurance company, mainly serving older people, that also has an army. "

  public-policy Republicans financial-crisis social-safety-net

• Can the Oil Market Be Manipulated? – Seeking Alpha

  "I have had an interest in tracking oil companies (for crude) and refineries (for oil products) trading in their own volume over the past 11 years. As I noted last week (in "Oil Inventories, Speculation, and Hedging"), anecdotal evidence is already emerging that vertically integrated oil companies (VIOCs) – those controlling the upstream/downstream process from field to refinery through retail outlet – were unusually active recently in trading in near-month futures contracts in their own product.
  This occurred both when crude oil and gasoline prices were rising (through close on April 29) and thereafter, as crude plummeted almost 15% and gasoline over 13% as of the end of trading on May 6."

  financial-markets trading macroeconomics fiddling-the-numbers markets the-real-problem-with-market-fundamentalists

• Debt Arithmetic and Expansionary Policy: Paul Krugman Vastly Understates His Case – Grasping Reality with a Flexible Trunk

  "Yet I find none of the classical, semi-classical, new classical, or neoclassical economists who believe in optimizing growth models stepping forward and saying: "Because r < g right now, what we really need is more government spending and an expanded government debt."

  It is very odd…"

  economics economic-crisis public-policy taxes oligarchy-in-action

• Economist’s View: "Eight Facts about Social Security"

  "Social Security’s 75-year shortfall is manageable. In fact, it’d be almost completely erased by applying the payroll tax to income over $106,000. Source (PDF)."

  public-policy conservatism Republicans Social-Security economics

• What can the movie Bridesmaids tell us about the Recession and Keynesian Economics? | Rortybomb

  "Annie’s character in Bridesmaids feels like the timing and progression of her life has gone into a ditch. That the next step in her baking career happened to coincide with the collapse of the mass securitization of bad debt and an over-the-counter credit derivative protection market is really bad luck. But it shouldn’t mean that her ability to launch a new business, to exercise and refine her talents and skills and have her employment give her a proper sense of self and purpose, should be ruined indefinitely. Full employment is the friend of new business owners. It would be great if either of our political parties would emphasize that in a time of 9% unemployment."

  public-policy economics economic-development Keynesianism unemployment

• Agile Coach Camp 2011 – Coaching- Eventbrite

  "Agile Coach Camp is about creating a network of practitioners who are striving to push the limits in guiding software development teams, while staying true to the values and principles at the core of the Agile movement. We've invited practitioners who, like you, are passionate about their work, active in the field and willing to share what they've learned.

  Do you have a technique or practice worth sharing with your peers? Or an idea you'd like to test out with some leaders in the community? Are you facing challenges and want to get some perspective from other practitioners, or hear how they do things? If you feel you’d benefit from connecting with 70-75 Open Agile Process Facilitators, ScrumMasters, XP Coaches, Trainers, Change Agents, and Mentors to talk, draw, debate, and explore ideas, then this unconference is for you."

  conference agile agile-practices Columbus to-attend