ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

It’s confounding that my name is alone on the cover when so many made this book go. Very special thanks to my partner in this fandango, my marvelous editor Tina Lee, who revealed the book that lurked inside a mass of ideas. She untangled my prose, helped me find paths (and connect them) when I got lost, and quieted a snarling collection of writing quirks I never even knew existed. Like Tina, A Book Apart’s Katel LeDû patiently kept me on track with a hand that was sometimes stern but more often generous with high fives.

Thanks to Mandy Brown for encouraging me to start writing this book, to Jeffrey Zeldman for encouraging me to keep at it, and to Jason Santa Maria and Rob Weychert for making it look so kick-ass. Thanks to Caren Litherland for her sharpshooter targeting of errant punctuation and clumsy grammar.

The ideas in this book were developed and tested during the design of many websites and apps. Dull notions became sharp design principles thanks to the steel of my frequent collaborators, who prove the rule that you should always work with people smarter than you. Among them, special thanks to my confederate Brad Frost, who also penned the foreword for this book (thus laying claim to several touchscreen puns before I could use them myself). Thanks to my coconspirators Dan Mall, Jennifer Brook, TJ Pitre, Jonathan Stark, Ethan Marcotte, Kevin Hoffman, Melissa Frost, Kelli Shaver, Robert Gorell, Robert Jolly, and Kristina Frantz. Thanks, too, to my clients, who were game to push the frontier with us and try new techniques. From the project archives, special shouts to Abby McInerney, Teri Everett, and David Fine for Time Inc.; Sara Winge and Edie Freedman for O’Reilly Media; Chad Schlegel and Bill Gannon for Entertainment Weekly; Tony Brancato for People Magazine; Ned Desmond and Christine Ying for TechCrunch; Cathy Ferrara for Scholastic; and Samantha Katz, Joel Smernoff, and Peter Meyers for Citia.

I have the rare fortune to be friends with people who are also my heroes. I often pinch myself at the company I’m in, even more so that they’re all so generous with their ideas and suggestions. My fellow traveler Luke Wroblewski never fails to make me smarter about mobile, especially over late-night drinks. He also convened the Mobilewood crew, whose future-friendly influence is reflected throughout this book. Thanks to the mighty Mobilewood brains of Brad Frost (again), Lyza Danger Gardner, Jason Grigsby, Scott Jehl, Scott Jenson, Tim Kadlec, Jeremy Keith, Brian LeRoux, Bryan Rieger, Stephanie Rieger, and Andrea Trasatti. Thanks to my Providence crew: Jennifer Robbins, Jason Pamental, Bil Herron, and Coryndon Luxmoore for reality-checking my early notions on touchscreen design. I’m grateful for expansive conversations with my smart friends Rachel Hinman, David VanEsselstyn, Carla Diana, Rusty Mitchell, Loren Brichter, John Gruber, and my hacking partner (and Brooklyn’s sweetheart), Larry Legend. Thanks, too, to Bill Buxton for his encouraging words and to Steven Hoober and Patti Shank for their tireless mobile research efforts.

My gumption is goosed daily by the enthusiasm and creativity of my studiomates in Brooklyn. Thanks to all of you and especially to Swissmiss Tina Roth Eisenberg for creating a remarkable community at Friends, and to Jessi Arrington and Creighton Mershon for filling Studiomates with so much spirit (and color!).

Finally, I’m so very grateful to the two loves of my life: my wife, Liza, and our daughter, Nika. Nika’s boundless optimism and wonder constantly replenish my own, and her always inventive uses of phones and tablets remind me that we’ve only begun to scratch the surface of how we’ll interact with information—and one another. And holy cats, Liza, you make everything possible. Every day you teach me, challenge me, encourage me, thrill me. You help me be the best Josh Clark I can be, and you’ve certainly made me the luckiest man alive. Thank you for sharing this wonderful life with me.