Available free on Archive.org, the 1985 Electronic Engineers Master Vol 2 contains page after page of excellent technology company logos, many of which have been lost to the obsolescence of hardware and business plans.
Marcin Wichary the designer/typographer/writer behind the Segmented Type Playground and the Pac-Man Google Doodle, turned the logos into a beautifully haunting slideshow.
(via Kottke)
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Drew Magary offers
The 2016 Hater’s Guide To The Williams-Sonoma Catalog.
I was on the Jersey Turnpike when I saw it. I was driving my family to New York for Thanksgiving and there, along the shittiest stretch of road in the shittiest state in America, I saw the Williams-Sonoma fulfillment center: a vast hangar that seemed to stretch a mile long, with shipping containers lined up along the side, like piglets feeding on a series of artisanal teats.
He picked the perfect catalog for this sort of thing and the perfect presentation, so I'm just going to snag Jim Cooke's perfect "eat shit" illustration to go with it.
The only thing I ever bought from Williams-Sonoma was a fancy $100 Breville electric kettle whose LED light and rubber seal failed three months in, right after the take-it-back-for-a-refund point was passed. I made this Venn diagram to satisfy my lust for revenge but never published it.
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The 1981 Radioshack computer catalog is beautifully illustrated, but everything in it is complete TRS. Read the rest
Wired offers a gallery of "Amazing and Ridiculous" (that's slideshowese for "old") gadgets from a 1980s Sears catalog. Read the rest
