Posted on Wed, Mar 26, 2008
I want my MTV…lookin’ good!
It’s always fun to look back at websites to see how they have changed (or not) over the years.
Designers and developers now have more tools and techniques at their disposal then they did back in the “early days.”
Utilization of CSS has made it a lot easier for designers to keep web pages consistent in terms of look, feel and formatting (and therefore enhance usability) and more advanced authoring tools have allowed websites to tap in to rich media-driven techniques.
However, one could argue that the new design technologies could actually make websites harder to use than before. It certainly is food for thought.
Anyway, here is a great article featured on freelancing design website, WakeUpLater.com. The articles shows how some websites have changed over the years including; Amazon, Nike and Starbucks.
If you really want to start looking for old versions of websites, be sure to check out The Way Back Machine – a great repository of archived websites. You’ll be hard-pressed not to find what you’re looking for!
[digg=http://digg.com/design/The_evolution_of_websites]
Posted on Mon, Mar 24, 2008
This article was posted in one of the gaming forums that I frequently troll. I couldn’t help laughing, and thought I’d have to share.
It was written in 1995, when the Internet was a mere pup. The article basically calls the Internet out for being a useless unedited directory of mess rather than the everyday-Joe’s-first-port-of-call-for-information as it is today.
Before I make fun of the article, I can totally see where the author is coming from. In 1995, I thought the Internet was just a slow jumble of random information, too.
Here are some of my favorite quotes:
- “Visionaries see a future of telecommuting workers, interactive libraries and multimedia classrooms. They speak of electronic town meetings and virtual communities. Commerce and business will shift from offices and malls to networks and modems. And the freedom of digital networks will make government more democratic…Baloney!”
- “Yet Nicholas Negroponte, director of the MIT Media Lab, predicts that we’ll soon buy books and newspapers straight over the Internet. Uh, sure.”
- “Then there’s cyberbusiness. We’re promised instant catalog shopping–just point and click for great deals. We’ll order airline tickets over the network, make restaurant reservations and negotiate sales contracts… the network is missing a most essential ingredient of capitalism: salespeople.”
- “Computers and networks isolate us from one another. A network chat line is a limp substitute for meeting friends over coffee.”
I LOVE that last quote. Just love it.
[digg=http://digg.com/business_finance/Boy_Newsweek_sure_got_the_Internet_wrong_ten_years_ago]
Posted on Wed, Mar 19, 2008
I’ve been playing around with the Internet Explorer 8 Beta.
First impressions are so-so.
IE8 looks and feels a lot like its Explorer 7 counterpart. However, IE8 adds “Activities” to the browser interface (e.g. clicking the Facebook dropdown allows you to see the status of all of your buddies) and “Webslices” (portions of a web page that you subscribe to.)
At this stage, I need to be educated to the benefits of Activities and Webslices. I’m not used to using a browser in such a fashion. But, with time, I could learn to love it.
Currently, I use a web browser to search for information and log onto various web pages. I’m used to my current interface and am at ease with how I use social media. The one thing that is essential to me is speed of use…which is where the IE8 beta fails.
I don’t want to get into a browser war, I don’t care for that. I just know that my current browser, Firefox 2, kills IE8 in terms of speed a loading pages.
The good news it, IE8 is in the first stage of beta release, which means there is time to tweak, improve and act on user feedback.
Other useful browser links:
- Flock – This could be big. Social media oriented browser. Is this what Web 2.0 will look like?
- Firefox 2 – my personal fave…currently
- Firefox 3 Beta – doesn’t seem to work properly on my Vista machine
- Internet Explorer 7 – I like it, especially the interface. Just a little too slow compared to FF
- Internet Explorer 8 Beta – Certainly worth checking out
- Safari for PC – Pretty fast, I personally don’t care for the interface (and I’m an Apple lover, not hater)
[digg=http://digg.com/software/Internet_Explorer_8_n_more_of_the_same]
Posted on Mon, Mar 17, 2008
I kid you not, memorize all of this in two minutes.
Since I have a ten year old son, it was inevitable that I would get exposed to that time-suck of a device, the Nintendo DS (Lite!)
Largely, I’ve ignored my son’s lengthy play-by-play descriptions of Link’s exploits in The Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass. However, Ty recently bought Brain Age 2, which piqued my interest (mostly because I didn’t want him to have a better brain age than me.)
The handheld console, paired with this game, sure makes one usable mix! The mini-games that comprise Brain Age 2 are designed with the DS interface in mind. I can use the touch-screen and the stylus to tap-out or write my answers (much easier than using a push button interface) and I can even use the DS’ built-in microphone to shout out my answers!
Yeah, yeah, I’m slow to come around (I thought the DS was for kids), but this serves as an example of how a game designer has successfully blended interface design with game mechanics.
Bravo. Oh yes, just so you know, my brain age is a rather embarrassing 42. Must. Try. Harder.
[digg=http://digg.com/design/Nintendo_DS_n_usability_in_a_nutshell]
Posted on Tue, Mar 11, 2008
My buddy, Stew, bought this to my attention last week. While he was trawling through webpagesthatsuck.com he came across the Hyundai promo website.
Go there. If you dare. It crashed Stew’s computer.
Don’t turn the sound on – it will drive you nuts!
I always say that a great website is a balance of graphic design and usability. Hyundai are down with the graphic design (highly subjective statement) but certainly have it in for usability (no subjectivity whatsoever…fact.)
This monster of an animated website is not only very slow to load (even on a fast connection), the navigation is pretty awful.
I have one hyphenated word for Hyundai: do-over.
Ironically, Hyundai are the ones who truly need to “think about it.”
[digg=http://digg.com/design/Hyundai_n_calling_your_website_out]