- LogoMaid Rips Off Dan Cederholm’s SimpleBits Logo, and Then Things Get WeirdDan’s work is ripped off, again. This time the culprits are defiant, though. The resulting Flickr comment list has to be the longest I’ve ever seen on Flickr (more like Slashdot but without the nesting). In the aftermath, Nathan put up a list of logos stolen by LogoMaid. I believe LogoMaid finally issued a forced apology and took Dan’s logo down…
- Lighthouse Issue Tracker"Beautifully simple issue tracking" from activereload. Worth a look, methinks. Subversion support isn’t built in, but is available as a plugin (or "Beacon" as they call it).
- Newsvine – Hacking John McCainMike Davidson pulls a prank on Senator McCain’s MySpace page (but the guy deserved it, apparently). The prank got a bunch of publicity, with the latest bit involving Mike interviewed by a Seattle news station.
Month: March 2007
Interesting Links for March 16–22, 2007
- Teleraña: Nobody Wants a $500 WebsiteAnother reason to educate clients on the value of a quality product: be it a website or software application or whatever. See the three key elements: cost, time, and price? You can only pick two. Nice writeup by Chuck Mallott on business and the worth of your work as a web designer/developer.
- Ficlets | Welcome to Ficlets!A site where your writing can be "prequeled" or "sequeled!" The idea is to share your stories and see what happens as it goes.
- PHP Video Tutorials for Web DesignersWhat it says: tutorials for new PHP programmers. I like the idea of video tutorials; if done well they can really be a big improvement over a static blog post or article.
- Daring Fireball: JavaScript Bookmarklet BuilderJohn Gruber delivers a clever script to help you develop bookmarklets. His bookmarklet generator takes your normal-looking JavaScript code and modifies it to fit on one line with all the correct escaping, but puts it as a comment in your script block so you use the bookmarklet but keep your normally-formatted code intact.
- www.welie.com — patterns in Interaction DesignA great list of design patterns. Design patterns create a shared language; if you know the name of something, you will be able to easily talk about things with others and can avoid re-inventing the wheel for lots of UI tasks.
- technorthodox: TextMate Trac bundleBrian Cavalier brings you a TextMate bundle for editing Trac wiki pages. This is just what I was looking for a few months ago, and now I use Trac more than ever so it will be useful. (via sdevore)
SXSW 2007 Wrap-up
It’s over… my time in Austin, that is. I had a great time listening to live music, seeing friends and colleagues, and enjoying the city’s great eateries. Big cheers to the free buses (aka “Dillos”) that served our RV campground conveniently, though I must say the walk home was very pleasant along the Town Lake bike/hike path.
Three hip-hip-hurrays to the SXSW Interactive conference, also. It was great to meet everyone including: Dominique Lussier (Ottawa, Canada), John Mosteller, Christiano Prado, Grant Hutchins (newly of SpiceWorks in Austin, TX), Rob Grady, Dan Ritzenhaler and Ryan Johnson (Forty) and the good folks from SOMA FM (I told them that I love Big Al, their AI DJ and got a sticker!). James Archer and Nathan Smith—sorry we didn’t get to talk and catch up. I hear from lots of folks that attended this year that it was almost impossible to catch everyone for more than a “hello”, so hopefully we can connect again soon.
The conference has grown (a lot) since my first time in 2005. It’s good for the industry, and shows an enthusiasm that is contagious enough to bring the creative industry (aka Interactive) to the mainstream. The downside was some logistical issues at the conference center and a harder time meeting and talking to everyone. I’m thinking of skipping next year and going to a WDN or AEA conference instead.
Here are my thoughts, gripes, and notes:
Helvetica: Love it or Hate it
I had the pleasure of attending the world premier of the film Helvetica. It was inspiring, educational, funny, and elegant. Most impressive for a film about a typeface! Go see it if you get a chance. See the full screening schedule. (Also note Kottke’s review.)
Future Panelists?
Notes to all future panelist/speakers:
- Please post slides to a URI for later reference (and for those that didn’t make it to the panel)
- Please use a simple, not clever, title for your talk, and stick with the topic after giving the details to the SXSW folks. There were several sessions this year that seemed to promise A,B,C and delivered X,Y,Z; in one case it worked out well and in another case it was disappointing.
Sessions
Following are my notes and links from the sessions I attended. Like several other attendees, I tended to enjoy the one or two person sessions that were focused and well-prepared (as opposed to a fairly general panel that covered some ground but didn’t leave us with a lot of “take-aways” or solid learning.)
My favorites: After the Brief: A Field Guide to Design Inspiration (slides, podcast) and Web Typography Sucks. I liked both because they were superbly delivered, had great content, included valuable lessons, and covered areas that I need to work on.
Wishlist: Two sessions that I wish I had gone to are Writing, Better and Javascript: The Big Divide — both had great feedback and started good discussions. Can’t wait for the rest of the podcasts…
Interesting Links for March 9–15, 2007
- FlickrBlog – CollectionsFlickr is impressive once again in releasing a new feature called "Collections" that allow you to group your sets. I’ve already made a few to hold the large themes (both geographical and topical) of my photos.
- south by southwest coverageIn case you didn’t come to SXSW this year, or to hear sessions you missed, this site has links to the podcasts and videos from 2007 SXSW Interactive conference (more to come I assume, so grab the RSS feed also). My strategy this year was to skip the keynote talks and go to alternate panels with the intention of listening/viewing the keynotes the week after.
- SEOmoz | Put Your Best Foot Forward: 19 Gorgeous Website FootersNice collection of footer designs from around the web.
- Netdiver digital culture magazine + new media portal -> Feed your eyesNetdiver is a great resource for finding design inspiration. I just resubscribed to their feed after about a year of abstention… hopefully it’s still as unique and creative as ever.
- Edward Tufte: CoursesI’m going to attend one of these famous one-day courses May 24th in Virginia. Not only does Edward Tufte teach the session, but you also get copies of his books to take home with you.
SXSW 2007 in Austin, Texas
I’m in Austin for the third year in a row to attend South by Southwest Interactive, and hoping to get into the swing of things as panels start tomorrow at 10AM.
Erin and I are staying here for a few weeks, which is a nice change from the usual drive in Friday night and leave Tuesday afternoon to get home to work and family. Our “Sol Seeker” is camped a mile from downtown at the charming “Pecan Grove RV Park” along the Barton Springs restaurant row (we are next to Chuy’s, Shady Grove, Romeo’s, Uncle Billy’s, etc). We’re a stone’s throw from Palmer Auditorium and Zilker Park. (Oh, and if you are curious what/who Sol Seeker is, she is our home on wheels that we write about at “Travel Adventures with Lance and Erin”).
So this year should be great—the conference has grown by leaps and bounds. The keynote addresses are now housed in the Hilton Ballroom since they apparently outgrew the size available at the Convention center across the street. It’s encouraging to see and feel the excitement surrounding the web design and interactive media industries (and film and music, too, for that matter).
Speaking of music, a side benefit to being here for a bit longer is that we can catch some shows. Last night we saw “The Mother Truckers” at the Continental Club (awesome venue and great band!) and had a great meal at Guero’s Taco Bar afterwards, a local favorite. Tonight was a Lucinda Williams concert, but we had to skip it. Tomorrow we might stop by and see Jimmie Dale Gilmore at the Cactus Club… maybe.
Stay tuned for thoughts and ideas from this year’s conference; I’ll post my notes sometime next week. Aaron and Brian, I’ll miss seeing you guys here. Sam and Michael R., you should come next time!
Interesting Links for March 1–8, 2007
- Google Maps PHP Class: Phoogle Maps | systemsevendesigns Freelance Web Development Cornelius, NCThis looks cool for use on a blog or maybe a CakePHP app since there is already a helper for it.
- MiniAjax.com / A showroom of nice looking simple downloadable DHTML and AJAX scripts
Nice collection of JavaScript-based modules. - ModalBox — An easy way to create popups and wizards
This looks like a good replacement for the Lightbox modal window hack from Particletree. Will have to give it a try (DF?) - IconShoppe ~ Royalty-free stock icons for the web
Dan’s icons finally get their own site. 🙂 These are well worth the small price tag. - A List Apart: Articles: Semantic Flash: Slippery When Wet
Great example of using Flash for dynamically modifying images — this is in the same vein as the new swfIR technique. - Think Small – New York Times
Small houses with lots of character (via 37signals)
The Sensible Leader 