Readership Question: Who should we interview?
December 1, 2004 at 7:50 PM
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This week's readership question is going to be a simple one... a simple question, but perhaps a bit difficult to answer. As some you already know we interview web experts from nearly every corner of the industry. We get a good perspective on the critical issues they face and why they do what they do. We try to get interviews with the experts you want to learn more about. Being that the new year is coming up I would like to know what one web expert do you think we should interview? Now, please note, it can't be someone we already interviewed before, so take a look at the list of past interviewees before responding. Ideally this person should be someone the web industry knows somewhat, or wants to know more about... so nominating your cousin's next door neighbor won't count. Think long and hard about this, if all goes well we should see someone's name bubble to the surface and we will seek them out for an interview right here on Digital Web Magazine. Make your nomination in the comments for this post.
Comments
Definitely Joe Gillespie.
Give it an Aussie flavour and interview an interviewer, Russ Weakley - MaxDesign
me ;-) But seriously: Richard MacManus
Russ Weakley because he's been interviewing everyone else - someone should interview him :)
Don't laugh (too much). Gary Schare, Director of Windows Product Management at Microsoft. Why not put him on the hot seat, after all the talk about IE standards support? It'd be great to convince him of the error of his ways.
Andrey: While I apprciate the suggestion, we actually have already interviewed Adam Greenfield.
http://simplebits.com 's Dan Cederholm
Nick, that interview is almost three years old.
And the Zeldman inteview is almost 4 years old... the point is I am looking for people who we haven't interviewed before.
I think you should consider interviewing John Gallant (Big John) from Positioniseverything.net He is a CSS Guru and great guy. I would also support interviewing Russ at Max Design. Very helpful and he deserves it.:+)
I second the suggestions for Joe Gillespie and Russ Weakley. Both have had long-standing and valuable contributions to the web design community (God knows how much I refer to WPDFD and Maxdesign) yet I've never read a single interview on them. The previous post on Gillespie's retirement is all the more a reminder. He's been around long before anybody else.
Joe Gillespie, definitely. Also a Lynda Weinman interview would be fun to read!
Chris: I agree with your suggestions here, though I think the statement "he's been around long before anybody else." I think you have to consider Jeffrey Zeldman (since 1995), Glenn Davis (since at least 1994), Lance Arthur (since 1996), Derek Powazek (since 1994), Leslie Harpold (since 1995), Molly Holzschlag (since 1993), and even myself (started in 1993 like Joe)... I am sure I am missing several people here.
Another vote for Russ Weakley. His work with the Web Standards Group is outstanding in its rigour and focus. He has a very generous and knowledgable approach to web standards and the online community.
I would like to read an interview with whoever is considered a star of contemporary graphic design. Really, who are they ? How do they see the web? Do they care? How do they see the future of the web? Why? Sometimes it looks like we all boil in our own juices.
Mindaugas: Good question, who are they. When you find out, please let us know ;)
Chris: Awfully flattering to be nominated, thanks! Mindaugas/Nick: Hillman Curtis is, I think, a great contemporary graphic designer. I've had some enlightening conversations with him about the pending emergence of citizen video content, the online world in general, and principals of graphic design. Ironically, he hosts a bunch of graphic design interviews on his site, including recent ones with James Victore, Paula Scher and Stefan Sagmeister.
Nate: Funny you should mention convergence. A conference you and I know will probably be themed around it next year. Hillman may keynote... we're going to work on that. I am sure we will have Daniel Jenett there as well.
Nick: I didn't mean that line to be a statement of fact, especially since I know that those names listed have been on the web for quite a long time. I just rememeber knowing about Gillespie before I even heard of anyone else when it came to graphic design and the web. I didn't know that you've been around just as long as he has, though. That's pretty neat.
Indeed, Joe has been around for a very long time. Like you, I stumbled across one of the greats early on.. for me it was Jeffrey Zeldman... Molly Holzschlag a little bit later. However, David Siegel and Lynda Weinman had to be some of the very first web experts... well, at the time anyway. I think most of anyone listed here and above wern't really well-known outside of closed mailing lists and circles of friends until they started publishing books or e-zines. For me Digital Web Magazine went in to development in 1998, five years into my career. It took a whole year to launch. I'd be suprised if anyone, outside of my friends, knew me on the web prior to that.
So many good choices that it's tough to decide. A number of people have already suggested Russ Weakley, who I agree would be an excellent choice. (Big) John Gallant would also be a very good choice. The one person, though, who is most conspicuess by his absence from your already impressive list of interviewees is Tim Berners-Lee. With the W3C celebrating its tenth anniversary, now would be an excellent time to interview him.
I would like to hear from somebody who "uses" webs for a living. Someone from the other side. We are told how a user uses our sites but the people doing the telling haven't changed their stories for sometime. The web has come a long way, I think users have too. I'd like to hear from a usability expert perhaps. See where we should be heading.
