Well I'd say neither of those things. The gulf between a child and an adult is really not that wide when it comes to matters such as taste and reasoning ability.
I would imagine the OP you're responding to was referring to the "drawings" of text, which look straight out of one of those kindergarten "write this letter 100 times to practice it" books.
The people/illustrations are pretty good, and wouldn't be out of the ordinary accompanying regular text.
> I would imagine the OP you're responding to was referring to the "drawings" of text, which look straight out of one of those kindergarten "write this letter 100 times to practice it" books.
This would make a lot more sense if this was at all what kindergarten handwriting looks like.
I don't think we should tell artists what they can/can't do, but I do think it would be reasonable for the New York Times to enforce that all content they host is made as accessible as reasonably possible, for some definition of that.
This could be made much more accessible by just including appropriate captions, and doing so would benefit a large part of the community.
I agree that it’s annoying for a longform article or something like documentation, but with the drawings on the sides I think it works fine for this application.
I don't have an issue with the format itself, but you're absolutely right that it's an accessibility nightmare. The worst part is that it's so easy for it not to be.
I thought maybe since there's no descriptive text alongside images, that there was probably something in the alt tags. However, the alt tags for each image are just empty quotes. For all intents and purposes this is just a blank page for anyone using a screen reader.
Hey everyone, use descriptive alt tags for your images. It takes 10 seconds and makes a big difference.
Short question, Short answer with nice drawings as a bonus. Perfect and logical way to send the message and a lot of time saved for the reader. There is not need to rewrite "the brothers Karamazov ate on a sushi restaurant" for such simple question.
I actually really enjoyed it as a short illustrated story. If this was written as a formal NTY article, it would have been five sentences and not particularly memorable.
>"If this was written as a formal NTY article, it would have been five sentences and not particularly memorable."
Maybe an attempt should have been made to do the story justice then. Discuss where these plastic things came from, who got the idea and when? How did their use spread? And the story doesn't even contain any hint of environmental criticism.
It's an incredibly weak article, and you can tell the editors knew that because of the vague headline they created for it, meant to make people curious. If the headline said "The $0.006 'Plastic Grass' in Your Sushi Container Is Doing an Important Job" far fewer people would have clicked on the article because 'it keeps food separate' is self-evident to anybody who's ever seen it. Better yet would be "The $0.006 'Plastic Grass' in Your Sushi Container Is For Keeping Food Separate." The brief digression into the original bamboo leaf form was slightly interesting, but this article should have gone much deeper to justify itself.
Normally I would agree, but I think they were referring to "bamboo kun" which is how the bamboo plant fights off fungi and was thought to provide some antimicrobial properties, although at least in textiles seems to be ineffective [0]
darkpuma already expressed the general idea but yeah--- if one piece of food has a bacterial/fungal presence, then having anti-microbial properties for the flavor-divider is a not that big of a plus.
When did the venerable New York Times turn into a comic book?
Anyway, far from being an "important job" this is an example of inexcusable waste. Casually using throw-away plastic junk for something as pointless as "separating the flavors", when I'm just going to shove both of those things into my mouth anyway without bothering to rinse out my mouth and cleanse my palate with bland crackers, is beyond the pale. With our precarious global environmental situation, we should be criticizing not apologizing for frivolous waste like this.
And for this matter, stop giving me free plastic forks or chopsticks every time. I own my own reusable stainless steel utensils.
I really wish delivery services like DoorDash would present UI to opt out of cutlery and condiments (preferably as a default).
When I order a dinner for delivery to my home, I'm likely going to use my own plates/knives. If I'm ordering via phone or pickup, I can decline the default forks/chopsticks but using the UI it's nto possible without a "comment" and some restaurants don't even read that.
Yes there's already waste in the packaging but often that's compostable these days.
Yet I do. I have some free plastic cutlery in the kitchen right now, yet not ten minutes ago I washed up a ceramic plate and a metal fork. With my hands.
There is a dishwasher but I'm using it to store post and as a wine rack.
<3 for the idea to be using my dishwasher as a wine rack..
I despise wasting time waiting for dishes to wash in a dishwasher; noting also the time it takes to fill it before you run it can leave you without your favorite glass/dish!
‘Free’ plastic cutlery is being rolled into the price of the dinner, for one. Some people also pay for garbage disposal.
Then there is the ecological issue of using and disposing of cutlery and plates after one use. Why would the harm of that need to be explained in 2019? Most household waste in the US goes to landfills.
Another issue is personal health. Plastic is continually emitting tiny amounts of toxic chemicals and leaching plasticizers and other endocrine disrupters/suspected carcinogens into the air and anything it comes into contact with. This differs from the glass and ceramic dishes that I purchase for use at home.
Why would you rather pollute the environment with more thrown away plastic crap than spend 20 seconds by a sink to clean a fork? Even if you recycle the plastic fork (few people bother to, since the fork is already associated with food waste they throw it into the trash along with the food waste) the energy cost of recycling that plastic is still inexcusable when you could have avoided the entire thing by simply owning your own fork.
Plastic is largely a byproduct from oil/gas processing... as long as we're using as much oil/gas as we do, plastic usage (even disposable) is already additional use out of the system. If it weren't composite plastic, it would be landfill sludge anyway.
Now, reducing the consumption of oil/gas could reduce plastic as a byproduct and increase costs in which case the market would self-correct.
If that's the direction you want to approach the situation from, then consider that by allowing the byproducts to be commercialized you are in effect subsidizing the oil and gas, and thereby encouraging their continued use.
You should also consider the unique harm plastic waste in particular does to wildlife.
I'm not saying it isn't a problem... the larger issue of littering in general, and wildlife preservation are huge to me. We have very well managed waste disposal sites, and do a lot of subsidizing recycling efforts.
My point was that if you aren't littering, then the net cost to the environment isn't such a huge thing. I'm also not a fan of government subsidies in general. Your point really isn't a subsidy, it's a means of greater use, which is generally considered a good thing. Unless you'd rather have more environmental waste that isn't used for any secondary purpose.
I'd love to see more/better efforts with regards to wildlife conservation, not littering etc. I like to do road trips while on vacation. Seeing the shear amount of litter on roadways, in the mountains and everywhere but a proper trashcan that will get disposed of reasonably is upsetting. Frankly, I think that getting society as a whole to respect their environment and other people's property (littering and vandalism) would go further to improving things than not.
I don't care enough about the infinitesimal impact of an individual using plastic silverware to want to go wash a fork, no. I don't feel the externalities of the decision come anywhere close to outweighing the convenience. Convenience being the whole point of food delivery.
I keep all the extra cutlery and napkins I get in a drawer and reuse them. Haven't had to buy paper towels in a long time.
Nevermind the trash you're promoting the production of by accumulating. You already have a reusable, probably more comfortable set of cutlery which has paid itself over a thousands times. As long as you have it, you don't need plastic stuff: no need to use it, no need to hoard it, no need to rely on it – 'cause you already have all the stuff you need at a moment's notice.
Doing the dishes is easy. The fact that I have to rack my head about which kind of plastic is reusable and which isn't, then have to separate the two – knowing that I'm throwing the kind of stuff away that will cause noticable damage to the environment when compounded per capita – seems like such a goddamn mess compared to having a ceramic plate ready for use.
Seamless.com has had an option at check-out for as long as I can remember that says "I'm trying to save the environment, spare me the napkins and utensils." It's always up to the restaurant to "support" that option though.
"I'm trying to save the environment, please bring me food in single-use containers and have a person make a trip just for me in a gas-powered vehicle; cooking seems hard"
From the company's perspective, though, the number of complaints from customers who didn't get ketchup, napkins, cutlery, etc. greatly exceeds the number of complaints from people who received too many extras. Given this, drivers are trained (and primed through the rating system) to grab all of the extra items they can.
I can't remember ever automatically getting any cutlery or napkins when ordering in food in Germany, ever. Maybe wooden chopsticks for fried rice, but maybe I'm misremembering that was when telling them to put some in.
Typically these are added to sushi packaged in disposable plastic trays. This makes the ‘grass’ a tiny percentage of the plastic used in the meal.
The article seems to convey that plastic is considered inferior to vegetable matter for this. It is cheaper, which actually suggests less resource consumption. Plenty of plastic and other resources (petroleum itself) would be expended to provide lettuce or bamboo for this instead of PET, with even less efficiency since it’s perishable. It would be worth comparing whether it would save resources.
Another option would be to redesign the container to reduce any need for a separator. A new design could end up using just as much plastic as the current tray + the grass - who knows.
Maybe it's regional, but when I get takeout food it's in compressed cardboard-type material containers. If nothing else, it biodegrades. Some of these containers are segmented.
Regardless, I am asserting that the "grass" divider is purely aesthetic and should be left out completely. The supposed practical purpose is transparent BS, those flavors are going to get mixed in my mouth more than they would in the tray merely by touching each other.
> It is cheaper, which actually suggests less resource consumption.
Cheaper so long as you ignore the externalities of long-term use of disposable plastic. Using a little piece of harmlessly biodegradable waxed paper instead might be "more expensive" in strict manufacturing terms but would the cheaper option if the externalities of plastic were properly taxed.
This literally gave me a headache to read. I assume they made the article look like a 6 year old drew/wrote it because they thought it wouldn't be long enough (page-wise) without 10000pt font?
I wish there were a day to send feedback to the NYT saying "please do not do this again".
Reading bubbly, squiggly cursive writing on a white background when nearly everything I use is black basically did give me a headache. Its an accessibility nightmare too.
To be fair, it's pretty bad handwriting. Perhaps deliberately so? And is switching between cursive and print in the middle of sentences meant to be stylistic?
My handwriting is terrible too so maybe I shouldn't complain, but that's why I type.
> Wendy MacNaughton is a graphic journalist based in San Francisco.
> Meanwhile: Wendy MacNaughton’s illustrated column about the big implications of seemingly small things.
So, the illustration and the words together are kind of the point (and they don't look like a 6 year old drew them, come on). There's even an interview with her here:
How does that tiny sheet of plastic in a plastic box separate the smell of fish from the rice when, in sushi, the fish is stuck either right above or inside the rice itself?
To the people complaining about the format, does it make more sense if you look at it in the context of a social media story? It looks weird as images presented vertically on the New York times website. But this would be right at home in an instagram feed.
I personally appreciate the hand drawn look and artwork, but supplementing that with a text version would be an improvement for many reasons.
77 comments
[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 137 ms ] threadAs far as I can see all the people are more or less drawn anatomically correct and IMO it looks good.
Have you ever seen something drawn by an infant ?
The people/illustrations are pretty good, and wouldn't be out of the ordinary accompanying regular text.
This would make a lot more sense if this was at all what kindergarten handwriting looks like.
This could be made much more accessible by just including appropriate captions, and doing so would benefit a large part of the community.
As it was, trying to read the handwriting was definitely annoying.
I thought maybe since there's no descriptive text alongside images, that there was probably something in the alt tags. However, the alt tags for each image are just empty quotes. For all intents and purposes this is just a blank page for anyone using a screen reader.
Hey everyone, use descriptive alt tags for your images. It takes 10 seconds and makes a big difference.
Maybe an attempt should have been made to do the story justice then. Discuss where these plastic things came from, who got the idea and when? How did their use spread? And the story doesn't even contain any hint of environmental criticism.
It's an incredibly weak article, and you can tell the editors knew that because of the vague headline they created for it, meant to make people curious. If the headline said "The $0.006 'Plastic Grass' in Your Sushi Container Is Doing an Important Job" far fewer people would have clicked on the article because 'it keeps food separate' is self-evident to anybody who's ever seen it. Better yet would be "The $0.006 'Plastic Grass' in Your Sushi Container Is For Keeping Food Separate." The brief digression into the original bamboo leaf form was slightly interesting, but this article should have gone much deeper to justify itself.
[0] https://bioresources.cnr.ncsu.edu/BioRes_08/BioRes_08_4_6501...
Anyway, far from being an "important job" this is an example of inexcusable waste. Casually using throw-away plastic junk for something as pointless as "separating the flavors", when I'm just going to shove both of those things into my mouth anyway without bothering to rinse out my mouth and cleanse my palate with bland crackers, is beyond the pale. With our precarious global environmental situation, we should be criticizing not apologizing for frivolous waste like this.
And for this matter, stop giving me free plastic forks or chopsticks every time. I own my own reusable stainless steel utensils.
When I order a dinner for delivery to my home, I'm likely going to use my own plates/knives. If I'm ordering via phone or pickup, I can decline the default forks/chopsticks but using the UI it's nto possible without a "comment" and some restaurants don't even read that.
Yes there's already waste in the packaging but often that's compostable these days.
There is a dishwasher but I'm using it to store post and as a wine rack.
Then there is the ecological issue of using and disposing of cutlery and plates after one use. Why would the harm of that need to be explained in 2019? Most household waste in the US goes to landfills.
Another issue is personal health. Plastic is continually emitting tiny amounts of toxic chemicals and leaching plasticizers and other endocrine disrupters/suspected carcinogens into the air and anything it comes into contact with. This differs from the glass and ceramic dishes that I purchase for use at home.
Now, reducing the consumption of oil/gas could reduce plastic as a byproduct and increase costs in which case the market would self-correct.
You should also consider the unique harm plastic waste in particular does to wildlife.
My point was that if you aren't littering, then the net cost to the environment isn't such a huge thing. I'm also not a fan of government subsidies in general. Your point really isn't a subsidy, it's a means of greater use, which is generally considered a good thing. Unless you'd rather have more environmental waste that isn't used for any secondary purpose.
I'd love to see more/better efforts with regards to wildlife conservation, not littering etc. I like to do road trips while on vacation. Seeing the shear amount of litter on roadways, in the mountains and everywhere but a proper trashcan that will get disposed of reasonably is upsetting. Frankly, I think that getting society as a whole to respect their environment and other people's property (littering and vandalism) would go further to improving things than not.
I keep all the extra cutlery and napkins I get in a drawer and reuse them. Haven't had to buy paper towels in a long time.
True, but there's a difference between saving upwards of 30 minutes cooking time vs saving 30 seconds washing a plate...
Seriously we (family of 5) run the dishwasher most nights - got the kids trained to do their part, so it's not much more work.
Do you like throwing away plastic wantonly?
Nevermind the trash you're promoting the production of by accumulating. You already have a reusable, probably more comfortable set of cutlery which has paid itself over a thousands times. As long as you have it, you don't need plastic stuff: no need to use it, no need to hoard it, no need to rely on it – 'cause you already have all the stuff you need at a moment's notice.
Doing the dishes is easy. The fact that I have to rack my head about which kind of plastic is reusable and which isn't, then have to separate the two – knowing that I'm throwing the kind of stuff away that will cause noticable damage to the environment when compounded per capita – seems like such a goddamn mess compared to having a ceramic plate ready for use.
Once, when I though that people might regularly use plastic I thought: "if that's not a mental health red flag I don't know what it is"
From the company's perspective, though, the number of complaints from customers who didn't get ketchup, napkins, cutlery, etc. greatly exceeds the number of complaints from people who received too many extras. Given this, drivers are trained (and primed through the rating system) to grab all of the extra items they can.
The article seems to convey that plastic is considered inferior to vegetable matter for this. It is cheaper, which actually suggests less resource consumption. Plenty of plastic and other resources (petroleum itself) would be expended to provide lettuce or bamboo for this instead of PET, with even less efficiency since it’s perishable. It would be worth comparing whether it would save resources.
Another option would be to redesign the container to reduce any need for a separator. A new design could end up using just as much plastic as the current tray + the grass - who knows.
Regardless, I am asserting that the "grass" divider is purely aesthetic and should be left out completely. The supposed practical purpose is transparent BS, those flavors are going to get mixed in my mouth more than they would in the tray merely by touching each other.
Cheaper so long as you ignore the externalities of long-term use of disposable plastic. Using a little piece of harmlessly biodegradable waxed paper instead might be "more expensive" in strict manufacturing terms but would the cheaper option if the externalities of plastic were properly taxed.
I wish there were a day to send feedback to the NYT saying "please do not do this again".
My handwriting is terrible too so maybe I shouldn't complain, but that's why I type.
You may want to see a doctor.
At the bottom of the article it states:
> Wendy MacNaughton is a graphic journalist based in San Francisco.
> Meanwhile: Wendy MacNaughton’s illustrated column about the big implications of seemingly small things.
So, the illustration and the words together are kind of the point (and they don't look like a 6 year old drew them, come on). There's even an interview with her here:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/18/reader-center/business-se...
In any case, newspapers have always had comics. I don't really see how this is all that different.
I personally appreciate the hand drawn look and artwork, but supplementing that with a text version would be an improvement for many reasons.