Pleasingly enough, yesterday’s second TTC Type & Tile Tour went as well as the first one. We had a 50% dropoff in attendance (then again, so did Nonfiction), but that was no problem, since it left us with 26 people. We started at the ugliest station in the system – Lawrence West, straddling the Allen Expressway – and proceeded to the nicest, Dupont. Ultimately we schlepped all the way to the Sheppard line (the first visit there for many) and toured pretty much every square centimetre of Bayview.

It was amusing standing inside at ground level – possibly the farthest north many people had ever been in Toronto – and blanking on the term for the kind of brick used in this decorative wall.

So I did what they do on the game shows and called my “lifeline.” “[Esteemed colleague], what do you call a stone with a rough surface? Not ‘reticulated’ but—” “Rusticated.” “Rusticated! Thank you, [esteemed colleague].”

A short time later, while photographing the isometric trompe-l’œil artworks at the other exit, K-Hug hurried over and told me the collectrix in the booth was pounding her hands on the window and (impotently) hollering “No pictures!” Noncommercial photography is allowed without a permit. And if she were that unhappy, maybe she should have left the booth.

We calmly walked downstairs, took the next train, finished our tour at Eglinton, and took over the back half of a Suction Cup for coffee.

Nice.

Somebody suggested I do a tour just for TTC staff, an idea that’s got legs.

Some lore from various guests on the Tours:

• There’s an oddball sign on the eastbound platform at Vic Park because there used to be a fare booth at the respective end of the westbound platform.
• They’re fixing the platform edge at Rosedale.
• The jail cell at Museum station – so unloved by the former chair of the TTC – was put there years ago to prevent people from using that space. Why? Wymmynz from UofT had complained of fear of assaults, and that area was out of camera range. Gee, why not install a new camera? Or only wait where there is one?

You can follow the coverage:

• “On the Facebook”
• Flickr pool
• Articles in the Tubby and its blog, and at Spacing and Torontoist (first, second)

There will be a write-in campaign that I need you to help me with. If you went on the tour, contact me.

“Asshat longa, vita brevis.”

Something actually funny from Bill Maher (Real Time with, 2007.10.26 [iTunes], about 29:20 in). By the way, two guests on that episode were homosexualists, the matter–antimatter pair of A. Sullivan and M. Navratilova.

MAHER: You’re in for a treat. We have been chosen here at Real Time to host the fifth annual Fall Fundamentalist Fashion Show. And you are gonna love this. Could we have our first model please, and I’ll describe it? All right!

• Sleek and stylish in this wool blend, Najiva is hot-hot-hot – and not just from wearing a suffocating tarp in the desert. This outfit just screams “Look out, world! I’m a woman of the 12th century!” Turn heads without losing yours in this sizzling Saudi sheath. And be the wife that he calls for tonight – and every night.

• Here comes lovely Anaan. Anaan is wearing a daring French cut with a plunging eye slit. It comes in black and dark black and it leaves absolutely everything to the imagination. Guaranteed to get your man so hot he’ll want to crack you on the ankle with a long stick. Whether you’re on the go or simply knowing your place, nobody does repression like the House of Saud.

• Here’s Khalee. Isn’t she just scrumptious in this business-casual abaya by Donna Karan? It’s a throwback pullover that says “I’m too sexy for my Shiite.” Dress it up for morning prayers or dress it down for midnight stonings. This one says “My mullah brings all the boys to the yard.” Available at Kmart by Isaac Jihadi.

• Here’s lovely Gamal in a first look from Saudi Arabia’s hottest designer, Muslim Dior. (He used to be Christian Dior, but he converted.) You’ll be proud to walk five steps behind your husband in this ensemble that screams “Islamofashion!” By the way, Gamal is the winner of Saudi Arabia’s Next Top Model, and I think you can see why.

• And finally, here’s something a little different – a coquettish outfit that showcases the girl inside the woman inside the stifling female-containment unit. It’s first-class clothing for second-class citizens! And it shows off your curves in all the right places – the top of your head, your shoulders, and absolutely nowhere else. When you hit the town in this, the only thing you’ll have to be ashamed of is the unclean vessel of Satanic temptation underneath. Perfect for a trip to the desert or the sea or a Djibouti call.

One of the many things screwed up by the organizers of ATypI Brighton 2007 was the recording of sessions. We were sent elaborate permission slips to sign – a bad idea, as it gives people an idea they previously didn’t have, that they could say no. Of course I said yes.

We showed up and found that the TypeTech pre-conference wasn’t to be recorded at all. The only recordings for ATypI per se took place in the main auditorium (site of much discomfort and unpleasantness – pitch black and every single thing rattled or thumped when touched). Those recordings happened solely because Kaveh Bazargan took it upon himself to make them. (He sat in the back tethered to his MacBook, in turn tethered to video and projector feeds. And nobody named Tiffany told him he was too loud!)

A complete failure by ATypI, which is still living in a century in which recordings of conferences were difficult and extraordinary (and charged for, like Objectivist rantings). Don’t try to tell me that St. Petersburg is going to do a better job with venue or organization.

Some videos are now posted. This could be an all-new justifiable example of pop-up windows: My presentation on TTC typography is more of a screencast. It’s all done with SMIL, so, incredibly enough, I might actually get around to transcribing and captioning it.

Now: How many outright errors did I utter? I know of at least three.

Another product of E-hippie peer pressure, Make magazine, was finally seen at a newsstand. So I bought it, and it is the first magazine I’ve ever wanted to destroy. Given that I keep all my magazines and have issues dating back to the 1980s in boxes here, things must really be bad.

They are. Make is a well-designed, well-written, Granta-sized quarterly about “hacking” your own “technology.” The production values are high, and ostensibly I should be attracted to the topic. I have “hacked” several “technologies,” from a camouflaged bike (too-elaborate instructions for which are in this issue) to creative reuse of household objects. (My cutlery sits on an Ikea shoe rack on top of the fridge. Shoes sit on car mats.) I should be perfectly situated in the target market.

But I cannot stand the entire ethos involved, nor any of the principals. It reeks of Creative Commons peer pressure: You must be a corporate drone if you buy off the rack. (It used to be only the goyim paid retail. Now it’s you!) The magazine comes from O’Reilly, publisher of computer books so ugly only an autistic could love them. There’s an editorial from capo di tutti usual suspects Cory Doctorow, who is overdue for an outright backlash and is no doubt included because the coeditor of his blog is Make’s editor-in-chief.

But fundamentally, I don’t want an ovoid stereo speaker hanging from the ceiling and above all I don’t want objects in my house with exposed edges or wiring. Apart from the safety issue (I can and will bump into any projecting edge or corner, absolutely none of which exist in my house for that reason), it’s unæsthetic.

Make fills me with the same repugnance I get from Pilgrim’s ideological caterwauling about open platforms. He’d make a great fundamentalist preacher; he’s certainly mean enough. The world that Make documents, and that Pilgrim wishes to foster and nurture, is one in which people half-listened to a documentary on television about the punk era and somehow decided that “DIY” is a guiding principle for everyday living.

I’m sorry, but I suck at building telephones and computers. I spend a lot of time fighting assholes who don’t give a shit about my expertise and qualifications. I’m not about to go around acting like I have expertise and qualifications I do not have. I am not a tinkerer-geek; that’s why I don’t use Windows. I expect the products I use to be adequately designed and tested up front and without a day-long assembly process. Ideally they would be very thoroughly designed and tested.

Make and Pilgrim have forced me to realize I fervently believe in totalitarian design management. Or at least I believe in it fervently if you’re trying to ram some kind of Maker Faire (sic; the name is its own punchline) or Creative Commons or open-source crapola down my throat. Steve Jobs is exactly the right model, or at least the right model for negative taste (knowing what to take out). I want things to work and to work well. I don’t want to have to solder my own circuit boards or maintain my own machine shop. Nor can every household problem be solved by a reused pop bottle.

In honour of the Make æsthetic, I shredded the issue with my own two hands.

What Web designers do is not “design.” Of course, what he’s done throughout his career, including his work for porn magazines, is.

Where is the most innovative and creative graphic-design work occurring right now?

I don’t think there is any. We’re in this interregnum. We’re waiting for things to happen. Following the changes in technology is the integration of old and new media. The Web is a fallow place. They haven’t figured out how to make design on the Web, except wireframes and complicated information structures. So, if you are looking to truly become a digital designer, the most interesting work is in illustration and typography.

To answer your question, the most innovative stuff is still coming out in traditional ways in toys and fashion. They have more spark and flair. But I’m 57 years old and I’m not really necessarily looking in right places.

You don’t say!

Today I hosted the first TTC Type & Tile Tour. We began way the hell out at Vic Park with an examination of the posted drawings for the planned renovation of the station (destroying numerous previously indestructible enamelled-steel signs in the process, replacing them with windows), proceeded to Main Street, Pape, the museum of test signage that is St. George, and Spadina with its cautionary-tale Walmer exit. We finished at Bathurst, where, in an audience-participation segment, I challenged attendees to figure out how to take the train just from the Sheppard-style signage. (You can go east, but only via elevator, and if you want to go west you can apparently take a bus, streetcar, or train.)

I learned quite a bit. (Did you know? Vic Park used to have a fare collector at the arse end of the westbound platform!) Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. Good mix of young and middle-aged, including several wymmynz.

The most amazing fact? I got 50 people to show up and follow me around like the Pied Piper for two hours and ten minutes. Fifty! And we went almost completely unnoticed by TTC staff, which could be interpreted in a less salutary manner.

We are gonna do it all over again next Sunday, this time in a longer tour of Yonge, University, Spadina, and Sheppard lines. Check the tour page for details.