John and David talked to journalist Clive Thompson about his recent essay called Design Lessons from Guitar Petals.

Here's a preview.

I really like your point about the pedal has to be, I think there's a term here.

You say it's calm technology?

Right.

Yeah, so there's this wonderful essay that John Cee Lee Brown co-wrote back in the 90s called

The Coming Age of Calm Technology. And he basically said, you know, we're heading to this world where,

you know, everything we're doing is focused on a single computer screen. You know, you've got your

multitasking. You've kind of got your WordPress there. You've got maybe a web browser there. You've, you've got your, with multitasking,

you've kind of got your WordPresser there, you've got maybe a web browser there, you've got an email

there, you've got a bunch, and you're flipping back and forth and flipping back and forth.

And he's like, this makes us jittery because we're constantly having to peer to get our

information. And he says, in contrast, there are technologies that are designed to ambiently broadcast information out the

corner of our eye that we can glance at every once in a while generally know what's going on.

And the great example of that is a classic analog wall clock. You put on the wall and you

always sort of know what time it is, even if you're never really aware that you're

looking at it. It's just kind of there. You don't need to stare at it. You just sort of corner

eye you look at it. That is what guitar pedals are like. They are a glancable technology that

you can sort of just peer out of the corner of eye and know what's going on. Whereas most

digital technologies, most phones, most computers are still like squint, squint, lean down,

peer, what's going on, what's going on. And that's what was so noticeable to me when I was

driving around in my parents' car trying to change the radio station. It took so much more of my

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