BASEMENT.ORG
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 29, 2008, 03:57PMArc90 Shows Adobe AIR Some Love
Over at the Arc90 Blog, I've laid out ten reasons (yeh I know, yet another list) we're digging Adobe AIR. Check it out.
Piclens : An Insane Picture Browser
Piclens has actually been out for awhile. It's a plugin available for most browsers that allows you to more intuitively browse images. I'm posting it here again because Piclens has really evolved into an amazing image browser. Try a Google images and drag your mouse left or right. Very, very impressive.
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 28, 2008, 03:22PMArc90's Looking For A Few Good Men (Or Women)
Arc90 is yet again looking to recruit a few lucky souls into the cult. If you're a Java, PHP or Coldfusion developer and find yourself "workin' to pay the bills" at the day job while you leave the cool projects for evenings and weekend, send us your resume or link to your blog.
If you're curious and passionate about technology, we'd like to hear from you. From Day One, we've tried to create a place where you get to actually get to do that evening-and-weekends work. If you like to dabble and touch many facets of web technologies - PHP, Java, Coldfusion, Javascript, HTML/CSS, Flash, Actionscript - then you're the guy (or gal) we want to talk to.
We're based in New York City and are looking for either full-time or contract people. Hit us up!
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 21, 2008, 11:43AMSeven Things I've Learned About Improving Design By Paying Close Attention To My Technically Incompetent But Wonderful Mother
I've written in the past about my mom's oddball computer and Internet habits. My mom is far from tech savvy. English isn't even her first language and she's only been using the personal computer for five years or so. Most importantly, my mom started using a computer in her early 50's. She is far from the technically-inclined Internet/Email/Chat/Facebook/Myspace generation of today.
But don't let her lack of competence fool you. There's gold in them there hills. Here are some of my mom's odd habits and some possible lesson's learned:
- My mom likes spam. Well, let's just say she loves seeing a large number of new items in her Inbox. I knew something's up when she'd tell me she urgently has to check her email. Then I thought to myself: "who the hell is emailing my mother?" It turns she just likes getting email. Also, all those annoying newsletters from Overstock, Sears or Banana Republic? She likes them.
Lesson Learned: People enjoy the feeling of being involved and connected to others - even if it isn't what we'd view as "legitimate" activity. - She doesn't know the difference between a search box and a URL box. This one blew me away. I was walking her through some task on the phone and I asked her to put a particular URL into her browser. She kept trying to no avail. It turned out she was putting the URL into the Google search box. She makes no distinction between interface controls in applications and inside of web sites.
Lesson Learned: Never assume that a typical user knows of or cares about the technical delineations that we're so conscious of. Yes, an HTML form tag is a world away from the controls within the chrome of a browser application, but many people don't know or care about that distinction. When designing, try to consciously break down the technical walls we respect so much. - My mom has one login...for everything. I've set up most of the user accounts for my mom: desktop, email, Yahoo, Facebook and we've made it a point to use the same login everywhere. As a result, mom has no notion of her user accounts being stored in various places. She's actually living the unified authentication dream we're all seeking.
Lesson Learned: Innovations in technology aren't just about new processor chips and brilliant code libraries. They're as much about creating illusions of seamlessness, elegance and downright smarts. Very often that's as much about trickery as it is about actual technical innovation. - My mom likes malware. Months ago, my mom called me laughing hysterically: "You have to come see this! Every time I play a song Scooby Doo comes out and and dances on my desktop!" As soon as I heard this, I knew that some insidious malware had made it onto my mom's PC. As Scoopy danced, Lord knows what that software was doing underneath. Still, it was a pleasant surprise that made my mom really happy, even for a brief period of time.
Lesson Learned: While a user's experience shouldn't be jarring or unpredictable, people may enjoy something unexpected if done well. I remember really loving the Easter eggs and hidden tricks in games. Another example is Google's ever-changing logo on it's main search page. It's a subtle twist, but people enjoy it. - She keeps every one of her contacts as a "task" on her Yahoo account. This one is bizarre. My Yahoo has a nice, full-featured personal contacts application built into it. My mom doesn't have a single contact stored properly in Yahoo. Instead she keeps all her contacts in the Note field in the Tasks portion of Yahoo Calendar. Each contact is a "task" stored haphazardly without any sort of useful sorting or filtering. I asked my mom why she put them there instead of in Contacts. She was annoyed by the question but then explained that she tried this and it worked the first time. So she kept doing it.
Lesson Learned: There a few lessons here. (1) Don't assume people know what "Contacts" or "Tasks" or "Todos" means. Large swaths of computer users don't have a clue. (2) You can win a user over with immediate feedback of some sort of success, however small. My mom immediately saw that tasks worked and so she kept using it. (3) Don't intimidate users. The "New Task" dialog is far less complex than the "New Contact" dialog. "Less" means less pain for novices. - She has never used Google. My mom is locked into the Yahoo ecosystem. Email. Messenger. She views search as search and hasn't fallen into a particular brand loyalty. When her searches fail, she just keeps trying in the same search box. She's not an exploratory user. Instead, she finds her groove somewhere and sticks to it. When she does lock in, she makes a big assumption: "now I have to use it right otherwise anything that may go wrong is my fault."
Lesson Learned: When things go wrong, many users assume that they've done something wrong - not the tool they're using. If "errors" occur, be wary of who you correct, and speak constructively. - She inadvertantly invites me to join crappy services all the time. Rarely does a week go by without my mom inviting me into social networking sites that I would otherwise never bother with (e.g. Hi5). When I bring up these invitations, she doesn't have a clue what I'm talking about, throws up her arms and declares "I have no idea what I'm doing!"
Lesson Learned: Don't deceive, trick or somehow coax users into doing things they wouldn't otherwise do. Don't make users regret ever leaving that checkbox checked on that signup form. It doesn't engender good things, only mistrust.
Of course, moms teach all sorts of valuable life lessons, but in their blissful ignorance of technology, they (and anyone else that isn't skilled with computers) can inadvertently teach us a whole lot more.
So if you're looking to improve your product experience or want to reach a broader, less savvy audience, what are you waiting for. Call your mother!
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 14, 2008, 10:39AMGoogle Is Not A Cologne You Can Sniff : The Daunting Challenge Of Rebooting People's Minds
Word of the Yahoo! layoffs are spreading around today. If anyone doubted Google's Reality before, they won't be now. Between Microsoft's bid for Yahoo! - it's largest buyout attempt ever at $45 billion, and the bleeding Yahoo!'s been feeling for awhile, the Big Google Monster seems invincible. When you've got Microsoft acting all fidgety, you know you're doing something right.
So what is Google doing right? Well, they have the best search engine around. I use it at least twenty to forty times a day. I'm locked in and I don't really consider going elsewhere. On a rare occasion, if I've hit a dead end here or there, I'll look to Microsoft's Live search or Yahoo. Still, it could be argued that Yahoo and Live's search engines are as good as Google's. I'm not sure if that's the case. In fact, I haven't bothered to try to find out. Google works and I have no reason to leave.
The Default Setting In Our Minds
Google is winning and is so difficult to unseat because they've established themselves as the default setting for search in people's minds. Does it really matter that Live's search is as good? Better yet, does it even matter that Live's search is better? It's too late. Changing the default setting in our heads requires a lot more than that. It requires something seismic to happen. Either an incredible new feature needs to arrive or Google needs to screw up badly. I don't see either of those scenarios materializing any time soon.
As far as brand monopoly goes, Google is getting there. Google is starting to equal the search. The act of "googling" is already accepted as a newborn verb. This sort of brand domination is nearly impossible to unseat, regardless of whether your product is better or not. How much does mindshare and first-to-market matter? Take a look at this chart:
The above shows Mapquest's dominance of map searching that persists to this day, as reported by Hitwise. Note that Google Maps is slowly gaining ground, but they've still got a long ways to go.
Mind you, Google wasn't the first to do search. Alta Vista was supposed to be the premiere search engine. Or does anyone remember Hotbot? It turns out that Google was that much better. Google's arrival really was a seismic event and we're seeing the outcome of that shift today.
Still, this bit of reality persists: even if you're better than your entrenched competition, if their stuff works and people are comfortable with it, you're not going to eat into that mindshare.
This is as much about comfort and familiarity as it is about quality of service and feature sets.
"Mmmm! Smell My Magazine!"
So what of all those young, fresh brains that haven't set Google as their default search just yet? How do Google and Yahoo get to that switch? Well, it's tough. You need to somehow wedge your way into that first experience. The default laptop or desktop install. The default search setting on your browser. Today, Google enjoys excellent brand awareness. Friends and family are probably going to point you to Google. So its pretty tough.
There's another snag though. Because Google is a service that really has no physical representation (i.e. a shrink-wrapped box on a supermarket shelf), there really is no shelf-space to vie for. How does Yahoo get people to try Yahoo?
If you pick up any men's or women's magazine, you'll find a fold-out ad with some cologne or perfume infused in the flap. You sniff it while your cheek bumps into some attractive, brooding supermodels, and almost instantaneously, you make a judgment. It's an incredibly effective way to experience a new product you may have never even heard of two minutes prior.
Microsoft and Yahoo are having a real hard time "stepping in" to your magazine-flipping experience on the Web. When you're in Google's ecosystem, it's no mistake that you'll never see a semblance of Yahoo and Microsoft. Google has done an excellent job of walling off and keeping you within their walls.
The challenge for anyone looking to unseat an entrenched brand like Google is significant. In light of all this, the definition of the challenge at hand is tweaked. It isn't: "how can we deliver a better product and win new customers?" It's more like: "how can we cause an earthquake to happen such that people's minds are reset and are compelled, or even forced to consider our product?"
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 11, 2008, 10:27AMDigital Rights And The Elusive Path To Righteousness
Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.
Matthew 5:6
Kevin Kelly (executive editor of Wired) put out a brilliant write up on his blog last week entitled Better Than Free. In it, he breaks down the hard realities of traditionally copyrighted works spreading on the "Internet copy machine" as he calls it. The harsh reality is undeniable: works can be copied on the Internet. And as such, they are inherently free.
Kevin then goes on to talk about intangibles that surround the consumption of copyrighted works that we are willing to pay for because these intangibles simply can't be replicated and distributed freely. He calls these intangibles "generatives" and he outlines eight of them. "Immediaacy","personalization" and "findability" provide new value that we otherwise didn't think much of in the pre-Internet Interstate distribution days.
It's an eye-opening article but it somehow leaves me feeling like something's still broken and unfixable, and so we're left scrounging for other, more ephemeral sources of value.
Can we all agree on this single premise:
Taking possession of someone else's creative work and calling it your own is wrong.
Now I'm fully aware that in this new world of bits streaming across the wire, "taking possession" is very much an outdated and loaded term, but even if we sterilize the definitions at play, the question still stands: is it wrong?
Is it wrong to come across a new band on Pitchfork, type their name into Isohunt, and within an hour or so, have that album on your hard drive and iPod? The chorus of anti-DRM advocates is strong out there. Boing Boing's Cory Doctorow comes to mind as someone who's shed light on just how ridiculous DRM really is. How useless, futile and unduly cumbersome it is. DRM is going away. Amazon MP3 is the future and we're all heading there.
Still, that same question lingers: is it wrong? If an artist has made clear that their work is not free, is it wrong to just take it? Is it doubly wrong to give a copy to a friend of yours?
Kevin's article is bold because it's acknowledging certain realities and instead looking constructively to other avenues of sustainability. For me, it still leaves some unnerving questions unanswered. Before this sea change, was the entire music distribution industry rife with false value? Was it a matter of time before they got theirs for charging us $16 for a CD? Did we buy vinyl and CD's all these years because we didn't have other, cheaper means to gain "ownership?" In other words, were we cornered into this unfair corner of capitalism? Or did we actually believe in the system? Are we simply hostages that have been freed? Or is there something inherently wrong with how we're behaving today?
I'm not entirely certain. Hopefully I or someone else will have a moment of enlightenment and help clarify whether we're just a bunch of jerks stealing music or if the music industry's party - a party where they grossly over-charged for admission - is just over.
Ok, enough questions. Anybody have some answers?
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 8, 2008, 04:43PMNice (and Free) Glass Vector Icons
Dezignus just keeps sharing the vector love. Here's a nice set of glassy looking icons. What's great about these is that you can come up with your own icons to overlay. Sweet.
Nice Javascript Zoom!
Man, Javascript is looking snazzy these days. FancyZoom is a great looking image viewing library built in Javascript. Clicking on a thumbnail creates a neat zoom effect as the image enlarges. Nicely documented as well.
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 7, 2008, 09:36AMThe Hell With Lorem Ipsum. Blind Text Generator Does It Right!
Ah, the legend of latin filler text, every designer's dubious ally. For forever I've used the popular lorem ipsum generator on the Web (you know, the one that shows up as the top result on Google). Well, there's a better tool out there that pulls it off in the Queen's English. Blind Text Generator does a great job of generating paragraphs against a set number of words. So long pretentious latin filler text!
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 6, 2008, 01:13PMWho Knew
"Who Knew is an information design network devoted to 'difficult content' - ideas and issues that are commonly misunderstood and censored." Through the use of visual design and succinct, to-the-point explanations, Joshua Trees and his team have put together a compelling series of visual essays. Well worth checking out.
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 4, 2008, 01:19PMGoogle's Worst Nightmare
So what's Google so freaked out about? Recently posted on the official Google blog, regarding the Microsoft's proposed buyout of Yahoo!:
Could a combination of the two take advantage of a PC software monopoly to unfairly limit the ability of consumers to freely access competitors' email, IM, and web-based services?
Google's incredible success to date teeters on a single, easily-overlooked prerequisite: that we continue to travel around the Internet through a web browser. Without that trip through the Web Browser Highway, Google's billboards that dot that highway would never be seen.
If you can envision an operating system that neatly taps into various web services - email, instant messaging, photo sharing, collaborative documents and spreadsheets - without requiring a web browser, you can start to sense why Google would be freaked out. An argument can easily be made that we don't need to make that trip through the web browser to get at all these great services. Hell, an argument can be made that the web browser is a less-than-optimal way of doing things. That the services should and eventually will live on your desktop.
If you combine the massive population that Yahoo! enjoys with the power and immediacy of pre-installed, click-and-go tools right on the desktop, Google's plans look a lot murkier. It comes down to that critical entry point. Today, Google got its hooks in because the browser and URL box was the great democratizer. You weren't competing for prime shelf space on the desktop. It was inevitable that Microsoft would lean back on the OS to more deeply hook into services that we typically access through a browser.
And what of search? Forget all these fringe services. Search is Google's bread and butter. It's where something like 98% of their revenue comes from. Well, the thing with search is that its really just a means to an end. We spend an average of, oh I don't know, 10 seconds on a search results page? Then we quickly move onto the valued destination we were seeking. Still, it's that brief trip down the Google Highway that Google cares about. That's where we stare at Google's billboards. If you threaten the need to take that trip (which incidentally happens solely in a web browser today), you threaten Google's existence.
Wouldn't it be nice to hit a simple key combination in Windows (Windows key?) and just type what we're looking for and see the results streamlined right there on the desktop? Or how about Apple's Spotlight feature? Just open up Spotlight and search the Web. The browser only comes into play after I've selected the destination I want to go to. If you stop and think about it, the hop we make through Google is useless. Google is just a utility that gets us to where we want to go. We don't need it in the browser. In fact, I'd prefer it not even be in the browser but rather maintain its own modal state outside.
Either now or later, Google is inevitably going to have to deal with Microsoft. I'm guessing something like 90% of all search originates on a Microsoft operating system. It is only natural (or wily, depending on your allegiance) and in many ways more ideal (or more sinister, again depending on allegiance) to start to deliver these services in a more seamless, integrated manner.
In many ways, Google has every right to be concerned. A world without browser-based search results - or browser-based anything for that matter - is a pretty scary place.
Posted by Richard Ziade on February 1, 2008, 11:11AMHide The Children : Microsoft Set To Acquire Yahoo!
Based on the big blob of write-ups at the ol' Techmeme, tech bloggers are all abuzz about Microsoft's proposed acquisition of Yahoo! My guess is the acquisition will happen. Some thoughts:
- Is this really all about ads and search? I'm guessing that's a big part of the story. So I'm left asking - is Microsoft's value heading to the Web, or is Yahoo's value headed to the desktop? Or both?
- Redundancy anyone? Who survives:
- Windows Live Photo Gallery vs. Flickr
- Windows Live Favorites vs. Delicious.
- The list goes on: maps? chat? shopping?
- Related to the last point, how does a Flickr or Delicious culture survive a Microsoft-ification?
- An operating system has acquired a suite of web services in many respects. I'd expect Google and Apple to continue to draw closer.
- What of all the great developer support Yahoo!'s contributed over the years? Does that get swallowed by the big MSDN monster?
So how big of a Web presence will MS+Yahoo be? Add the red and green lines and subtract some for "overlap tax":
