Written on March 24, 2008 – 7:03 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
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We wrote about the YouTube warp before on The Next Web. It is a visual way of browsing videos on Youtube. Cute but not very useful and well hidden from most users. But now there is a way to link to the Warp browser in your blog or website. A simple how to, link to this URL:
http://youtube.com/warp.swf?v=
If you put the alpha numeric part of the video behind the ‘=’ sign, your hyperlink will be enriched with some warp magic. An example: http://youtube.com/warp.swf?v=2v4p4CpPRwI, makes one beautiful warp about warps.
It can be useful if you want to guide your readers or visitors through a video tour on a specific subject. Wanna tell people where it went wrong with Britney Spears? Or do you prefer to tell them what Easter is all about? No problem! The warp creates an easy and attractive way to show related videos. Although there’s always the risk of some totally inappropriate computer-generated link…
Written on March 17, 2008 – 6:12 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
Bestselling-author Tim Ferriss from The 4-hour Workweek has interviewed the founding editor of Lifehacker.com, Gina Trapani. The result is an interesting article that contains some useful tips for web workers. Since this is a Web 2.0 blog, I assume quite a lot of guys would call yourself a web worker. So I highlighted some of the best advices, for the other tips I gladly refer to the man we owe this interview to.
Trapani wants us to forget about the ‘2read’ tag:
“One simple but powerful habit is this: To act immediately on things as they come up. (…) If I see a web page that looks like it might be a good Lifehacker post at some point, instead of just bookmarking it for later, creating a draft post in Lifehacker’s publishing system on the spot. This practice requires some discipline to develop, especially when you’re feeling lazy or distracted, but it can make a huge difference.”
Monkey minds swinging from branch to branch
To some degree, I reject the super-structured, old school of time management thought, (..) From 10:45 to 11:15 check email,” etc. As a “web worker,” by nature I embrace serendipity and tangents, and like to keep myself open to working on unexpected things that excite me, even if they’re not in the plan. (..) At the same time, I think a lot of web workers like me can take this to the extreme, and need a dose of structure and limits in their day.
Open/ closed mindsets
Basically I’ve got two modes of work: loose/open, and focused/closed. When I’m in “open” mode, my instant messenger status is set to available, I’m surfing, writing, checking email, coding, listening to music with lyrics—getting things done, but in a multitasking way, open to interruptions and tangents. When I’m in focused/closed mode,I shut down IM, stop checking email, close any windows I’m not using, switch to my ambient music playlist, set a timer, and plow through whatever I’ve got to get done. Typically I go into closed mode when I’m on deadline.
Some other useful lifehacks for Web Workers/ bloggers
By the way, if you think lifehacking is just a superficial buzzword, drop a line in the comments. In a time that everybody seems excited about ‘geek to live’, some critical thoughts about hacking your life.
Written on March 4, 2008 – 5:31 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
Remember the post I wrote about Wordpress NOT being the next social network, just because it’s too complicated for the larger public? I still think about it the same way, yet I see more and more initiatives that show that Wordpress is becoming an even larger player in the field of web publishing.
The most inspiring post on this subject is written by Raj Dash on the blog Performancing. He describes 48 unique ways to use Wordpress:
As someone who has both written small, custom CMSes from scratch as well as evaluated million-dollar professional CMSes for large corporations, WordPress’ robustness never ceases to amaze me.
According to Dash, the key to the many ways Wordpress can be used lies in five components: custom theme, custom code tweaks, custom or widely-available plugins, custom fields per post and custom code to use the custom fields. After making this clear he sums up some interesting Wordpress-powered sites, like city guides, webcasting stations and web portfolios.
Yet the simplest idea strikes me the most. Developers like Charlene from Essential Keystrokes use Wordpress as an easy content management system. Have a look at Furniture Warehouse, this simple website is build with Wordpress, not that you can tell though. It’s perfect for small companies that want a good-looking site that is easy to customize. They used to hire a web master or pay a huge license fee for a complicated CMS, now they can just ask an experienced blogger to install Wordpress with a good looking theme.
It might not be a bad idea if Wordpress would start to exploit this new usage of their publishing platform. With some minor adjustments - like a function that disables the comments functions - Wordpress could easily evolve to a popular content management system as well.
Some useful links
Written on February 27, 2008 – 12:16 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
On The Next Web, we try to give our articles a hip and stylish look by using Flickr pics instead of just another logo. Or as a visitor once said in the comments: “Tryin’ too hard to be cool and artsy”. Well, I think we’re doing pretty good job, you may judge for yourself.
Anyway, I’ve stumbled upon two handy plugins that make being ‘cool’ and ‘artsy’ with Flickr pics even easier. One for Wordpress and one for iPhoto.
Flickr and Wordpress
Australian problogger Darren Rowse wrote about Photo Dropper, a Wordpress plugin that finds Flickr Creative Commons licensed images all from within your Wordpress Dashboard. You can choose three different sizes and attribution links are automatically added underneath the images to comply with the Creative Commons license rules. Get the plugin here.
Flickr and iPhoto
Another great plugin that makes it possible to upload your iPhoto pictures. I’ve found it on Jaap Stronks’ blog and was delighted, since it will lower the barrier for me to upload photos to Flickr. I used to just import them in iPhoto, but now I can put them on Flickr with a few clicks as well.
A free iPhoto export plugin for Flickr. This provides a convenient way to upload your iPhoto descriptions, titles, keywords (tags), and ratings along with your photos. It also supports sets (yay!) and preserves GPS tags and other EXIF data. Flickr is a semi-free photo sharing service/site.
Get FFXporter here.
Written on February 22, 2008 – 11:11 am
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
I recently started working on a personal blog, just to aggregate all my online content in one place. So let’s say that we meet for the first time and you want to know what I’m doing, I can just tell you to surf to one spot where all my work is presented.
During the designing process, I soon faced the problem of integrating all these services like Twitter, Flickr, Last.fm, Del.ico.us etcetera etcetera. How can I aggregate all those different types of content without turning my blog into widget paradise?
The answer turns out to be simple: use an escaloop badge. It’s nothing more than a feed aggregator that presents the content in a clean and simple way. Just like the visualization of the service:
Escaloop is a personal side project by German Yahoo coder Carlo Zottmann. I hope he supports his side project with a pretty solid server, since escaloop might get a bit more popular than he thought it would.
By the way, if this article brought you in a lifestream-state-of mind, check out this useful lifestream post on ReadWriteWeb.
Written on January 19, 2008 – 8:04 pm
Sjors Timmer, Front-end web developer
Not long after the phrase Web 2.0 emerged, also Web 2.0 design appeared. An unwritten set of guidelines that demanded that a decent webpage should have gradients, round corners, some mirror effects, a badge, and the important stuff should be in a font size of at least 48px came to existence.
I’m still not sure what they were thinking back then. Did the designers really think users where that stupid that they needed big letters screaming at them? Was it all about showing off Photoshop skills, or had it something to do with the idea that Web2.0 should be clearly recognizable as something different, something totally not Web 1.0.
Well let’s no longer talk about the past, and bad examples, let’s search for good ones that are available to us now. Because I have the feeling that we’re slowly moving to a new set of design guide lines. I’ll present you three websites, that - although they are different - have a lot in common too.
First:
Flickr.com probably one of the oldest Web 2.0 companies that didn’t go along with the bling hype. The interface is clear and simple, but still looks shiny cool.
Second:
Cnn.com, got a new fresh design last year, and is one of the finest examples of how to make a site without gradients and without drop-shadows behind each box.
Third:
Hulu.com, only around for a few months now, and a living proof about designing a good site that mainly exist out of white space. (It It is still in beta, but you can get a login within a day, check for some more screenshots here)
three ways to go beyond Web 2.0 design
So what is it that all these site have in common?
1. Grids and white space
Order your site with mathematical precision, create a grid where each column has a certain width, and stick to that format. Another thing is making things stand out not by making them really big, but by adding a lot of white space around it, some things on Hulu just needs to be clicked because there is noting else that catches the eye. Mark Boulton wrote a good tutorial about it, Khoi Vinh wrote a blog post accompanied with a pdf for it.
2. Typography.
There is a lot more into typography than only choosing which font you are going to use. Without even changing the font you can already differ two text blocks from each other in different line-height, different grey scales, and different sizes. Once again Mark Boulton wrote a wonderful series. Another good point to start with is Oliver Reichensteins article about typography.
3. Colors, and shades of grey
I already mentioned the use of different shades of grey to differ texts in importance, and especially sticking to one or two colors and grey can be easy tools to create an attractive yet clean site. Flickr especially manages the grey tones pallet very well. Veerle wrote a good article and ColorLovers and Adobe’s Kuler are worth visiting too
To sum it up: master your grey skills, keep your distance, and get some mathematical madness for order running through your blood. And you will be on your way to go beyond the drop-shadows and big starry things with text in it.
Written on January 10, 2008 – 3:26 pm
Steven Carrol, Next Web WebTipr France
To know how to steal advertisers from magazines you have to understand how magazines work.
A little history is in order, I used to be the designer and director of a highly successful design, manufacturing and distribution company (Intimidation) out of London during the nineties. One of the most interesting aspects of the business was marketing. It was the one part where you really had to deal with the entire industry, know what was going on, and be at the center of the controversy in order to get the most bang for your bucks (the latter seemed to come naturally).
So I’m this tiny rogue bean in an industrial sized tin of Heinz being baked, the most important thing I had going for me was a unique product, lots of new killer features and plenty to distinguish me from the ‘competition’ which in my case amounted to a ‘one size fits all’ bunch of losers, so that part was easy.
As an advertiser with a very limited budget, I had to maximize the return, I had to know precisely where the advertising would work and how to get it at rates that my competitors would die for. So I made some bold decisions from day one, here was my manifesto in a nutshell.
1) Always do double page spreads,
- you get the best rates;
- they have an impact like none other;
- they intimidate the competition;
- they cannot be ignored.
2) Forget the rate card,
- Call up on p-day (publishing deadline) and offer them silly prices for a DPS, if the rate card said 1k per page, offer them 800UKP Max for a DPS.
3) Focus,
- Have a real top class advert,
- advertise only one product,
- the message had to be crystal clear.
- The product had to almost leap out of the page so that potential buyers could just about grab it (if not pin it to their wall).
- The advert had to be full on war, with a simple but extremely effective caption. To give an example one of our captions was ‘Aural Sex’ (The product was a DJ Mixer BTW). When you get girls phoning up asking you for more information about aural sex you know your on to a good thing.
So what can blogs learn from magazines about advertising and how to poach it away from the mainstream publications. This diatribe rant is to both sides, advertisers and bloggers, as both need to understand what it takes to be effective from each others perspective.
(more…)
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