digg_url = ‘http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/chris-dannen/techwatch/10-mac-apps-make-windows-users-drool’; digg_skin = ‘compact’; Used to be that Windows users could admit the Mac was easy to use–they just complained there wasn’t any software for the platform. Apple knew their weakness, too, so they endeavored to turn their developer tools into the envy of the industry.

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Ten Mac Apps That Make Windows Users Drool

GM returned from the black hole of bankruptcy today with promises of impending change in its corporate structure and products. The company’s press release is, as expected, filled with nonspecific ideas like “a fresh lineup of Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick and GMC cars, trucks and crossovers, each with leading-edge designs and technologies that matter to both consumers and the environment” and a new focus on “customers, cars and culture.” In other words, GM will actually pay attention to the fact that it needs to deal with changing technologies and trends in the car world.

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GM Emerges from the Rubble of Bankruptcy. Now What?

My colleague Steve Rubel neatly lays out the challenge facing communicators today : with today’s fractured and diffuse media, “life is nothing but a stream, and ad pages and feature placements become scarcer (and arguably captivate less attention).” And if this challenge frustrates communicators, how much more difficult is it for public affairs or advocacy professionals working to not only enlist supports but mobilize advocates?

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For Effective Advocacy, Select "E" for "All of the Above"

A student housing complex in France has one wing that shelters battered women–an effort to create “social co-education.” Every architect, no matter how humble they may be, is a would-be social engineer at heart. The Greeks and Romans alike believed that the very values of their society were embedded in their buildings; more recently, Communists, Fascists, and Utopians have all sought to create new paradigms for architecture that would change the way people lived–and thus, how they thought. A French firm, ecdm is continuing in that tradition, this time with a small-scale social experiment embedded in their new student housing block

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Housing Complex Doubles as a Social Experiment

How I wish it were possible to meet other people’s behavior in kind without having to think of oneself as equally churlish. It irritates me to feel obliged to take the high road, even though I know it’s the right thing to do, and the only realistic option, when others are ignorant, unresponsive, unreliable, rude, ungenerous, thoughtless or so wedded to their own agendas that the mere hint of a differing viewpoint pushes them to dizzying heights of defensive anger and uncivilized restatement or to awkward depths of sulky withdrawal. I would give a lot never again to have to deal with people who, as William James put it, think they are thinking when all they are really doing is rearranging their prejudices

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A Howl at the Moon

This week, Kristen, the Elder Economic Security Initiative intern, continues the discussion around family care giving by spotlighting a new book on the issue. The percentage of Americans over age 65 has tripled during the 21st century, but support and funding for this group has not kept pace. The book When the Time Comes: Families with Aging Parents Share Their Struggles and Solutions, by Paula Span, sheds light on this population by telling stories of adult children grappling with the difficult decisions surrounding their parents’ long-term care.

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Quality Long-term Care Allows Elders to Age in Place

I’ve written another guest post, this one for M-BRANE SF , the creation of Christopher Fletcher. In addition to being a blogger, Christopher is a chef, a magazine publisher, and a fiction writer currently living “in self-imposed exile in OKC.” My thanks to him for the opportunity and to GUD Magazine for introducing us on Twitter. My guest post – ” For Writers: A Story & Three Tactics ” – is about my evolution as a writer of fiction, my writing process, and a few of the ways I polish my work

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Now Appearing on a Blog Near You

My Twitter and Facebook friend Raul Ramos y Sanchez is the author of AMERICA LIBRE, a novel coming out this summer that is already an International Latino Book Award winner and one of USA Today’s 2009 Summer Reads. Raul is thoughtful (in both senses of the word), and his passion for exploring issues of ethnicity in American life, culture and politics mirrors mine for exploring issues of gender. He is always posting provocative questions along these lines, and we have enjoyed stimulating conversations on Twitter, on Facebook, and here on my blog

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Frontiers, Crossed and Crossing

Apparently, “balance” is now a dirty word. As in “Balance is a myth.” At first, I was inclined to dismiss this as so much sound and fury signifying nothing, but I can’t seem to let go of it. The dirtying of the word seems to me to contribute to the repulsive notion that women are something other than full-fledged human beings with the ability and the right to manage their own lives – not to mention to focus on what actually matters

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A Word is a Word is a Word. Or Not

Our Wisconsin partner, the Wisconsin Women’s Network , blogs about what elder economic security means in their state. Here in Wisconsin, we believe that elder economic security means the ability to age in place with dignity – for everyone. We believe that all elders deserve to be able to age in the place they choose with the economic resources and support necessary to do so, while maintaining independence and community involvement for as long as possible.

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What does elder economic security mean for Wisconsin?

As part of our “Blog About It: Elder Economic Security” event, we interviewed women on their views about elder economic security and asked them about what they will need for retirement, and how the economic downturn has changed their view about retirement security. Some women also shared their opinion on what can be done to make retirement savings easier.