02/2008 Article Archive

  • February 29, 2008 in Friday Blog Clips

    5 for Friday | The Week's Best Blogs (2/29/08 Edition)

    I usually avoid having two articles from the same source on 5 for Friday, but this week Smashing Magazine forced me to break the rule. SM makes the list twice with a set of breathtaking typographic posters and a look at website navigation. Vandelay Website Design is on the list, of course, and Web Worker Daily is back with a great guide to switching over to Google Apps.

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  • February 27, 2008 in Mirificam Press News

    Meet Me at SXSW Interactive 2008

    Next Friday marks the beginning of the 2008 SXSW interactive festival in my hometown of Austin, TX. I will be making the trek from West Texas to attend, and I would like to extend an invitation to any Bits O' NewMedia Readers who would like to hang out and talk web stuff. If you've never gone, I highly recommend it.

  • February 25, 2008 in Business & Process

    7 Reasons You Shouldn't Charge by the Hour

    A week ago, I posted an article entitled Pay Me Please: A Freelance Web Designer's Guide to Billing and Pricing. It included a brief explanation of why I avoid charging clients by the hour. I've since realized that this explanation was inadequate. After spending way too much time explaining and clarifying in the comments section, I decided to expand the topic into a separate post. So if you would like a deeper look into the melee of hourly billing, you've come to the right place. Here are seven reasons I avoid hourly billing like the plague.

  • February 22, 2008 in Friday Blog Clips

    5 for Friday | The Week's Best Blogs (2/22/08 Edition)

    There were an unusual number of great web design resource lists posted this week. Vandelay Website Design offered resources for continual web design improvement. Elite by Design posted a list of inspirational wallpapers. And Brad Colbow Design is back with a list of stunning design portfolios. Also, I'd like to welcome Copy Blogger to 5 for Friday.

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  • February 20, 2008 in Design Inspiration

    When Less Isn't More: Web Design Simplicity Gone Awry

    Less is more. The popular aphorism adopted by modern designers has been spouted off at some point in just about every client meeting I've been in. It's been used ad nauseam at conferences and in design magazines since its debut in the mid-twentieth century. Yet somehow it seems immune to the buzz-word death label. There's a timeless truth that finds such a suitable home in the saying that anything else feels like an ill-fitting glove. Even web designers who avoid common use of the phrase agree with the principle. But where is the edge of the "less is more" universe? When does less cease to be more? It would sound like a silly question out of context but it's one worth considering. Let's look at some instances where less is just less.

  • February 18, 2008 in Business & Process

    Pay Me Please: A Freelance Web Designer's Guide to Billing and Pricing

    Going it alone as a web designer will quickly lead to the discovery that your accounting skills are as important as your design skills. If you've ever done any freelancing you know exactly what I mean. When should I bill? How much should I charge? What kind of pricing structure should I use? These are questions I've wrestled with more than once over my eight year tenure as a freelance web designer. But fortunately, out of the heap of triumphs and failures, a refined set of principles has emerged. I'm sure these rules will keep you out of some sticky situations.

  • February 15, 2008 in Friday Blog Clips

    5 for Friday | The Week's Best Blogs (2/15/08 Edition)

    Surveys seem to be the big theme this week. Freelance Switch posted the results of their freelancer survey with some surprising results, and Rimm Kaufman gave a rundown of Google's new survey building tool. Also, 5 for Friday just wouldn't be right without Vandelay Website Design on the list, so Steven Snell returns with Common Reasons a Website is Unsuccessful.

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  • February 13, 2008 in Product Reviews

    School Pictures on the Web | How the Internet Will Change School Picture Day Forever

    Since the beginning, the web has continually presented us with tools and ideas that dramatically simplify age-old processes. QuickSchoolPix.com is another such idea that tackles the chaos of school picture day. I normally avoid mentioning personal design projects on Bits O' NewMedia but the example QuickSchoolPix.com provides goes much deeper than vain design credit. It's the core concept that makes it noteworthy.

  • February 11, 2008 in Design Inspiration

    Simple and Stunning: 10 Website Designs that Inspire

    Most of the time, the aim of a website design is to present information in a concise format, both simple and pleasing. But a perfect balance of simple and pleasing can sometimes be difficult to achieve. It's not always clear exactly where to start. In moments of waning creativity, I find that a little inspiration can give me the surge I need to get over the initial hump. Over the past few months I've been collecting examples of websites with inspiring simplicity and dead-on application of style to content. I narrowed down the list to ten designs which have been added to a Flickr photo set where they will be joined by subsequent examples in the coming months. In this article, these first ten designs are pictured and discussed.

  • February 8, 2008 in Friday Blog Clips

    5 for Friday | The Week's Best Blogs (2/8/08 Edition)

    There were so many great articles this week, I really had a difficult time choosing. I finally decided that Courtney Tuttle's two articles about flagship blogging had to be thrown together into a two-for-one link. Brad Colbow Design make its debut on the list this week with a witty and insightful article called My Million Dollar Idea. Also, congratulations to Steven Snell (Vandelay Website Design) on the launch of his new blog, Traffikd. I expect to see some great content coming from over there.

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  • February 6, 2008 in Design Tips & Tutorials

    Beat Your Website into Submission with .htaccess

    I devote most of my day to designing and coding. I don't have a lot of extra time to mess with server configuration. But my neglect of that aspect of web design has cost me countless hours of unnecessary development and a near break-down on more than one occasion. My server was bending me to its will instead of the other way around. Somewhere along the way I discovered its weakness--.htaccess. That's the little file that puts password protection on directories (that's all I knew it did). Now I'm beating my websites into submission one command at a time.

  • February 4, 2008 in Web Design Culture

    Keepers of the Cloud: Who Will Hold the Key to Our Information?

    Years after the first Orwellian-like predictions about centralized data storage started gaining some validity, it appears as if the conspiracy theorists may have been right for once (almost). But unlike 1984 we weren't dragged to centralization by a tyrannical dictator--we gradually migrated there on our own. We did it because it's easier, cheaper, and more fun. Oh, and that central data center is more like a network of individual storage centers--a data cloud.

  • February 1, 2008 in Friday Blog Clips

    5 for Friday | The Week's Best Blogs (2/1/08 Edition)

    This week, I ran across a lot of good "big picture" articles. Deep Jive Interests makes its debut this week with an insightful look at what Digg would look like without the Digg elite. Dosh Dosh chimes in with a discussion about historical propaganda techniques and how they apply to modern web marketing. Vandelay Website Design is back again with realistic look at web designer/client relationships. Overall, the articles I sorted through this week were exceptionally well-written and deep-probing. It was difficult to make cuts but here's the final five.

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