Back in the 90s, the web simply delivered information to people who passively accessed it. It’s a Web 2.0 world now, where people interact, contribute, and connect. When you look at the power of the Web 2.0 trend in the Internet economy, most people point to the success of Facebook, or the influence of Web [...]

“Making the simple complicated is commonplace,” said jazz composer and bassist Charles Mingus, ” but making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.” It sounds like I’m selling usability when I talk about the return on investment that applied usability can bring to a project. But it’s a fact that research has shown again and again. [...]

Web professionals often talk about the challenges of repurposing content, creating Web-friendly content, and adapting content for the Web. This chart outlines some of the differences in a succinct way. Do you have any other points you’d add to this chart? Let me know and I’ll credit your ideas on this blog if you want. Download PDF (72 Kb): [...]

1. Arms extend fully around body when giving hugs. Rating: 10/10  Notes: Somehow this feature still functions effectively when children are adults, and regardless of their expanded height or girth. 2. Visual acuity and sightlines Rating: 10/10  Notes: Most subjects seemed to have 360-degree vision (“eyes in the back of their heads”), could spot micro [...]

Have you ever been concerned about security on Twitter? You should be. I’ve tweeted this before on my Twitter pages @usabilitydesign and @socialmediamash, but I have to expand on this issue here because I think it’s going to be something that is going to become an issue for Twitter micro-bloggers. In case you’re new to Twitter, or [...]

Why buy the milk when you can rent the cow? Many businesses find that software subscriptions may be more economical and efficient than endless cycles of software purchases, upgrades and customization.  Only a few years ago, most businesses felt the pain of being software licensees. The cycle went something like this:  Issue an RFP, then [...]

Here are 5 quick tips on naming your business, from the experts at BrandNewPerfect.Name: 1. We want the perfect domain name. In the beginning, everyone pined over what seemed to be the perfect domain names – the obvious ones like realestate.com, entertainment.com and internet.com (how would you like to own the ‘internet’?). Then some creative [...]

Establishing a Web Governance model can be daunting and fraught with internal politics and maneuvering. Once a major Website project is in operational or “steady state” mode, a governance model for content management should also be part of your overall Web strategy and governance planning. For the operational side of Web governance, the following three models are [...]

Why we can, and should, preserve content on the Internet An ocean is never the same body of water because it’s always moving changing, evaporating and being replenished by new rainwater and runoff. Likewise, Internet content is an ocean of information that with content that is evaporating almost as quickly as new content flows into [...]

Here are 10 general tips on domain names for organizations to consider when shopping for a good domain name to register. Keep in mind these are rules of thumb, and there are often some exceptions to these, but if you research your domain names well before you register them or use them, you’ll spare yourself [...]

When developing content, all design elements must be considered: editorial, interactive, visual and accessible. This chart graphically illustrates and elaborates on each of four elements:

When most businesses hear about the rise of social media – i.e. blogging, podcasting, social networks such as Facebook – their reactions can be paraphrased as “Interesting, but how is that going to help our business?” or “I don’t want my employees wasting their time socializing on the Web.” With social media, the emphasis is [...]

Join our live blog and post your comments, thoughts, biases, ideas, opinions, raves, and inspiration about National Media Day in this live digital conversation. Join our Live Blog for National Digital Media Day in Victoria, BC on 09.25.08

A clever list of  free* Internet guerilla marketing tactics to help promote your product, service or website instantly:  Create a Google Gadget. You can create Google Gadgets such as a countdown timer (to an event), a list (of ideas, suggestions, products, etc), a microblog (what you’re doing or working on) or a YouTube channel (videos about [...]

If everyone thinks telework is a great idea, why aren’t all employers doing it?   If only we could rise on a weekday morning without having to put on our work clothes, start a cranky car, fight our way through smoggy traffic, pay for expensive parking stalls, then do it all over again at the end of the [...]

The often fussily fastidious practices of project management started in the 20th century, when there were notebooks and file folders instead of Macbooks and digital file folders. Here’s a refreshing rethink of project management practices and the new “Action Method” from Scott Belsky of the Behance Network. 10 realizations for productivity & making ideas happen Our years of research [...]

With apologies to Jakob Nielsen’s Top Ten, here are the Top 10 Mistakes in Web Design, from someone who has worked as a Web Manager and Web Strategist for many years: 1. The Web Strategy doesn’t follow the Business Strategy. Whether you’re designing for a Fortune 1000 corporation, a SOHO business, a government agency or [...]

 A Manifesto of Contentology, vs 1.1         What does “Contentology” mean? In this Manifesto, Contentology is a coined word that, in its strictest etymology, could mean “the science of content” or “the study of content”. The word “Contentology” is supposed to make people stop and think for a moment, and if it sounds absurd, [...]

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How to put information overload into information overdrive In 2004, author Lawrence Lessig coined the term “email bankruptcy.” After he spent 80 hours in one week sorting through email that had been in his inbox since January 2002, he concluded that “without extraordinary effort” he would never be able to catch up. So he sent [...]

Normally I advise Web Managers not to create new sites with new domain names just because they think it’s the only way to promote new content. You have to be able to rely on your homepage to feature new content, and if your homepage doesn’t change enough, your users may become afflicted with the “Watching [...]

View full-size diagram  1. The content strategy determines the function of the etext (how it will be used, read, etc). 2. The function of the text determines how the etext should be designed. 3. The eText design impacts the how the etext can be experienced. (along with other factors such as physical environment, type of [...]

In determining site navigation options for Web sites, many Web administrators/developers are satisfied to offer several navigation options to people (e.g. site search + menus + static links) as well as redundant navigation methods (allowing users to choose several ways to arrive at the same content). However, most people use more than one navigation choice [...]

Web analytics practices for intranets are fundamentally different than those applied to Internet sites. Internet analytics ask: Who is using the site? What days of the week and what hours of the day receive the most traffic? What browsers are people using when they visit the site? Why are people visiting the site? With intranets, [...]

1. Print content is structurally and functionally different from online content.  Understand the differences when you write for Web sites. Print is formally written and passively read. It’s linear, narrative, dated and presents a continuous view. Online content is informally written, chunked out, non-linear, interactive, dynamic and current. One involves reading paper, the other involves [...]

Most Web sites would receive a failing grade when it comes to providing transparent, comprehensive and responsive “contact” content. When Web customers click on a link, that’s an interaction, but when they submit a contact request, that’s a transaction of information – they’re send you their personal “content” and expecting the site to respond accordingly. [...]

The downloadabled Universal Design Access Chart was compiled from various Internet sources for the purpose of assembling a wide variety of access issues and barriers that relate to disabilities, yet may also improve the user experience for those who have needs relating to age, education, income, environment or other variables. Universal Design Access Chart [compiled [...]

Not all sites follow best practices to the letter, but as a usability guy here are some of the peccadillos or minor annoyances I always encounter on the Web:  Down with the Times New Roman empire!  Who the hell uses Time New Roman anymore? Not for Web sites, anyway. Ol’ TNR serif may be popular with [...]

Many Corporate Web sites are developed before the owning organization has signed off on a Corporate Web Strategy, which should act as the governing document for all Internet-driven initiatives. If Web development isn’t driven by an alignment of sustainable technology, user-driven content and business-driven goals, the corporate Web presence will either fail to meet your [...]

Cellphones can be a nuisance in cars and restaurants, and yes, the Internet can be a wasteland of crap and commercialism, but one night those convergent technologies helped me save my wife from a potentially dangerous predicament.  While visiting Montreal on a business trip, my wife started having a migraine after her meetings were over, [...]

No more excuses. If professional communicators want I.T. professionals to give them a little more respect, and quit calling their work “fluff”, they need to start adhering to some clear standards and technical rigor. Yes, communications is also a “technical” craft, even though it’s more often included under the heading of “arts” rather than “science”, and as [...]

In January, 2004, I was asked to speak at IQPC’s Content Week conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. The following column is based on my presentation from that event. You take your car into the shop every couple of years to get its front end aligned every couple of years, so why not do the same [...]

A new IBM research report suggests that the best analogies for businesses in the future may no longer be the command structures of the military but the self-organising networks found in nature: schools of fish, flocks of birds and swarms of insects. This research, contained in The IBM Global Innovation Outlook 2.0 Report, reinforces Bioteam [...]

Every day millions of Internet searchers use Google or other high-speed search engines such as MSN Search. Are all these Googlers just doing the “search lurch”? Try a few key words, click a few search results, and maybe they’ll find what they’re looking for in a few seconds. Or maybe they’ll just give up and [...]

Most Web sites receive a failing grade when it comes to providing transparent, comprehensive and responsive “contact” content.   When Web customers click on a link, that’s an interaction, but when they submit a contact request, that’s a transaction of information – they’re send you their personal “content” and expecting the site to respond accordingly. They’re [...]

When I was updating my information on LinkedIn.com, a business networking site that allows professionals to create and expand their own private networks of colleagues, clients and consultants, it occurred to me that in an open Internet environment where it’s hard to know who you can trust (e.g. what used to be called “cold calling” [...]

Shel Holtz, ABC (Accredited Business Communicator), is principal of Holtz Communication + Technology, which focuses on helping organizations apply online communication capabilities to their strategic organizational communications. What inspired you to write your latest book, Corporate Conversations? There is a fair amount of literature available on employee communications for communication professionals. But there’s very little [...]

Jimmy Wales is the founder of Wikipedia and director of the Wikimedia Foundation. He was recently profiled in Wired Magazine. We’ve all read in Wired Magazine and other publications about how you founded Wikipedia. What’s something we didn’t know about how it all began? My daughter was born December 26, and Wikipedia was founded January [...]

Gerry McGovern has spoken, written and consulted extensively on Web content management issues since 1994. He has written three highly respected books, including Content Critical and The Web Content Style Guide, and is currently working on a fourth. You’ve said that Web designers should think of the Web as a publication and think of themselves [...]

Jesse James Garrett is author of the landmark information architecture book, Elements of User Experience. He is also the founding partner of Adaptive Path, a user experience consulting company. The Elements of User Experience got its start on your Web site. What are the origins of that book? The model described in the book really [...]

Ann, can you tell us briefly about your professional background, and what led you to co-writing Managing Enterprise Content: A Unified Content Strategy? I have been developing unified content strategies for about 15 years and working with content management systems for about the same period of time. The unified content strategy came about as I [...]