Having a hit social media site is like having a hit music video on MTV. (If MTV still played music videos) You never know when you could find yourself being yesterday’s news. Sites like Friendster, EbaumsWorld, and MySpace came in with a lot of hype and now find themselves in decline. On the other side of the coin Digg.com has been praised for just how long it has stayed relevant as one of the top 150 most visited websites for 7 years. (www.alexa.com/topsites) That makes it an elder statesman in the social networking world. I figured I’d try my best…
Read MoreArchive for the ‘Reviews’ Category
The goings on at the UX Book Club Chicago monthly meetings (3/31/10)
If you’re not already familiar with the UX Book Club’s Chicago chapter, let me get you up to speed. It’s a small group of passionate design folks who meet downtown to talk about things in the industry. Such as our jobs, our roll as designers, and what is going on in our professional spheres. We praise each other’s triumphs, as well as bitch about other designers, clients, educators, etc. We also digress into joking about current events, or corporate drug testing, or Battlestar Galactica, or whatever happens to pop up organically throughout the evening. Oh yeah, and there’s books too. Every…
Read MoreUsing Online Video Effectively in the Hospitality Industry
In 1995 video advertising on the web was such a hassle most companies didn’t even bother. Most of the country was on dial up and notebooks didn’t have nearly the market saturation. Fast forward 15 years and web marketing videos are everywhere, particularly in the hotel, resort, and hospitality industry. Of the 15 Million videos uploaded every minute about 10% of those are advertising. Having video content on the web isn’t just a good idea; it’s a necessity if you want to be competitive in the hospitality market. With that in mind let’s take a look at 10 companies that…
Read MoreComcast/XFinity: Changing Your Brand Name as Damage Control
With Toyota’s recall and Comcast’s announcement that they are rebranding themselves as Xfinity I figured I’d take some time and explore the idea of damage control advertising. It’s nothing new. The Emancipation Proclamation was a part of Lincoln’s re-branding campaign; it was his effort to rebrand the war and get public opinion back on his side. It might have started in politics but quickly moved into corporate advertising when corporations like Phillip Morris decided a name change was necessary to get rid of their bad press. More recently some of the major banks have had name changes in an attempt…
The dominance of search
Last night I attended a presentation for web professionals in the Chicago area. It was organized through meetup.com. The presenter was Matt Moog, Founder & CEO at Viewpoints. You can see his slide deck here.
Among his many relevant points was the notion he referred to as ‘the dominance of search.’ Matt’s focus for the evening was specifically on sites that serve up social commerce, but I think the search issue is something any site needs to consider seriously. What Matt was referring to was his claim was that 50-80% of traffic across the web comes from search. This was a…
Read MoreApple to announce Slate – and the crowd goes (sorta) wild
Apple fans have been hearing rumbling of the apple tablet, the completely flat fully functioning notebook computer, for years now. Apple released the iPhone, still no tablet. They released the Macbook Air but didn’t waste a breath on the tablet. Finally, after years of building it up, Apple is close to bringing it down to us. If you happened to be on CES or G4 that day, you might think it was Charlton Heston coming down the mountain with a certain stone tablet instead of the long awaited new gadget from Steve Jobs and Co. Outside of the message boards…
Read More8 things Ushering in the “New School” of Web Development, Part 1
In the grand scheme of my profession, that being a Web Developer, I would still consider myself to be a rookie. I have been developing web sites and getting paid for it, for around 3 years; however, I would probably say that I have been doing it “professionally” for around a year and a half. Even with my “rookie” status as a web developer, I do consider my talents to be very respectable, especially for the relatively short period of time I have been doing it. One thing I have noticed since I began my career is the difference between,…
Read MoreThe importance of documentation and planning for user experience
User experience expert – John Yesko, gave this latest presentation and the topic was “Rich User Experience Documentation – Beyond Static Wireframes.”
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