News : March 2006
Starting Small: Web Business for the Rest of Us
For those where not able to attend SXSWi this year or for those who did and missed our panel (we know who you are), the podcast, slides, and notes from our panel are now online at StartingSmall.info. If you wrote any notes or blog posts about our panel, please let us know so we can add them.
Article: Preparing for Widescreen
Designing for different screen resolutions is just one challenge designers face daily. Can you be all things to all screen resolutions? With a little JavaScript and some CSS Mike Madaio thinks so. Read more
The 2006 SXSW People Awards
Ok, as we do every year now, rather than just posting a standard list of names and links to people I meet, I ve everyone a title of sorts. The titles were developed and given based on a complicated algorithm using darts, sticky notes and newspaper clippings. Without further delay, here is the list, enjoy:
- Most simplistic minimalist business card: Craig Cook
- Coolest business card that could double as a life saving device: @Media 2006
- Best free beer token: Mule Design, "Find a Mule and get a free beer"
- Best slogan: Gilbert Lee, "Easy to use me."
- Most anticipated meeting: Veerle Pieters
- Most happy to have met: Andy Baio
- Most overdue meeting: Jonathan Snook
- Best code kung-fu: Douglas Clifton
- Best railer: Michael Buffington
- Most corproate backing for a programmer: Leonard Lin
- Most extraordinary woman: Heather Hesketh
- Best conversationalist: Aaron Jones
- Best geeked out conversation: Chris Pirillo
- Best lunch chat: Zach Inglis
- Best shirt: Chris Fahey, "Kern"
- Best outfit plugging a product: Curt Cloninger
- Best shwag recieved: Jim Coudal, "Copy Goes Here"
- Best brief meeting: Greg Storey
- Best photo of a photographer: James Archer
- Most Photogenic: Shaun Inman
- Least Photogenic: Ethan Marcotte
- Most likely to have a photo taken at an inoppertune time: DL Byron
- Best crazyman face: Jason Santa Maria
- Best superhero pose: Mike Rundle
- Most down to earth: Paul Nixon
- Most wished I could have talked to more: Jeffrey Zeldman
- Best Margarita maker: Bart, bartender at the Iron Cactus
- Most amount of drinks ever carried through a our party by one individual: this guy
- Most elusive: Cameron Barrett
- Most often seen without a camera in hand: Kris Krug
- Most often seen infront of a camera: Craig Newmark
- Most wishing they were not infront of a camera: Kevin Cheng
- Most connected all the way around: Jason McVearry
- Most connected with social software: Chris Griego
- Best lurker: Wes Felter
- Best hair (2nd year winner): John Halcyon Styn
- Best fluffy red beard: Rob Weychert
- Most drunk when there is drinking to be had: D. Keith Robinson
- Most hopping that we're not in another bubble: Hugh Forrest
- Most quiet: Garrett Dimon
- Most mobile: Brian Fling
- Best party: South by Northwest (hey, if I said anything else I would be lieing)
- Best party host: Brad Graham
- Best height: Christopher Schmitt tied with Ryan Gantz
- Best first timer at SXSWi: Rick Cecil
- Best new idea at SXSWi: Bryan Veloso, bowling
- Most likley to have the next big idea: Thomas Vander Wal
- Most likley to forget the names and phases of people he met at SXSWi: Nick Finck
Ok, so I know I am totally missing like a three thousand people... well, maybe more, but to be honest, the whole event was a blur to me... I am only now beginning to put the pieces back together via the photos that I have taken. So, with that said, if you have any more awards you feel should be given out for SXSWi 2006, please by all means add them in the comments to this post.
Formally Educated or Self-Taught?
Here’s a short, informal poll here at Digital Web Magazine. How did you become a Web designer? Are you formally educated or self taught? If you’re formally educated, did your formal training prepare you for life as a designer? Do tell.
Newsletter updates
So what's going on with the Digital Web Magazine Newsletter? Those of you who have been subscribed for a while may have noticed a slight change in the layout of the text-only emails we send out. Well, thats only one small change that is happening with the newsletter. Thanks to Mark Wyner's design skills and help from Dave Greiner from Campaign Monitor we now have a HTML version of the newsletter that you can get. This is totally optional, but in my opinion it looks 100 times better than just plain ol' ASCII text-only. To get the HTML version (which will be out in our next issue) all you need to do is subscribe and choose HTML in the subscription form. Already subscribed but want the HTML version? No wories, just subscribe with the same email in which you already get the newsletter and click the HTML radio button, your subscription will be auto-updated from text-only to HTML.
SimpleBits realignment
While I was away getting drunk in Austin it turns out that Dan Cederholm has launched a realignment of his site, SimpleBits. Very nice touch Dan! Yes, I know this is a late news, but I just recovered from my hangover. On a related note, if you haven't read it yet, check out Digital Web Magazine's interview with Dan and review of Web Standards Solutions.
Article: CSS Mastery book review
For the Web standards converted, Cascading Style Sheets have been the de-facto standard for styling and positioning content on the Web for years. Does Andy Budd’s CSS Mastery have anything new to add to the canon of CSS literature? James McNally thinks so. Read more…
Article: Building Your Own Start-up Technology Company
This week, Innovating the Web Experience columnist Dirk Knemeyer returns to advise would-be tech entrepreneurs. He draws from his experiences starting and growing Involution Studios for part one of a three-part series, Building a Start-Up Technology Company. Read Part One: Making the Leap...
Starting Small site and photos from SXSWi
For those who have not been able to get a pass to SXSWi and for those of you who are looking to see what you may have missed while in a different panel, etc. I have been posting a bunch of photos of the panels and parties at SXSWi that I have been attending on Flickr. Meanwhile, I remind you that the slides, notes, photos, links and other resources for my panel can be found our site Starting Small. Go check it out.
Last Chance for Free Hosting
Last chance to win free hosting for a year by attending our SXSWi panel Starting Small: Web Business For the Rest of Us. Panel starts in about 15 minutes in Ballroom E.
Free Things to get at SXSWi
Ok, so just by going to SXSW Interactive I have found a series of cool things you can get for free with little or no effort at all. So here goes:
- Take a photo, put it on Flickr and get a chance to win a free ipod nano
- Attend my SXSWi pannel, ask a question during the Q&A and win free hosting for a year
- Bowl at SXSWi for a chance to win a whole mess of prizes
- Attend Andy's SXSWi pannel dressed up as a superhero and win free copies of "CSS Mastery" and "Blog Design Solutions"
- Be one of the first 100 people to arrive for Dan Gilbert's talk and win a free advance readers copy of "Stumbling on Happiness"
- Find a Mule and get a free beer
- Have a LIS degree get a free beer
- Just show up and get lots of free beer, wine and margaritas
Not going to SXSW Interactive this year? Well hell man, Digital Web Magazine and plenty of other sites give away free passes every year, just subscribe to our RSS feeds and keep an eye out starting in January of 2007. No more excuses.
Article: Just Build It: HTML Prototyping and Agile Development
Communicate effectively with your clients and you'll build a relationship and rapport that will help you deliver a better product. Is the time-honored design document always the best way to communicate Web project outcomes with your customers? View Source Columnist Garrett Dimon doesn't think so. Read more...
Web Design in a Nutshell 3rd Edition Released
New to the world of Web design and looking for a great primer? Check out Web Design in a Nutshell, 3rd Edition from O'Reilly Media, written by Jennifer Niederst. Digital Web Magazine contributing authors Aaron Gustafson and Derek Featherstone both worked on the book.
South by Northwest
It's that time of year again, where hundreds of web geeks make the long trek down south to city of Austin for South by Southwest Interactive. Now, anyone who has gone to SXSWi knows fairly well that the best part of the conference is all of the parties that go on after hours. With that said I am happy to invite you to South by Northwest sponsored by Blue Flavor, Bryght, Newsvine and Raincity Studios. There will be lots of beer, wine and margaritas to suck down. Be sure to bring your digital cameras because there is nothing more bloggable than drunken web geek celebrities.
- Who: Blue Flavor, Bryght, Newsvine and Raincity Studios present...
- What: South by Northwest
- When: Saturday, March 11th @ 10:30PM
- Where: The Cactus Room at the Iron Cactus
606 Trinity St. Austin, Tx 78701 (6th and Trinity)
Tel: 512-472-9240 - Why: To celebrate good web design, web standards, and to see geeks drunk
Special thanks to Austin Web Standards Group, Digital Web Magazine, Hesketh.com, Refresh Austin, WebDesign-L, and the Web Standards Project for their support of this event.
You can RSVP via Upcoming.org if you like.
Veerle's Blog redesigned
Veerle Pieters tells me that she has just launched the redesign of her blog. She's running it on Expression Engine and it looks pretty nice. Veerle will be joining me and a group of panelists at SXSW Interactive as we discuss Starting Small: Web Businesses for the Rest of Us. Be sure to get in on your chance to win free hosting for a year from Media Temple.
The Candy Store
Jeremy Keith has a great post that resonates with me on the subject of Less is more. He cites a few examples including a 2000 Digital Web Magazine interview of Joshua Davis... of all things. Some excellent points here. It seems that while so many business are jumping on what is being called the Web 2.0 bandwagon, they are often forgetting that it also has to do with simplicity and ease of use. To many business are trying wildly to cram every new web feature into their sites so fast that the justification for the feature in the first place is often overlooked or completely absent. Don't let this candy store mentality happen to your or your projects.
