Over at friendlybit, Emil talks of feed readers being a threat to a design on web. I find it a good article and something to think about. I’ve seen many debates over “Full vs Partial Feed” publishing. I’ve seen lots of talk on “Great Content vs Great Design”. Now Emil brought up another thought on “Users should decide vs Webmasters should decide” and “styling vs unstyling” web trends.

The widely accepted rule was to let the users decide the layout; after all why should we need to download the same design over and over? Design was something the user decided, not the author.

But those content-only sites didn’t live long. First tables, then CSS, enabled users to make sites more interesting and in many cases easier to read.

Everything has pro and con. Sometimes it’s so hard to take sides.

Myself as a user, I like the idea of reading full feed from various site content through feed reader for faster and easier (no need to remember all site urls) accessibilities.

But then again, you lost track of the site look and feel aspect as well as some other factors like aside links, photo galleries, no-feed related content pages such as “about page”, “portfolio”, others articles and even a good comments discussion. You become very unfamiliar with the site and sometimes you don’t even recognize the site that you roll the feed from when you happen to came across.

Not too long ago feeds were introduced. Feeds make it easier to subscribe to websites by separating content from all the “design stuff”. This enables users to decide how your content should look. Proponents often talk about how much faster it is to read content from different sites when they all look the same. No time is lost trying to understand a new design.

Apart from having a great content, site aesthetics is also one of the essential factors of web medium.
So, myself as a designer/site owner, I published partial feed only.
Why? Becos’ I got alot more stuffs to show off than just feed content.
I prefer varieties of stylish medium than a dull unstyled web.
I want my readers not only to taste my writing but also to feel my overall site identity.

What kind of web do we want? What kind of web do you want? Should we go back to an unstyled web where content is the only thing that matters? Did the “content only”-proponents win after all? Is it a “feeds only” web what we want?

In the case of “Users should decide VS Webmasters should decide”, I take it as webmasters are the advanced users and hence they have a chance to change the direction in which they prefer best. ie. If you favor unstlyed web, go ahead and publish full feed. Otherwise, support the effectivness of design aesthetics and force trick the users to the direction by publishing a partial feed.

Oh yes, LONG LIVE DESIGN!

Read Emil’s full article on “Feed – a threat to design on the web” here.

I was reading about this lipstick article (Feel Naked Without LipSticks) on 9rules which actually got some quotes from this lovely site, “Meriyas Lounge”, so I thought of checking it out for more articles.

I was expecting to find some female fashion shop or rather, female accessories and widget review blog. Whoa! It just took my breath away. Seriously!

“Meriyas Lounge”

I’m looking for something to read or click on. I don’t know which one is the site content or site logo or heading at all. I’m seeing… Ads, ads, ads, and ADSSSS! I have no idea where exactly they got that lipstick quotes from, may be some sub pages but from the very look of the main page, it just taking me off from browsing farther. It took me a couple of minutes to find the actual site menus, oh yah; they are right at the top-left corner. Kind of lost in the overall ads contexts.

I guess the site is seriously after afflicted $$$, and yes, it’s good for them. But as for the site visitors…I doubt if they wanna revisit the site for the second time. I wish they added some information about the site in the main page and reduce some ads or move a few to sub pages. In that way, visitors can easily make out what the site is about and the content is more accessible. The site designer should reorganize the ads placements and layouts to blend in with the content rather than using too obvious packs which everyone might tend to ignore. But then I don’t know much about online ads business so who knows their ads placing suit their purpose. I’m just talking from the user perspective as it’s very hard to browse the site and the main content is lost in the ads.

For my own satisfaction, I’ve clean up the site to see the relevant content. I blocked up all those ads and finally got this very clean site. Lovely!

Blocked Ads from Main Page

Clean Site

Now…what was I come here for again? Oh rite, cos’ of that lipstick article.

9rules submission will be @ 12am Eastern time…ie. what time in Fiji? Hmm let me figure that out first.

I’m thinking of trying out my luck. I’m not expecting anything as I’m not prepared and not ready yet. Nevertheless it’s always good to try things out beforehand and test your luck. Ofcos you can always submit again in the next rounds.

For those of you who haven’t heard(I doubt that) of 9rules, check them out here. They have this very cool logo.
It’s a great network and I always want to be part of it. Oh well…sure my time will come…just a matter of time. (smile)

Updated:

It’s time and I just submitted my site : Round 5 Opens!

I just upgraded my Firefox to the latest 2.0. Six of my extensions broke, including my favorite LoremIpsum and ScreenGrab.

I just notice, there is no “Extension” option under “Tools” but it becomes “Add-ons” and includes two tabs “Extensions” + “Themes”. And I don’t know where my connection settings go…oh it’s under “Advenced – Network” tab.

A bit of here and there changes I’m noticing… The browser tabs becomes a little glassier. Nice.

I have to upgrade my IE too. I downloaded other day and don’t want to install it since I want to keep it standalone for V7 and V6. So I’m still using RC1 Standalone for testing purposes.

I don’t know why IE installer file is too big in size ie. 15+MB compare to 5M of Firefox. IE download is definitely not the choice for people with bad internet.

Anyways I’m not gonna do any comparison between the two. This is just a remainder for you to upgrade your FF with latest one.

Download Firefox 2.0 here.

Just a breaking news yall. My beloved, the gang at WordPress, new creations and releases.

WordPress MU is an official branch of WordPress that is designed for managing and hosting thousands of blogs instead of just one.

Download WordPress MU

bbPress is forum software with the WordPress touch, and developed by the same folks. It has some pretty cool features, such as tagging, RSS feeds, Akismet spam protection, AJAX interaction, but the team focused the most on creating something fast and light. bbPress can power a forum with hundreds of thousands of posts with just a fraction of the load as WordPress.

Download bbPress

I don’t think I can check out WordPress MU…may be later. bbPress is interesting though, may be install it locally and check it out. You guys can test out too and let me know how it go.

Technorati Tags: WordPress MU, bbPress, Downloads, Releases, WordPress

This is just so much eye attracting design. Incredibly beautiful in the use of color as well as the graphics and texture. I just love that peacock…phoenix, phoenix…peacock, ok phoenix and those magnificent rainbow and flowers.

I see not a single thing wrong with the whole site design. I’m not considering the loading speed for that thick background effect but it seems quite all right.

N.Design Studio – Design and Blog

I love those main navigation tabs with little icons in it. I love the hover effects of the tabs and the image link hovers. I love the choice of that particular font style and the choice of black header and footer to have a sense of closing or the edges to the site. The little links such as “Archive, Links, Contact..” at the header and “Sitemap, Css, Xhtml, Rss” at the footer are just so cute to resist.

Although the heavy use of very colorful graphics, the main company logo is still distinguishable. And I just love the fact that it is a valid XHTML site. This is one serious design work and I’d give a great respect to the designer for the site as well as his beautiful portfolio. Definitely going to attract major clients.

Love it! Cheers.

I’m gonna roll it just for the love of its design.
Check out his old flash version as well.

I’m not a freelancer, well not yet but like to be in the future, but these 7 points by Successful Andy Budd are very worth taking note of whether you are a freelancer or not.

#1. Love what you do
To be a successful freelancer, you need to have a passion for what you do…

I love what I do. Yes, I really do. I never thought I’ll be doing what I’m doing when I was in high school as I didn’t even like looking at the computers. But once I start digging into this profession, I beginning to like it and yes I’m loving what I do.

I do have a passion. Right now I have a deep passion to eat one good “Kyar-San-Chat”. hehe Ok sorry, just a bit hungry at the moment.

#2. Never stop learning
Every day new ideas or techniques are discovered and sometimes it’s hard to keep pace…the best web designers are endlessly inquisitive and always want to keep abreast of the latest trends and technologies…

Sometimes, I wonder what will be like when I don’t want to learn anymore. IT and Computer profession is very different from any others. IT industry is very rapid and fast growing, every minute, everyday. If you cannot keep up with the speed you are rather useless in a few months time. Having a degree in IT field is nothing like having a degree in other fields like Accounting, Medicine, Nurseing. In those, you can make use of what you learn in school for a long time, unless ofcos, there is a new disease to cure/study or a new program is introduced to calculate accounts.

In IT, a degree is just a piece of paper to frame and is rather useless if you cannot keep up/don’t know what it’s like out there in the real world. Sometimes, it’s so tiring to find out how far behind you are with the latest technology. While you’re learning one thing and not even specialize on that yet, many other new things pop up and the thing you learning becomes usless. I wonder many times, how do I even keep up with this rate. But you know what, the most important thing is as long as you have a passion for learning new thing, you’ll be just fine.

#3. Specialise
Some skills are more in demand than others, but if you’re the top of your field in a particular language or skill, you’ll always be in demand.

Very true, as long as you’re the best in one field, you’re sure to make a living out of it. Lets’ see what I’m specialise at…

#4. Get a killer portfolio
The best way to do this is to contact friends and family and offer to build them a website. I’m not suggesting you do this for FREE as this is potentially damaging to the industry and can also leave you in the difficult situation where your work isn’t valued….create your own personal project or sandbox where you can demonstrate your ideas. I’ve hired freelancers in the past based solely on the basis of their personal work…

This is something I lack. I don’t have any portfolio of my own. Well, you can’t show off what you done for your company since it might be somewhat illegal? or they might not want you to since you are working under their terms and conditions. But if you are to be freelancer then you seriously need your own portfolio. Atleast have a website/blog of your own where you publish your latest informative muses, so people know you are still alive and up-to-date.

Lets’ see…I wanna build up my portfolio, who wanna hire me? Mom? Dad? Bro?? No free job, KFC would do.

#5. Network like crazy
As the old saying goes, “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know”. This couldn’t be more true as a freelance web designer. The best way to get work is to use your contacts and network like crazy.

I’m really bad with networking. Actully I suck at it. I don’t know, I’m just not a people kind of person. I seriously need to work on this skill. Yes, a good point to note.

#6. Manage your time
As well as doing the work you get paid for, you also need to market yourself, manage your projects, do your accounts and everything else that’s involved in running a small business…One of the benefits of being a freelancer is being your own boss, so make sure you’re both strict and fair…

Freelancing is flexable yet very dangerous if your time management skills are weak. The article explains it well, so better read on it.

#7. Build your reputation
One of the best ways of becoming a successful freelancer is to become the person people want to do business with. You can also build your reputation by sharing your experiences and knowledge through writing articles, blogging and speaking at local events. By building your reputation as an expert, people will be happy using your services and recommending you to others. Blogging is a particularly good way of doing this and is something I highly recommend.

Whoa! In this case, I’m on the right track (kind of). I just build up my reputation as a jack-ass a few days ago. Hey still, I’m building up my reputation rite? ha` ha`. Yep, it’s way better to check out your blog to determine your personalities + many other things than checking your beautiful resume. You blog talks about who you really are and has a greater impact on people than reading a few pages of your resume.

I have a blog, I rock! I have a reputation, I kick arse!
Now, am I a potential successful freelancer or am I a potential successful freelancer?!? (wink*)
Read the article in detail here. Very resourceful and great notes there. Must read!