Particls is an interesting take on the whole NetVibes Phenomenon. It prompts you with real time alerts when changes occur on your favorite sites or RSS feeds. Sounds cool, huh?
I don’t think so. I’m going to stick with NetVibes or PageFlakes for the same reason I cancelled my Yahoo! IM account and stopped getting email on my cell phone — Sporatic and unpredicatble alerts equal low productivity. On-demand is the way to go.
31Three is a design studio with a popular blog I happen to read. Recently, they came across another group’s web site with a strikingly similar design to their own. I guess imitation is the sincerest form of flattery but this is laughable
Check it out Here on Flickr.
When Sir Tim Berners-Lee and W3C consortium first developed the concepts that would become the foundation for the semantic web, they were trying to address a serious issue concerning the web. Namely, that the potential of the convergence of knowledge found on the web could not be fully realized because of its organic and unpredictable nature. In other words, we had a big ugly mass of information and no easy way to index and share it.
The Utopian solution of the W3C consortium essentially involves the cooperation of all web site designers in conforming to a set of rules that will make the information on their sites easy to parse, index, share, etc. For those of you heavily involved in the world of web design, this gospel is all too familiar. Of course, I do my best to design by standards but ultimately, that system is doomed to fail for two key reasons:
1. Technology is unpredictable. As soon as you settle into the standards that apply to one technology, a completely new one comes along.
2. Designers are unpredictable. Some are too new to know about standards and some are just too lazy to care.
All accessibility issues aside, the point is that we are much better off preaching the cause of specific and limited information exchange in technologies like RSS. We need easy-to-use lightweight means of getting only the most pertinent information out. We don’t need a Utopian revolution.
Postage has gone up in price several times in the last few years but what you may not know is that the last increase included an additional increase for magazines. For many small independent printed publications, unfortunately, this may be the beginning of the end.
However, necessity is the mother of invention as they say. So as a member of the new media community, I would like to encourage my colleagues to use this hurdle as an incentive to push failing publications to the web. An internet model will sound like a great alternative to shutting down completely. Let’s face it; we are the future and this blow from the post office may just be the shock that forces the media industry to get creative with their delivery.
The world of online collaboration tools can be pretty hard to navigate especially if you are in the new media business. Everyone has a favorite and there is a new one hitting the streets just about every day.
When it comes right down to it, though, the actual task they are all trying to accomplish is pretty simple: Show what everyone is thinking and doing. Right? Okay, sometimes it might be a little more complicated than that, but not often. So try using the MyStickies Firefox extension to share information about your web projects.
I’ve been using it with my wife over the last week or so while she does some copy editing for me on a couple of sites. I have to say that I can’t imaging a smoother way to communicate about specific details on a web site. She adds virtual post-its to the site and I can log onto the site and see all of her comments and even leave responses. It’s always the simple ideas that work the best. This is a simple as it gets.
Recently, Wired Magazine ran a promotion with Xerox in which they allowed subscribers to upload a photo that would then appear on the cover of a special personalized issue in July. Of course, I had to take advantage of the offer so as soon as I had a chance, I cropped a nice picture of my son covered in Spaghetti Os and uploaded it.
We talk a lot about the web as the only future of information exchange but it will be a while before print is essentially out. In the meantime, there have been some pretty amazing developments in print technology that allow for some exciting new applications. Wired has taken the soul of MySpace (Personalization) and applied the same concept to a printed magazine.
I’d like to think that I live my life by the biblical concept that it’s better to give than receive; but when it comes to business that principle can be a hard one to swallow.
For example, there is a local designer here in Midland that I send clients to from time to time when I’m too busy or a client’s budget isn’t enough to get the job done. He’s a lot cheaper than I am and he doesn’t do much programming but I know he’s reliable. I’ve never actually met him but this week, to my surprise he sent a client back my way that needed some web functionality that was beyond his skill.
Fortunately, we still live in a society that responds to good will (at least in Texas we do. Yeehaw!)
The chaos cloud that is YouTube and most other online video content providers can be very interesting… for a little while. But ultimately, on the viewing end of things, we enjoy well produced, well informed content. PodTech.net has a little more of that sparkle we expect from trusted content providers. It also speaks to a niche audience that wouldn’t have a chance for a spot even on a cable network with hundreds of channels.
It’s worth checking out and if you make the web developer blog rounds on a regular basis, you will probably recognize a few names as you browse through the latest videos.
To give credit where credit is due, I saw Bumptop on Cameron Moll’s blog. This is a great example of how we can become stuck in a one dimensional way of thinking when it comes to design. You’ve probably heard the story of the woman who cut off an inch around the edge of her pot roast before she cooked it because that’s the way her mother did it and her mother’s mother did it. When her grandmother is confronted with the question of why, she tells her granddaughter that she simply never had a pan big enough to fit the whole roast.
When I saw the Bumptop demo I imagine I felt about the same as that woman did when she found out she was wasting good roast. In web design, as technology and bandwidth go up, we should always be looking for new ways to “fill the whole pan”. If you don’t, someone else will.
Watch the Video
Traditionally (or at least for the past 100 year or so) there has been a very clear distinction between home life and work life. I won’t get into all the cultural implications of that mindset but suffice it to say that I’m glad things are beginning to change. I am learning to view my work as a vocation rather than a career — something that my parent’s generation never had the joy of experiencing. For them, unfortunately, you were either a hard worker or a bum.
Now, I admit that some separation of the facets of your life is important but I think you will find that the more you view them all as an extension of a single goal, the more fulfilling the whole process becomes.
Here’s a photo of my father-in-law with our new daughter during one of my spur of the moment work/vacation trips in the middle of the week. I love my job!
Well, one look at my home page (Liquid Design Media) and you probably already know how I feel about the question. But the issue is much more complex than that. The new web 2.0 generation of designers has told us to reject the splash page as an unnecessary barrier between the visitor and the information they want to see. I would agree with that assertion in most cases and, in fact, I very rarely use splash pages.
However, there are some instances where I would highly recommend a splash page. Generally, the higher the art factor in the content of the site, the more appropriate a splash page is. I the case my web site, though, I feel like the splash page helps direct visitors more effectively to the content they are looking for. The point is that you shouldn’t let the latest trends dictate the direction you take on a site. Do what works best.
Recently, I’ve been starting meetings with prospective clients a little differently. Right off the bat, I tell them not to think of their website as a brochure. For some reason this concept sparks a big “ohhhhh” moment for a lot of people who aren’t in the industry. A brochure is static, difficult to change, and updated once every few years. Sound familiar?
More than once I’ve found myself lost in a maze of sentence fragements and nonsensical rambling trying to explain how the web has changed in the last couple of years. It’s a hard issue to convey consicely. Take it from me and don’t try to tackle it head on. Just say, “Your website is not a brochure and if you treat it like one, you won’t be getting the most out of it.” For most of the business owners you will run into, their website is the most effective and efficient tool they have to communicate with, track, and serve new and existing clients. Doesn’t sound like a brochure to me.
If you’ve used CSS based layouts for any amount of time, then you already know about all the wonderful benefits they offer. Quick and easy site-wide changes, beautiful easy-to-read html, and design/code separation are just a few of the big ones. Unfortunately, this wonderful new world of CSS design has bred a new kind of snob. If you think I’m wrong, try mentioning tables at the next web conference you attend. Tables are the old way, you see — the way of amateurs — the way of losers. No really, it’s a moral, nay spiritual issue (You think I’m joking, but seriously, try it).
I actually found myself in a design predicament just this week that I just couldn’t seem crack. I was so entrenched in my CSS snobbery that I couldn’t see the obvious solution right in front of me in the form of
.So to sum up: CSS is awesome but the visitor experience is the most important piece of the pie. Use what works.
If you’ve been in the web design business for very long you know how frequent requests for free work can be. Charities need websites, your friends are constantly coming up with ideas that need websites, relatives need a family reunion website, and the list goes on and on.
I’ve found that the best way to deal with these kinds of requests is to decide in advance how many free projects you will work on per year and stick with that number no matter what. Otherwise, your business can easily get smothered by all the great causes. Also, don’t foget the myriad of free tools that can get your free loading clients up and running really fast with minimal effort. My personal preference is to use blogger.com and feedburner.com to create a quick custom blog. With a few minor tweaks to one of blogger’s built-in templates and a little time configuring feedburner, I can have a pretty nice looking website with some very impressive features. Here is one that I am working on right now. It has taken me a total of three hours to get it where it is. Not too bad!
