Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox no longer rebelling against past excesses
"For 18 years, Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox column was published on his useit.com website. ...
This was a good run, but it's now time to unify this content with the main Nielsen Norman Group website. Thus, the old Alertbox columns have now been moved from useit.com to nngroup.com and future columns will be published directly on nngroup.com. ...
Even after the dot-com bubble burst, there was a long period where the barebones useit.com design stood out and elevated the site above many latecomer UX websites. Cutting through the clutter is an important value on the web, which has so much more information than anybody needs.
However, eventually it makes less sense to rebel against the excesses of the past. Also, with almost 500 Alertbox columns published, it became clear that more navigational apparatus was needed. One solution could have been to redesign useit.com to make it more like other sites. But why bother? If a big change was needed anyway, it was better to use the opportunity to integrate the articles with the company information and host all the material on the same website with a single navigation structure and a single search. So that's what we did: no more microsite for the Alertbox."
(The Nielsen Norman Group, 31 December 2012)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Internet Archaeology: graphic artefacts from our recent past
"Internet Archaeology seeks to explore, recover, archive and showcase the graphic artifacts found within earlier Internet Culture. Established in 2009, the chief purpose of Internet Archaeology is to preserve these artifacts and acknowledge their importance in understanding the beginnings and birth of an Internet Culture. We focus on graphic artifacts only, with the belief that images are most culturally revealing and immediate. Most of the files in our archive are in either JPG or GIF format and are categorized by either still or moving image, they are then arranged in various thematic subcategories. Currently, a major focus of Internet Archaeology is on the archiving and indexing of images found on Geocities websites, as their existence has been terminated by parent company Yahoo; who discontinued GeoCities operation on October 26, 2009. Internet Archaeology is an ongoing effort which puts preservation paramount. Unlike traditional archaeology, where physical artifacts are unearthed; Internet Archaeology's artifacts are digital, thus more temporal and transient. Yet we believe that these artifacts are no less important than say the cave paintings of Lascaux. They reveal the origins of a now ubiquitous Internet Culture; showing where we have been and how far we have come."
(Internet Archaeology)
Via Chelsea Nichols [http://ridiculouslyinteresting.wordpress.com/2011/11/26/internet-archaeology-the-best-of-90s-internet-graphics/]
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Luke Wroblewski on: Multi-device Layout Patterns
"Through fluid grids and media query adjustments, responsive design enables Web page layouts to adapt to a variety of screen sizes. As more designers embrace this technique, we're not only seeing a lot of innovation but the emergence of clear patterns as well. I cataloged what seem to be the most popular of these patterns for adaptable multi-device layouts."
(Luke Wroblewski, 14 March 2012, via Christopher Allwood)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Welcome to the Era of Design
"All businesses, no matter what they make or sell, should recognize the power and financial value of good design.
Obviously, there are many different types of design: graphic, brand, packaging, product, process, interior, interaction/user experience, Web and service design, to name but a few. ...
You see, expecting great design is no longer the preserve of a picky design-obsessed urban elite - that aesthetically sensitive clique who'd never dare leave the house without their Philippe Starck eyewear and turtleneck sweaters and buy only the right kind of Scandinavian furniture. Instead, there's a new, mass expectation of good design: that products and services will be better thought through, simplified, made more intuitive, elegant and more enjoyable to use.
Design has finally become democratized, and we marketers find ourselves with new standards to meet in this new 'era of design.' To illustrate, Apple, the epitome of a design-led organization, now has a market capitalization of $570 billion, larger than the GDP of Switzerland. Its revenue is double Microsoft's, a similar type of technology organization but one not truly led by design (just compare Microsoft Windows with Apple's Lion operating system)."
(Adam Swann, 5/03/2012, Forbes)
Fig.1 "Mille Miglia" bicycle by VIVA [http://www.vivabikes.com/].
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Principles of the Visual Language: A Dialect of Our Own Design
"A visual language informs all design, from architecture to print. Fluency in the same language drawn on by Bauhaus, mid-century Swiss, or postmodern design is essential for brilliant web design. In this practical talk, ground uniquely web-based interactions - from complex CSS3 animations and rotations to JavaScript behaviors - using that time-tested visual primer. Take a more considered approach to choices, evoke the desired emotive responses, learn how to better articulate your design decisions. Extend graphic design's grammar into a visual dialect of web design that guides us to smarter, beautifully balanced juxtapositions of elements in our new, multidimensional web experiences."
(Simon Collison)
Fig.1 Simon Collison (03 June 03 2011) "A Dialect of Our Own Design".
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
