Wednesday, May 02, 2007
Web Designers Survey
For all web designers out there, you should take this survey. From A List Apart's website:
Designers, developers, project managers. Writers and editors. Information architects and usability specialists. People who make websites have been at it for more than a dozen years, yet almost nothing is known, statistically, about our profession. Who are we? Where do we live? What are our titles, our skills, our educational backgrounds? Where and with whom do we work? What do we earn? What do we value?
The survey can be found at: http://alistapart.com/articles/webdesignsurvey.
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
A Digital Revolution
Wow! I just went to digg.com to check out the latest news, and I have stumbled across a new digital revolution. The 16 hexadecimal digits (as of this post, the HD-DVD key was posted to this article at the bottom) that are used to unlock the HD-DVD from their content protection system have been cracked and posted around the internet. And digg made an attempt to keep the numbers off their user generated content site. Whoops!
In reply, the AACS has sent cease and desist letters to Google and many bloggers commanding them to take down the key. One such place was digg.com, and the founders at digg agreed to remove the stories. This set of a whirlwind of protest, where hundreds of digg users have started creating sites mentioning the 16 hexadecimal digits in creative ways. UPDATE: After witnessing the uproar by the digg community, Kevin Rose has changed his mind. Apparently, digg will no longer attempt to remove these stories.
It is fascinating to see all the resistance by the digg community. At one point, every story on the front page made reference to the number!
This just goes to show, in today's modern world the users control your site.
photo from downloadsquad.com
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
JOOST Invitation
Brent Roos is offering an invite to Joost for anyone that plays along with his game. Basically he would people to write a short essay of why they think they should receive an invitation. Based on the comments of his site, everyone who visits his site is either illiterate or doesn't know how to follow instructions. Based on that, this simple paragraph should be enough!
However, I believe in the spirit of sharing and I am excited about trying Joost, so why not explain my reasons. Besides, Brent has a link to a funny YouTube/Google video. I hadn't seen it before and it got me to stay on his site for a while.
For those of you who are not familiar with Joost, it is an IPTV service, a way to get TV over the internet. Currently, the content is lacking (no Heroes, 24, Lost, or SportsCenter), but the technology is promising.
Many of you are familiar with Real Nebraska, our online video recruitment objective. As more and more schools begin to follow our trend, we must come up with new and exciting ways to keep our objective fresh. Enter IPTV. I'm not convinced broadcasting our content through IPTV is the way to go, but I would like to take the opportunity to explore in more detail.
So Brent, if you read this - how about an invite?
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
Blog Comments
It appears this blog has been spammed pretty hard with inappropriate comments. Therefore I am turning off all comments until I can put together some ways to counteract this. I hope to have it sorted out this weekend. Thanks for your patience!
Wednesday, October 25, 2006
Getting Real
The team over at 37signals embrace the new web design 2.0. They start with the interface and then work backwards. The interface is what the customers/users see; make that the best it can be and then add the functionality.
It seems to be working just fine for them, Basecamp, Campefire and Backpack all seem to be doing well.
They recently released a book on their philosophy of "smarter, faster, easier" web applications. After the first chapter, I'm hooked. Check it out for free online at: http://gettingreal.37signals.com/toc.php
From the first chapter:
Getting Real starts with the interface, the real screens that people are going to use. It begins with what the customer actually experiences and builds backwards from there. This lets you get the interface right before you get the software wrong.
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Finally, someone is willing to share the Holy Grail!
A press release came out today announcing the launch of a new website, www.makemoney101.com. What a joke. The website makes the promise to provide "the webmaster the tools to keep those 5 steps ahead of the competition". Wow, finally we are going to be five steps ahead! Why stop at five, why not ten? Or twenty?
The press release goes on to promise "'the full package'". Everything we have been using in the past is only a partial package, so it's good to finally get the real thing.
It seems lately the make-money-quick trend has been refuled. The Web 2.0 cycle has now set in, so the scammers are coming out to take advantage of the prey. All the "experts" will try to sell the tools needed to become a millionaire. A few schmucks will be taken advantage of, so more crooks will come out. I would love to see this come to an end, it only polutes the market and gives the real marketers a bad name.
By the way, when I went to www.makemoney101.com, I got the "server not found" error. Sounds like some great tools!