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I bookmark a lot of pages and sites which I find interesting, inspirational and informative every day! I’d like to share some of them with you here. In general they are about user experience, usability, UCD, accessbility and design. In general, but not always!!

• YouTube Blog: Should quality matter in web video?
  Since I started working in web video, the most common misconception I face is, web video equals low quality video. This week we asked “What do you think the differences are between making videos for the web versus other venues like film festivals or TV?” on YouTube's Facebook fan page. Though there were a lot of positive voices talking about the immediacy, democracy and audience engagement of web video, some of the comments unsurprisingly echoed this idea.
• Photos as Web Content (Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox)
  Users pay close attention to photos and other images that contain relevant information but ignore fluffy pictures used to "jazz up" Web pages.
• Ideal line length for content
  I’d like to design a site that uses optimal line lengths. I also want the line length to stay within the optimal range no matter what default font size the user has set in their browser. Is it possible?
• UXMovement: Applying the Golden Ratio to Web Layouts and Objects | Usability Counts | User Experience, Social Media
  1.618 is a number all serious designers should know. It’s known as the golden ratio found through out nature, art and architecture. Seashells, the Mona Lisa and the Parthenon all show the golden ratio. Our faces and bodies are also proportional to the golden ratio. It’s so omnipresent that it’s even found in sounds and intervals of time. If there ever was a mathematical way to explain and express natural beauty, the golden ratio is it.
• 4 lessons The Apprentice candidates should learn about focus groups–Making Websites Easy To Use
  Every year I watch The Apprentice I grumble to my partner about the appalling way the candidates grill focus group participants. Their approach is to either present them with an idea and ask if they like it, or they tell them about the concept, ask for thoughts and then argue the participants into submission. When this doesn’t work and the focus group clearly dislikes the concept they just ignore it and carry on regardless.

Please do feel free to suggest other related (and unrelated ones)!

I bookmark a lot of pages and sites which I find interesting, inspirational and informative every day! I’d like to share some of them with you here. In general they are about user experience, usability, UCD, accessbility and design. In general, but not always!!

• xSort is a free card sorting application for Mac OS X
  Free card sorting application
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  500 Internal Server Error
• Four Essential Elements For Creating Captivating Websites | Usability Counts | User Experience, Social Media
  The four principles of design are balance, rhythm, emphasis and unity. Each one of them is essential for bringing together the different visual elements that are necessary to achieving a strong design, which, in turn, is imperative for a website to succeed on any level. What follows is an examination of each principle, with insights about how to incorporate them into your own Web design for optimal results.
• Top retail names guilty of spamming customers, finds email study | News | New Media Age
  Andy Yates, co-founder of Spam Ratings, said, “Trusted brands are making a big mistake by not acting responsibly, openly and fairly with customers. Businesses spend millions building brands and then seem intent on destroying them by sending millions of unwanted emails.”
• » Beyond Staggered Sprints: How TheLadders.com Integrated UX into Agile Johnny Holland – It’s all about interaction » Blog Archive
  Agile has a relatively short history in the broader view of software development. Integration of User Experience into Agile has an even shorter history with relatively few stories of overwhelming success. Over the last eighteen months, we at TheLadders have had some successes—and some failures—in our foray into a post-waterfall way of developing elegant, efficient and sophisticated consumer-facing software. This is our story.

Please do feel free to suggest other related (and unrelated ones)!

I bookmark a lot of pages and sites which I find interesting, inspirational and informative every day! I’d like to share some of them with you here. In general they are about user experience, usability, UCD, accessbility and design. In general, but not always!!

• State of the Internet: Mobile Web’s Explosive Growth: Tech News "
  In 1999, it was the rapid growth of wired web services that was the top story. Fast-forward to today, and it is all about the massive and seemingly unstoppable growth of the mobile Internet that is all the rage. The demand for the mobile Internet (and its subset, the mobile Web) is upending all expectations and predictions. Between Apple and Google, about 500,000 new portable Internet devices are getting connected to the Internet.
• Do iPhone or Android Users Watch More Video? (And Other Video Trends)
  Mobile video optimization firm Bytemobile has just released its most recent "Mobile Minute Metrics" report, a look at wireless users' video consumption trends and behavior based on metrics from a cross-section of nearly 2 billion Bytemobile customers in 58 countries around the world.
• The Value of an Existing Customer / Flowtown (@flowtown)
  The value of an existing customer
• Thoughts on UX Design – By Jon Searle
  I carried out a survey with 200 people to investigate the emotional values associated with certain colours, the results are shown below followed by a brief discussion. You can get the basic outcomes of the research just through studying the image below, however.
• LukeW | Killing Sign Up Forms
  In my recent Sign Up Forms Must Die presentation, I outlined a few solutions for getting people engaged with digital services without asking them to fill in a bunch of input fields up front. In case you are interested in trying one of these alternatives to sign-up forms, here are some resources to get you started.

Please do feel free to suggest other related (and unrelated ones)!

I bookmark a lot of pages and sites which I find interesting, inspirational and informative every day! I’d like to share some of them with you here. In general they are about user experience, usability, UCD, accessbility and design. In general, but not always!!

• 500 Internal Server Error
  500 Internal Server Error
• » Johnny proudly presents: Content Strategy Week Johnny Holland – It’s all about interaction » Blog Archive
  We love content strategy. Why? Because content strategy solves problems. Lots of problems. And during this week five leading content strategists from four countries will tackle a different set of challenges, just for you.<br />
  <br />
  So what type of articles can you expect? Let’s check out what each day will bring:
• » 4 Web project problems content strategy can solve Johnny Holland – It’s all about interaction » Blog Archive
  I get this question a lot: How do content strategists work with IAs/designers/writers? Truthfully, they often don’t. But, they can and they should.<br />
  <br />
  Not only should they work together, they should do away with the typical web project process that leaves content until last, resulting in a mad scramble. People don’t muck up web projects. Bad processes do.
• iPhone App Designs Reviewed: Critique Board and Lessons Learned – Smashing Magazine
  Some time ago I started a mobile app design review section on our company’s website. The idea behind this “Crit Board” was simple: if mobile developers want to create apps that people want to buy, they’ll need help with design and usability. But most of the time they can’t afford it. On our Crit Board, developers can send us their mobile apps (iPhone apps, Android apps, Blackberry apps) along with questions and problems, and we (free of charge) will pick apart key usability issues, illustrate our design recommendations and post our findings.
• 500 Internal Server Error
  500 Internal Server Error

Please do feel free to suggest other related (and unrelated ones)!

I bookmark a lot of pages and sites which I find interesting, inspirational and informative every day! I’d like to share some of them with you here. In general they are about user experience, usability, UCD, accessbility and design. In general, but not always!!

• Test Usability By Embracing Other Viewpoints – Smashing Magazine
  As Web technology improves, users expect Web-based widgets to be useful, content to be relevant and interfaces to be snappy. They want to feel confident navigating a website and using its functionality. They crave being able to get things done with little friction and on demand. And demand they do.
• Presentation Zen: Start your presentation with PUNCH
  The primacy effect, when applied to presentations, suggests that we remember more strongly what happens at the beginning of a presentation. In order to establish a connection with an audience, we must grab their attention right from the beginning. A punchy opening that gets the audience's attention is paramount.
• Demystifying Usability : Design and Emotion: Designing for Mood
  'Getting in the mood' is the name of a paper I'll be presenting at Design and Emotion in Chicago 5-7th October 2010. Since I'm getting in the mood for the conference , here are some highlights of my latest thinking on mood, product design and interaction.
• How to recruit a UX leader with the X factor
  We're increasingly asked by organisations for advice on building a user experience competency. Our advice is to start at the top and get the right person for that first critical leadership role. User experience leaders demonstrate 3 core competencies: they understand research; they follow user experience methods and standards; and they are great communicators.
• How to Make Your Web Statistics Actionable: Search « kylejlarson.com
  If you were ill and your doctor handed you a chart including your weight, heart rate, and blood pressure and promptly sent you on your way with no analysis or feedback, he wouldn’t be your doctor for long. Without actionable analysis of the data it has very little usefulness. Website statistics are often discussed in a similarly meaningless way. I’ve suffered through many meetings where people throw around numbers with nothing more to say about them than this number has increased and that one has decreased. Most sites have some statistics available and maybe they are even reviewed occasionally, but to get real value from your statistics they must be a catalyst for action. Analyzing your on-site search and search engine keywords is a great place to get started.
• Alphabetical Sorting Must (Mostly) Die (Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox)
  Ordinal sequences, logical structuring, time lines, or prioritization by importance or frequency are usually better than A–Z listings for presenting options to users.

Please do feel free to suggest other related (and unrelated ones)!