Here's what we're reading online, this week at Involution, on design, tech, and the digital life, in our third links round up.
The Hiring Wars
The tech talent crunch, especially in Silicon Valley, is leading to all sorts of crazy stunts on the part of employers to recruit and hire the best dev and UX people, including acquiring their companies for big valuations as a sort of hiring bonus. As just one example, Facebook recently acquired Dutch boutique software design firm Sofa for their UX expertise.
The editors of Focus, created an interesting infographic on the winners and losers of the talent wars so far.
The Harvard Business Review analysts have been assessing whether talented people are all they're cracked up to be.
Bill Taylor, cofounder of Fast Company magazine, writes that "Great People Are Overrated" in an ode to team players, while Jeffrey Stibel, Chairman and CEO of Dun & Bradstreet, counters with a post explaining "Why a Great Individual Is Better Than a Good Team".
Jeffrey pulls no punches: "Our intelligence is incredibly complex and as a result, a great individual can far exceed the value of many mediocre minds. This is why it is absurd to ask questions like 'how many mediocre people would it take to collectively beat Kasparov in a chess match?' Mediocre minds can also destroy the value or contribution of a great mind."
Just My Type
For typography buffs, letter headz, and those of us obsessed with the history of this art form, Dutch designer Joep Pohlen's handbook of type, "Letter Fountain", is finally available in English. Earlier editions of the book were only available in French, Dutch, and German.
While digital type has come a long way, there's still nothing like viewing type specimens and references on the printed page, and this book is one of the best.
Stand Up for Yourself or Die Sitting
For knowledge workers who spend long days at their desks, eyes glued to their laptops, the news that sitting for long periods is killing us all, is not something that we want to hear.
It's up to us, in the name of self preservation, to take breaks, stretch, walk, or even ride a long board skateboard around the studio like we do at Invo.
In a related story, if you're in the Boston area, you'll soon be able to walk down to the Greenway and get some healthy eats at the recently announced public food market which "will feature up to 100 vendors of fish, produce, wine, cheese, and other local products in a facility that will feel more like a bustling European bazaar than a grocery store" according to Boston.com.
Your Office in the Cloud
Web Worker Daily has a good take on Microsoft's Office 365 launch, as the late to the cloud game giant tries to stay competitive. And Google counters with "365 reasons to consider Google Apps".
Google Goes Social … Again
We're all Googled up this week, as everyone eagerly tries to score a Google+ invite for the search empire's latest attempt at integrating social into their offerings. Wired digs into the history of Google's failed social efforts and wonders whether this time will be any different.