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As always, I’m a sucker for good info-graphics and good motion-graphics. Put the two together and you’ve really got me.
You have to watch this a couple times to really internalize some of the numbers. In particular, Facebook’s overall dominance is simply staggering.
(via @micah)
It took a pretty big fiasco, but as the Ars Technica notes, this is the first time Microsoft has very clearly suggested users move away from IE6 because of a specific flaw. Now if they would all just heed that advice…
It’s a step forward, but then: two steps back. “I’m not aware that the vulnerability exists in other [non-IE browsers]… But those products may have other vulnerabilities.” Sigh.
That’s like saying: “I know smoking can cause cancer, but you might get cancer from something else, so you might as well smoke.”
(via @elliothere)
As you can see, the client configuration currently at risk is Windows XP running IE6,” the blog post reads. “We recommend users of IE6 on Windows XP upgrade to a new version of Internet Explorer and/or enable DEP. Users of other platforms are at reduced risk. We also recommend users of Windows XP upgrade to newer versions of Windows.
There is a unique and interesting balance in this town between hard, intense work, and a lot of relaxing, fun things to do. The always-connectedness actually makes it easier I think, not harder to find that balance because you can work from so many different locations. It’s not binary: in the office working, or out of the office, not working.
Thing two that I think is special is that there’s very little friction here. There’s no commutes; we’re living in a world where it doesn’t matter whether you’re sitting at your desk in your office, you’re sitting in your home, you’re sitting in a coffee shop, you can get work done. Especially with software and Internet-related things, you’re always connected, and as a result, the integration and probably the ability to sustain a level of intensity that’s required is higher.
An interesting case study by Sam Brown about his work on Carbonmade’s internal reporting system, Pulse.
Counter-point.
Fantasy world is thinking that everyone has the ability and the access, the know how or even the desire to upgrade their browser.
Point.
If you’re one of those people who is hiding behind the outdated notion that web sites should look, or be experienced, exactly the same in every browser, you are in for a nasty shock. The real question is not should web sites look the same in every browser but can they? The answer is no. Live with that, move on.
If you are one of those people who is waiting until using progressive CSS is safe because all major browsers support the same CSS at the same time, you’re living in a fantasy world.
The writing is definitely on the wall for IE6. Some major sites and services are starting to drop support for it. Even so, I keep hearing the argument that IE6 must be supported because a good chunk of corporate America is stuck with it. From my understanding, they’re stuck with it because they have propriety web apps that only work in IE6.
Ok, fine. But maybe we’ve been approaching this the wrong way the whole time. Why can’t these companies install Firefox, or Chrome, or Safari alongside IE6? Tell employees to use IE6 for their stuck-in-time web apps, and a normal browser for everything else. What’s the problem with this approach? And why aren’t more people advocating it? What am I missing?
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It is designed to be completely invisible — a super normal registration interface. It’s only worthy of remark because it was incredibly effective. We saw a noticeable increase in our registration rate compared to the old page.
We stopped being clever. Instead, we built the most effective solution for the problem at hand — and nothing more.
I’ll say this up front: I sincerely (and selfishly) wish I had written and posted this months ago. I posed the following argument to a friend not long after I had become hooked on Twitter, and frankly, had I written about it then, I would’ve looked like a genius at the outset of the fix replies debacle. Instead, you’ll have to take my argument for what it may (or may not) be worth now:
Huh? Let me explain: Twitter is brilliant because of its simplicity and the way it lends itself to being an open and public messaging/broadcasting platform. These basic tenents are what differentiated it and helped it become what it is today among a host of other more “traditional” social network sites.
I would go so far as to say that the ultimate genius of Twitter is its lack of features. There are no groups, there are no sub-sets or tiers of users. No special treatment. Up until Twitter “fixed confusing replies” (as they originally put it), everyone saw what everyone else wrote (unless they chose not to). You are valuable to people on Twitter if they listen to you and find value in what you say. On some level, Twitter stumbled into what it is today. It would be hard to come up with a more simple structure for a social network if you tried. Simplicity is the genius of Twitter. But there is a problem…
I’m loving Shaun Inman’s new homepage. He introduced it on Twitter by saying, “pixels are the new blog.” It’s very reminiscent of his Horror Vacui iPhone game.
Working on the web is a bizarre business. We create our own ecosystems. Our own worlds. We decided what is in, who is out. For a small period of time, we are our own gods. And then we let the project go into the greater world. And most people shrug. And we move on to the next big thing.
I have now between five and ten newly empty hours a day, and the things I pushed away-seeing friends, writing fiction, eating off of plates-don’t return naturally. The project is gone, taking with it the nearly monastic order it gave to life. In its place there is: one, the need for praise…, two, the sense of failure (all those problems left unsolved, all the rough edges and clutter that you couldn’t distill to simplicity), and three, the sudden awareness of insignificance (all you have done is to turn on another blinking screen among the blinking billions in the media night sky).
This made the rounds yesterday, but I’m just now getting around to posting it. So, if you somehow haven’t seen it yet, click through for some of the best “design” and copywriting I’ve seen in a long time.
My favorite line:
“That’s right, I’ll Ajax the crap out of your site. Nothing, and I mean nothing will be static. I’ll pull your data asynchronously from every orifice of your server. Your clients will be SOOOOO impressed.”
A commenter on Yewknee’s blog pointed out that there is additional fun in the source code, right down to the ID tag names. On some level, it’s almost unfortunate that Safari 3 beta no longer supports the blink tag. Almost.
Auto-tune has taken over the music industry. But you know it’s reached a new level when musicians use it as an instrument, and now it makes for a good comedy routine.
(via @philcoffman)
or not.
A great post on the ins-and-outs of building a web company and why a business model isn’t all that important starting out. The problem is, I disagree. Now, sometimes you’re onto a new technology that is so amazing that it makes sense to go for it and let the business work itself out later (which is essentially what he is proposing). But I think too many people treat their startup this way, when, in reality, their startup is nothing new.
If you’re nothing new, it begs the question: why start it if you don’t know how you’ll make money?
I generally believe that for many technology companies, you need not necessarily have any idea how you will make money when you get started, and if you show good progress on the product and customer adoption, you need not make any commitments to a business model for some time. You do need to intimately understand where you sit in the proverbial value chain and what your position there means for your company, but you don’t need to know precisely how you will extract value. In fact, I’ll go farther and say that focusing on business model too early can hurt a company’s prospects.
This post contains some extended thoughts that came out of a post I read on the Less Everything blog regarding An Alternative Rails Maturity Model idea.
I originally read the post the day it came out and I’ve been mulling over it. Something was bugging me. Not just about the idea of a Rails Maturity Model certification, but even the idea of a guild of some kind as proposed by Steven Bristol.
Here’s the thing (and I think this is provable time and time again in much more mature industries): trade guilds, trade associations and standards bodies maintain the status quo. They do everything they can to do so, even when it’s not to the benefit of the industry or the clients/customers of that industry.
Let your work speak for itself.
Let me say this upfront: in the field of web design, qualifications don’t actually mean as much as you’d think. Really, it’s about what you’ve done, and what you can do. How you get to this point isn’t really an issue.
And why it was rewritten in Rails.
(via Muxtape)
The thing that’s so wonderful about using beautiful, appropriate tools is that they become an extension of you, your body, you fingertips, and your mind. They get out of the way and let you directly interact with the problem you are solving. Everyone’s tried to remove a screw without a screwdriver; a task quickly becomes impossible that otherwise would be trivial.
What will we build?
I think the next 20 years of innovation around software and the Internet will make the last 20 years look like child’s play. And while the vector of negativity and pessimism continues to follow a steep upward slope, it’ll eventually crest. In the mean time I don’t see an endpoint to the human animal’s desire to innovate.
Budgets are definitely getting slashed all over the place. Paul Boag has some great tips for potential clients who find themselves with less money to spend (or who simply want more for their money). You can read his 5 tips below and click through to the article for explanations.
I agree with all of Paul’s tips and a good web design firm should be able to help you along those lines. I added a 6th to the list: hire a smaller, more agile agency. No, I’m not just fishing for work, I think this is truly something you can use to your advantage. Small agencies (or even individuals) can often focus more on your project and give you more of their time. And, because their overhead is so low, they can usually go further with a smaller budget.
To quote from the great Zeldman:
“Fancy offices and ten people at every meeting are out. A close relationship with an individual or small team that listens is in.”
Don’t pester your users.
Amazing story, but not surprising. A good site, with good product(s) or service(s) will be reused. It can’t help but be reused. You don’t need to trap your users in a way that makes them feel coerced into further participation with your company.
(via Shawn Blanc)
We were wrong about the first-time shoppers. They did mind registering. They resented having to register when they encountered the page. As one shopper told us, “I’m not here to enter into a relationship. I just want to buy something.”
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