News : March 2001
The Dreaming America (the guys who brought you Ranger Mag) has been in the press recently. UnDesign featured Scott Benish and NetDiver interviewed Josh Kneedler. I will be meeting up with Josh and Scott as well as Gabe from Born Mag and Digital Web Mag's new Managing Editor, Ben Henick tonight for drinks, maybe some pool and an all around good time. It's a celebration of good content on the web from Portland designers and writers... of course, it is also another excuse just to get drunk.
This week's issue of A List Apart covers the failure of communication between Information Architects and User Interface Designers. Written by WaSP co-founder, George Olsen, this is a must read.
FLASH Response is now live on the Australian INfront!
About two weeks from this Friday I will be starting my new web design job at Intel... for everyone still looking for a job... there _is_ hope. Never give up, a good artist never gives up.
Adobe is featuring Swedish design company, Precinct this week. Precinct has some very slick design skills going on there.
Back in town and already working on the next issue of Digital Web Magazine. Lots of interesting work coming in from all over. If you haven't done so, please consider contributing cover art, articles or tutorials and get yourself recognized. You can find all the information you are looking for about contributing here.
Xygoxen is updated and they have an interview on me in the newsletter so check it out. The French Film Festival designed by Viper Communications Group an international company looks a little like INfront. And the sexy rAz has just finished Vibra Shop an eComm Indie record store and would like everyone to check it out and stress test it!
Way back in High School I did a video documentary called A Day in the Life of a Freshman. Basically three video camera crews followed a student around school and taped their daily activities... hey, it got me out of class so it was worth it. Anyway, check out this pictorial: A Day In My Life as told by Cameron Thomas.
If it's not designers losing their jobs, it's designers losing their pants.
The crew at The Chopping Block informs me that there is a new piece of happy learning goodness for the museum of modern art; What Is a Print?. Darleen states, "who knew the chopping block would make it to the moma?" ...I think she underestimates the greatness of the skills at the ChoppingBlock. :)
This has to be one of the better articles I have read all year. Darwin Magazine covers the idea of pushing the bleeding edge in their article Creative Tension. Responses from five leading designers including Terry Irwin of MetaDesign, Clement Mok of Sapient, Kevin Farnham of Method and more. This is a must read.
People talk about "giving back to the community" all the time... DigitalWeb gives back, but Maxine Sherrin is giving back in the best way possible. Check out the WestCiv Self-paced Courses... yes, they are free to anyone who is interested. If you want to learn CSS, HTML, XHTML. validation and more, here is your chance.
The A List Apart crew at SXSW... I think the smile on my face says it all. I wish that Webchick, Erin Kissane and the Webcore Labs crew could have been there as well. Maybe next year? More photos to come.
I'd say "Better late than never," but it's never too late for a Photoshop Update. Here is the Photoshop 6.0 » 6.01 update.
Alison Headley of BluishOrange has posted a great picture of my birthday party at SXSW. Not everyone is shown in this picture, if you can imagine that. The man standing in the back was our only waiter, needless to day, he received a good tip.
WebReview decides to tackle The Myth of 800x600. This is a pretty good example of explaining liquid web design. The "myth" here, of course, is that no were in the "Fully flexible pages ('liquid' pages)" description does it indicate that you can, in fact, set the content at a good 400 pixels wide. The page you are reading this on is a good example of liquid web design. Ebay, much to the chagrin of the author, is not a flexible design. Want to know more? Here is a great tutorial explaining the different styles that I wrote in, hold on now, the year 1999.
The aussies are living it up at the DiK INfront Party. Justin and Caryn are also covered on SMH.com.au in the feature, "Waiting for the next boom"
Not the freshest link in the world, but well worth the perusal: Lab404 graces us with information on fresh ideas for inspiration--not the same stuff again.
Issue 5 of ThornyRabbit is out entitled Visions of Wonderland - Utopia. Yet another good mag.
Six has relaunched... now in a new zine format, check out SpeechTherapy again for the first time. The featured article is truly moving.
We love getting feedback. We love positive feedback and we even love negative feedback so we can use it as constructive criticism. The recent restructuring of DigitalWeb is but a single reader's suggestion. Thank you Beth Cherry. Of course, every few thousand emails or so we get a rotten apple. A rant of types that serve no purpose but to bitch and complain and not offer any positive suggestions on how to improve things. Recently we even found an entire poorly crafted web zine site dedicated to bitching and moaning with no positive outcome. We would typically link into this said site or even mention its name, but instead we would like to give you, our readers, a more positive solution to this. Here is a list of sites that we fill are not only good design but also have tons of good content written by good people who make an effort to give back to the community in a positive way.
To the 50 or so people waiting to get their portfolios into the Classifieds section, please bare with me as I go through each link and check to see if your sites qualify. We have recieved an unexpected amount of sites being submited, so this process will take a bit longer than expected.
A new issue of A List Apart is out... we have no idea why thought, Zeldman got into town on Wednesday. I got into town on Tuesday night but had a bday to goto on Wednesday. Jeffrey had a book chapter to rewrite... but somehow, late Thursday night, the man found time to pull another issue of ALA off... hats off to the insomnimaniac. This isssue: 'SMIL when you play that' ...a introduction to SMIL and SVG by Zeldman, no less. And while your at it, don't forget to check out Matt Rea's SVG is Fun area in his gallery on DesignFlea.
Today, something much more than just an idea was born. More on this later... the wait will be well worth it, trust me.
Jared Dunn also has some SXSW Photos up, linked in from Alison Headley (who, IMHO, didn't need to win the award, she already has proven herself).
Matt Rea of DesignFlea has posted some SXSW Photos for your viewing pleasure. Also, Sooz has posted a few of her SXSW Photos... more to come from her. And I will be posting my own photos up here soon too.
I know you haven't resubscribed yet. Just because you got the email doesn't mean you are subscribed. If you haven't resubscribed since March 10th, please do so now.
v-2.org interviews architect Thom Faulders... a very cool read.
I just got back from SXSW in Austin, and let me tell you, I had the time of my life. Thank you to everyone who went to my surprise birthday party... it was the party of a lifetime. I would also like to thank everyone who took some time aside to chat with me at SXSW... in specific (like the link whore that I am): Jeffrey Zeldman, Matt Rea, Carole Guevin, Joshua Davis, Heather Hesketh, Steve Champeon, Jeffrey Veen, Heather Champ, Derek Powazek, Lance Arthur, Matt Linderman, Scott Benish, Josh Kneedler, Darleen Scherer and Steve Bowden, Alison Headley, Susan Nixon, Michael Nolan and the rest of the New Riders crew, Peter Merholz, Stewart Butterfield Nikolai Nolan, Ryan Gantz, Jared Dunn, Pableaux Johnson, J. David Eisenberg, Samir Shah, Chris MacGregor, Matt Haughey, Sooz, Mark Bernstein, Meg Hourihan, the Linkdup crew, and most of all Billy Hutchison for orchestrating the party! I know I missed several people, when I get the list from Sooz, I will add everyone in. And thank you to everyone who has emailed me today on my birthday to wish me the best!
The BBC's venerable Top of the Pops is holding a 5-second sting design contest. (sting = programme opening sequence.) Top prize is the chance to work in the Beeb's Graphics Design department for six months (or intern there for 4 weeks if you're still in school). Details here.
Gone fishing...hope to see you there.
A new issue of Digital Web Magazine is out for your reading pleasure. All subscribers will have to re-subscribe here (long story, more later).
Another new zine hits the streets... triple-double-u by Hendrik Aufmkolk and crew.
Jeffrey has a new interview up at MacSlash. He covers his view of the BUI, what it means and how it should be handled.
Kris Krug tells us that a new issue of *Spark-online is avialable for our reading pleasure. This issue is "Between Utopia and Chaos..."
While we are busy getting the next issue of Digital Web ready to go this week, we are reminded that good things come in packs of 10... Surfstation issue 10 is up and kicking. Check out the interview with Jens Karlsson of chapter3.net. The new Revolution is all about Profit, some very nice work here. Check it out.
A new cover is up at Archinect... this killer peice is done by none other than Joshua Davis.
A List Apart issue #100 is out for your reading pleasure... this issue covers everything from respect for web designers to the importance of Source. This issue is highly recommended.
Adam Greenfield, of v-2, launches a new company as an attempt to restore a deep respect for design to information architecture, and bring respect for information architecture to just about everything else. Kurious Oranj, what the world needs now. I like the way Adam thinks.
I just stumbled across this great resource about The Psychology of Cyberspace. My favorites are, of course, the ones dealing with communities and mailing lists... specifically "The Natural Life Cycle of Mailing Lists" and "How Many Mail List Subscribers Does It Take to Change a Light Bulb?" which ring through as horrifying truths about online communities. Oh, and sorry about the slight off-topic post. ;)
If you are going to be at SXSW, be sure to goto the Fray Cafe... see you there.
We are always late with deadlines and too much work to do and not enough hours in the day to do it. For me... I wish there were extra hours for sleep. Anyway, I send out a belated happy birthday wish to Shirley Kaiser.
