Can you believe it’s 2010? We can’t – but we’re just a little thankful that the roundups of the decade and list posts of New Years Resolutions are coming to a slow. Here are some excellent articles we found this week that we thought interesting!
This month has been a roller coaster of a ride for our blog. We’ve gone through having an unexpected amount of traffic that has caused our server to crash quite a few times, and had a load of people giving us helping hands to get our articles out there. Truly, this blog has been a goal for a long time now. To have it running is such a relief, but it doesn’t stop there!
Before freelancing I had a little stint in real estate investment. As a good friend of an investor, I was asked to come on his team to help out with following up with leads. During this time, I learned more than I’ve learned at any other job. I learned about determination, the importance of networking, and how to sell people on things I wasn’t completely sure of (or had even seen before). More than anything else, though, I learned the art of negotiating.
We’re so happy to be in our fourth week of running this blog, and we’re so happy with the support we’ve gotten from everyone. We’d like to extend a Season’s Greetings to everyone, and show off some articles that peaked our interest this past week!
Watching T.V. with my 15-month old son has to be one of the greatest things to do during the day. Not because I’m too lazy to take him to the park, and not because hearing him laugh and watching him dance to the songs puts a permanent smile on my face – but when you pay attention to the morals of the shows, you’ll notice that they give good lessons that you can implement in your life. I’m not talking when you’re wasted and/or high and you catch a late-night showing of the Teletubbies, but if you actually pay attention to 1/4 of the things said, you can take a lot out of it.
Design is a language of its own. In learning its vocabulary through your daily feeds, classes, or discussion with others, we know this is true. Words like usability, focus, palettes, accessibility, and balance plague our day-to-day conversations with others. I mean, how many times have you been explaining design decisions to your clients when they’ve shot back confused looks your way?
In our usual fashion, here is the “Sunday Special” Round-Up of our favorite articles we found this week! Whether you’re a blogger, freelancer, or designer – we’ve got something in here for you.
Every morning I set side an hour specifically to wake up, make a cup of coffee, and sit down with my favourite newspaper: the Internet. Yes, I have the Toronto Star delivered to me every morning, but I much prefer to sit down and read what is going on in my industry. The latest design and development headlines are delivered along with my favourite blogs immediately through RSS feeds.
Those of us who participate in website design communities hear a lot of talk about the User Experience. What constitutes a usable design? How do you get them to interact with your website the way you want them to? Not only do we have to learn how users think, but also how they adapt to new techniques as they are introduced. Is one method more effective than another? Is the new way really better than the old? The habits of our users are different today than they were last month, and five years ago it was a different ball game entirely. As web development professionals we benefit from paying close attention to usability in our designs.
This past week has been a lovely one! From launching to having over 600 unique pageviews, we are very excited that you’re joining this adventure with us!