The MIT Technology Review published an interesting short article: “Redesigning the Web for Touch Screens A new crop of touch-based devices is changing the way users interact with Web pages” By Erica Naone
Excerpts:
- the advent of touch-based devices “is almost asking the entire Web to change its behavior from what’s been built up over 20 years,”
- Individual problems are often small, but they add up to something more significant, Vegesna says. For example, roll-over interactions are common on many websites, but these don’t work on touch devices. Other common tricks, such as hovering over a link to see the connected URL in the status bar, have to be adjusted before a user can perform the same function.
Read the whole article at http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/25236/?nlid=2950&a=f
Creative Overflow has an interesting and helpful take on why only 4% of small businesses survive 10 years
Excerpt:
“Three distinct personalities make up a successful business; an entrepreneur, a manager and a technician.
The entrepreneurs job is to be the go getter. The one that creates out of thin air; the person constantly coming up with new and wonderful ideas for the future of the business, creating new products and new services. Always looking for new ideas and ways to lead the market. Without these people in your company the future will be nothing more than mediocre, if there is any future at all.
A manager is a person that builds business systems around the things that the entrepreneur creates. He makes sure that things are done in an effective way, that there are systems, rules and guidelines in place. He maximizes profits and make sure that the business runs like a well oiled machine.
The technician is the person, building the fiscal things that the entrepreneur has thought up, and that the manager is managing. He is the here and now guy, he brings home the bacon. If there was no technician, nothing would get done. The only person making the fiscal goods that brings in money is the technician. Without them there would be no business. will edit more in the morning am tired!
Unfortunately and inevitably these 3 personalities clash.The way that an entrepreneur goes about achieving their goals causes a lot of havoc around the office, this is unsettling to those in his employment, therefore he is usually met with a lot of resistance. The entrepreneurs worldview then becomes that of people being the thing that gets in the way of the dream.
The manager craves order, constantly feels the need to keep the entrepreneur in line and focused otherwise he feels that the entrepreneur will drive them out of business with all his ideas and schemes. He tries to order the technicians work into a system that would consistently give predictable results.The technician is happiest when he is in control of the work flow and left alone to do his work. The entrepreneur always gets in the way, throwing new ideas into the mix (that would probably not work anyway) and keeps the technician away from focusing on the job at hand. The manager also gets in the way of the technician onto whom he wants to impose.
The technician can’t stand being treated that way. To the manager the technician becomes a problem to be managed. To the technician the manager becomes a meddler to be avoided, and to both of them the entrepreneur is the one that started the trouble in the first place.”
Click http://creativeoverflow.net/why-9-out-of-10-small-businesses-fail/ to read the rest of Creative Overflow’s article.
By the way, the design on their website is beautiful and creative. Substantive content AND great design: keep Creative Overflow on your radar!
MIT Technology Review published this article “How to Make the Internet a Lot Faster” advising that very-high-speed broadband can’t just be about big pipes.
Excerpts:
- Existing applications for very-high-speed Internet include the transfer of very large files, streaming high-definition (and possibly 3-D) video, video conferencing, and gaming. Some experts speculate that accessing large data files and applications through the cloud may also require better broadband.”Just big pipes alone to an end user does not necessarily guarantee that you can deliver high-end applications,” says Gary Bachula, vice president of external relations for Internet2. There are many factors beyond raw bandwidth, Bachula says. For example, an improperly configured router or a university firewall can affect performance and end up acting as a network bottleneck. “You need to have open networks, you need to publish your performance data, you need to have people troubleshoot your network remotely,” says Bachula.
- It’s also not enough to build a fast hardware infrastructure, says Steven Low, a professor of computer science and electrical engineering at Caltech, and cofounder of the network optimization technology company FastSoft, based in Pasadena, CA. Low believes the protocols that move traffic through the network will also need to be updated to make effective use of very-high-speed capabilities.
Click the following link to read the whole article: http://www.technologyreview.com/web/24605/?nlid=2772&a=f
According to an article from MIT Technology Review:
“Researchers at SRI International and Georgia Tech are preparing to release a free tool to stop “drive-by” downloads: Internet attacks in which the mere act of visiting a Web site results in the surreptitious installation of malicious software. The new tool, called BLADE (Block All Drive-By Download Exploits), stops downloads that are initiated without the user’s consent.
“When your browser is presented with an [executable file] for download, it’s supposed to prompt you for what to do,” said Phil Porras, SRI’s program director. But software can also be pushed onto an unsuspecting user’s computer without ever asking for permission.”
Click the following link to read the whole article: http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/24632/page1/
Here is a helpful video by Scott Skibell of MacScreencasting.com about adding green screen to video screencasts: http://www.macscreencasting.com/green-screen-video-in-screencasts.html
Here is a link to Wikipedia’s page on “chromakey” which says: “Chroma keying is a technique for mixing two images or frames together in which a color (or a small color range) from one image is removed (or made transparent), revealing another image behind it. This technique is also referred to as color keying, colour-separation overlay (CSO; primarily by the BBC[1]), greenscreen, and bluescreen.”
Here is a great Wall Street Journal article by Richard Greenwald that is well worth reading with practical advice for success:
Excerpt:
“(Very successful consultants often) teach—whether at a regional business college, through university continuing-education programs or through workshops given by professional associations.
At first, it sounds counterintuitive to train others to do what you do. After all, you’re creating more competition for yourself in the very community in which you work. But teaching offers four big positives for consultants.
First, it provides some income, though admittedly not much. Second, it’s a way to network, because sometimes students can become clients or lead to clients. Third, the teaching looks good on a résumé, giving consultants credibility in the marketplace and a way to stand out from the crowd. And fourth, if you’re going to teach somebody the latest skills, you better have those skills yourself. So teaching forces consultants to stay current and sharp themselves.”
Read the whole article: “How to Succeed in the Age of Going Solo – Anybody can become a consultant. But not everybody does it well. Here’s what you need to know to thrive”
Jason Del Rey gives four tips for how to advertise on Facebook in this Inc. Magazine article.
1. Choose your target
2. Test, test — and test some more
3. Do your own tracking
4. Make your ads pop
