Information is disseminated at amazing speeds across the web and here is a prime example.

I was watching a keynote by Mark Zuckerberg at SXSW. The crowd took exception to the line of questioning by the interviewer and began to complain. Within seconds the whole Internet was a buzz of what was happening. Notified by Twitter and RSS feeds, curious people, attending other panels, started coming into the room to see what was going on.

Attendees at SXSW constantly blogged and tweeted during panel discussions. Information was posted online in almost real-time: faster than a thousand phones calls could possibly be made, or a news announcements could be created. Pretty powerful stuff.

1. Content is most important
2. Content is most important
3. Content is most important
4. User/Customer experience = marketing
5. E-commerce business is built on repeat customers
6. Share knowledge
7. Plan for now
8. Be kind, mindful and honest in everything you do
9. It’s easy to talk things to death
10. Social Networks are real and apply to business too
11. Buying is highly social
12. 60 Million+ users are worth $15 billion or ~ $250 per user (to Microsoft)
13. Keep users by helping them live better
14. Some of the most important things that affect the quality of a deliverable are momentum, motivation, movement. Delays kill!
15. Internet geeks really like Twitter

Glassbooth.org is an interesting political web site for several reasons. I found it extremely educational, rich with links to information. But more importantly, the way it first asks about what issues interest you most, then presents a short survey based on your weighted responses is a brilliant way to compare issues on what matters most to you.

This technique really simplifies what could easily be a longer form with less effective results and a poor user experience. Kudos to the folks that created this site. A fine example of how to use the Internet intelligently and effectively.

I've been studying and participating in Web 2.0 social activities for the past 3 years or so to some degree. Most of the time I see the benefits of this movement, but I have to say, Who gives a shit what people are doing in micro-snippets of information. Why are trivial activities interesting? Is it voyeuristic? Do people rank their coolness by what others, whom they admire or emulate, are up to? Twitter is ridiculous and to me signifies virtual, social activities have jumped the shark.

I am pleased to announce my employment with a newly formed interactive marketing firm, BIG WHEEL, located in St. Louis, Missouri. 

As Project Manager, I manage our portfolio of projects, traffic, operations and provide technical direction. Because we're a small shop, we all wear many hats - just the way I like it.

Need a good web partner? Call us. We deliver projects with the discipline of a hard-core IT company blended with the innovative strategy of a "now" media advertising agency.

Managing emails are a problem. In the outside world, the volume of spam is taxing the system and spam filters have become a major hassle. In a corporate environment, unsolicited emails may not get in, but spam created by co-workers and business associates carbon copying a half-a-dozen people for each intended recipient creates internal spam.

Is has become common practice to abuse using Cc. People use Cc for CYA, I did my job, or look what he/she wrote. Granted, an email is hard evidence an effort to communicate was attempted, but how did we survive before this ability to be so transparent existed? It blows my mind who gets Cc’d on some emails I receive. Most of these sub-recipients couldn’t care less. So people, have some self-control and take responsibility for your communiqués. If you need to share your email, fine, but if it isn’t necessary to inform someone of your actions, don’t.

Another peeve of mine is attachments. I recently set up mailboxes for a client and within a week someone was complaining that a 10Mb limit was too low. When I asked why, they said they needed to send large attachments in excess of 20Mb.

Email is not, nor ever was, intended as a file transport system; File Transport Protocol (FTP) was. Everyone who moves files should know how to use FTP and if 10Mb of mailbox space isn’t enough, you’re not using the system correctly. Use Gmail they give you a whopping 2418 Mb. Party!

Please don’t email anything over 2Mb. Use FTP or another web service. There are dozens of services available today that allow you to move large files using your browser. Some are free for occasional use and others charge a reasonable fee.

Here’s the rub: People Cc too many people with too large of attachments. This creates an enormous amount of unnecessary traffic. Stop the madness. The administrators, mail servers and network will thank you.

I like the St. Louis RCGA. They make a huge effort to do a lot of positive things for the City, but they have issues, especially with marketing. Their new campaign to promote St. Louis on a national level comes with a new identity.

This is weak. I hope it was cheap, but it doesn't sound like it...

From archcitypundit.com

The St. Louis ads will begin running in mid-April.marking the first time the slogan and logo will appear before a large national audience. The local marketing campaign is part of a larger, $20 million economic development program that’s being led by the St. Louis Regional Chamber & Growth Association.The five-year program was crafted amid concerns that St. Louis has trailed the nation in job growth over the last 30 years. The plan is being funded with public and private dollars…

The RCGA also has a new web site. It's better than the old one, but what's with the site search at the bottom of the page - that's real handy.

Yesterday was the St. Louis User Experience Conference 2006 held on the campus of Monsanto. The venue was outstanding. Overall it was a good event for a crazy low price of $30. St. Louis doesn’t have many events like this to attend, so hat's off to the organizers.

The day was divided into six sessions with two topic options for each slot, ending with a keynote on The Future of Digital Product Design by Dirk Knemeyer. The brevity of each session kept the day moving, but having only 45 minutes per presentation allowed only the surface to be scratched. More than anything, the speakers provided food for thought and resources for additional research.

Many of the presenters outlined case studies of past UX projects. Although they didn’t talk numbers, they did elaborate on work hours and durations to accomplish certain activities. I found this particularly interesting. Mostly for me it will provide fodder for a few blog posts and some concepts I can use in my business. What more could I ask? Don’t miss next year’s event.

Also, November 14, 2006 is World Usability Day. The St. Louis Science Center is having special exhibits all day.

Most children's entertainment sites feature primary color layouts, cute characters, simplistic animations and obnoxious sound bites. Leave it up to the Japanese with their own style of children’s media to lead these sites to the next level.

Toonami, a cartoon on The Cartoon Network, has come up with their own streaming media site, Toonami Jet Stream

Awesome design, cutting-edge Flash work, really cool.

The creator’s parent company, Vis Media, although newly formed, is poised to bring other Japanese media to the Net. Hopefully the days of the animated GIF and lame Flash game are soon over.

I guess my interest in this site lies in the fact it's a kid's site, but it isn't designed as such; yet the site is appealing to kids. They are sophisticated enough to understand "adult" design.

Taken further, the general adult public is often considered not sophisticated enough to appreciate and understand good contemporary design and are often handed the same old crap.

The moral of this story: don't underestimate your audience and don't be afraid to push the limits. If the work is done well, they'll get it.

BJC HealthCare, headquartered in St. Louis, MO, recently won a Silver Award for its web site, http://www.bjc.org.

The Aster Awards Program provides national-level recognition for healthcare organizations and advertising agencies who strive for excellence in medical marketing.

As part of the team responisible for the design, I am happy to see BJC and our work get this distinction. BJC puts a lot of effort in creating great health and wellness content for BJC and all their member facilities.

Congratulations BJC.

Because of Amazon.com and other mega ecommerce sites, online shopping has hit the mainstream and consumers expect their experience to be easy and flawless.

Shopping carts come in a wide variety of configurations and the basic functions of allowing a user to save items in a basket, create an order and process a transaction are common to every one. That is just the tip of the iceberg. Regardless of choosing an ASP solution, pre-built app, or custom development, the details require careful analysis to ensure the cart will meet all business requirements. Here are some things to think about and questions to ask.

Inventory

The meat and potatoes of a store are the products. Map out fully how products are categorized and make sure the shopping cart accommodates this structure. Document all the attributes a product can have: name, description, photos, size, color, options, SKUs, and special customer part numbers to name a few. Is it necessary to show a sample or excerpt like a sound clip of music, or table of contents of a book? Does the store inventory need to be tied to in-stock product availability?

Orders

Are orders taken individually or as part of a user account? Do partial orders need to be shipped seperately? How long do orders need to be stored?

Accounts

Another important part of an e-store is how user accounts are handled. Are customers required to log in at some point during the shopping process thus creating an account? At what point? Is this optional?

An account may take a user some extra time to initially complete, but the benefits are worth it: saved personal info expedites the next purchase, orders are grouped under an account providing a history, and preferences such as saved products, and special pricing can be established.

Accounting

How is the store tied to the brick and mortar business accounting software? Is there an easy way to get order and customer info in and out of the store? Some have APIs or modules that make the downloading orders a one click effort.

Shipping

Businesses handle shipping an infinite number of ways. Which carrier? (UPS, USPS, FedEx, other) Is there a separate handling charge? If so, is it a flat rate, percent of shipping cost or order total? Again, are partial orders shipped? Does everything get shipped from the same location and to the same address?

Payment

Credit cards, which ones? Checks? PO numbers? Split payment? When is the transaction processed, at time of purchase, when shipped or when received?

Security

Use Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology with at least 128 bit encryption. Also encrypt any stored Social Security numbers and financial account numbers. Make sure the handling of any Personally Identifiable Information (PII) meets Payment Card Industry (PCI) data security standards. Security is paramount and regulations are getting stricter every day.

Sales Tax

Collecting sales tax? In which states? Some states have rates by county. Will the cart calculate these? Perhaps some products will be taxed and other not. Some customers may be tax exempt. Can the cart handle this?

International

Are orders going to be accepted from countries other than the US? Which ones? Other currencies accepted? Can the shipping address be in another country than the billing address?

Promotions

Are promotions important? Some merchants like to provide a promotional code to select customers for discounts. What other types of promotion does the business require?

Pricing

Most shopping carts can accommodate one price per products, but what else is needed? Many businesses have different prices for different customers (wholesale, retail, VIP). Do products need to be priced “on sale” for a specific timeframe?

Reviews

Some retailers like to allow customers to write reviews for products. Is this important?

Wish List

Much like a basket, the wish list allows customers to save items outside of the cart.

Email to a Friend

This can be for any items or just those in the wish list.

Related Products

Up-selling can be a powerful marketing tool. By relating product to each other, customers maybe introduced to items they didn’t know existed or are needed with a particular product.

Statistics and Reporting

In addition to typical site visitor statistics, e-stores often supply data that helps companies cater their inventory or improve the store: Most or least frequently ordered item, customer with the most orders, average order amount, state with highest number of orders…

There are many more things to consider when gatheing the requirements for e-commerce. Selling online has become easier and less expensive, but not simpler. Make sure to ask the right questions and make the best decision based on the requirements. Customers will not tolerate a sloppy and risky ecommerce experience.

Some cities like New York, San Francisco, Portland and even Minneapolis have flourishing freelance resource markets; St. Louis, on the other hand, does not. Several factors may contribute to this:

Size – St. Louis’s creative market is not large enough to consistently employ freelancers.

Culture – A traditional worker bee culture encourages people seek full-time employment or leave.

Talent – Most beginners are not talented or smart enough to be independent contractors.

Business Practices – Agencies find it less risky to hire people than to constantly search for temporary resources.

True or not, these reasons are interrelated: If there was more work, the need for freelancers would increase. If agencies wouldn’t hire as many creatives, the need would increase and sustain more freelancers. If young folks saw freelancing as a viable work situation, more would consider it.

A huge by-product of a strong freelance market is a better skill level of these people; competition would demand people become better at what they do. In turn, the agency’s work would become better and they would get more projects. When they get more projects, there is more work and they hire the best people.

Imagine…

All agency owners fire their creative staff and hire the best ones back as freelancers.  All talented creative individuals begin to stand up for their rights and don’t work at crappy agencies for sub-standard pay. They gain confidence and take their work to the next level increasing the competition. They get more experience by working on a bigger variety of projects and make more money to boot. Companies seek St. Louis as a hot bed of creativity.

… and then I woke up.

I'm looking for an experienced Flash developer for an upcoming project. Must have excellent ActionScripting with XML skills and experience playing video in Flash.

Also looking for web designers with experience in highly-usable, application interface design.

Send me your stuff. mail (at) jamesbielefeldt (.) com

A reverse auction is one of the most perverse ways to win business I have ever heard. Very little information about the project is presented: no schedule, no creative brief, no technical requirements, no examples, just a few basic facts.

“Design a promotional web site to collect recipient’s information with some reporting over a 6 month period.”

The only solid information is the budget. The object of a reverse auction is to estimate costs for the project within the budget based on a vague description, gut reaction, assumptions and an educated guess. In other words, a wing and a prayer.

I guess the project is awarded to the lowest bidder, but it can’t be as simple as that. This practice seems to be common in the sales promotion industry, but is foreign to me and violates everything I’ve learned about conducting sound business practices. Only in the advertising business could something this preposterous be acceptable. How low can an agency’s self-respect be to risk loosing money by winning a project they know little about? The very act of participating is an act of submission.

I don’t have an answer on how to fix this situation other than don’t play the game. If the project begins with this much in the client’s favor how can it ever get to a point where it’s fair for the vendor. Up front it’s a loose-loose for everyone. There is no honesty, no trust, no respect, no communication and no relationship. Money is the only factor – is there a profit margin or not.

On a recent trip to New York City I was pleasantly surprised to learn that all restaurants, bars and clubs are smoke free. Even the elevators in our hotel lounge seemed happy about it.

I just created a GMail account. The first step is to enter your name and your cell phone number. GMail then text messages you a numeric code needed to complete the application.

I'm not sure why they do this, other than to be cool, but it was a new experience for me. Perhaps they are showing off their technical prowess, or introducing you to one aspect of their GMail functionality. GMail does provide IP telephony and text messaging via your browser.

As far as user experience goes it was kinda neat, but the impractical nature of having to access your cell phone just to do something that really didn't require a phone isn't big on usability.

Bud.TV Coming To A Small Screen Near You

$30,000,000. I hope someone in Saint Louis is working on part of this.

Omnicom Group Inc. closed Tuesday on its acquisition of St. Louis based Rodgers Townsend Advertising, after approaching the local advertising agency in March. Read More.

A little quiz for yourself, or your clients to determine if they/you are up to speed on what’s up with today’s web:

1. What is the fastest growing web programming technology?
2. What does AJAX stand for? Bonus – what company is credited for coining the phrase?
3. What is a mashup?
4. Do you blog, or have you ever commented on a blog?
5. Provide three examples of online communities?
6. What site has the most traffic in the US?
7. What is a Podcast?
8. What is viral marketing.
9. What is the most popular site for watching videos?
10. What is the most popular site for sharing photos?

If you, your agency, or internal people don’t know more than half of these without Googling, you need help with your web presence. Email me, mail [at] jamesbielefeldt [dot] com.

Recursion and Illusion. This is weird, but I like it.

WhenWeRollWeRollBig

An outstanding article on the history of Wikipedia via Kottke.

I just read the essay by Edward R. Tufte, “The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint: Pitching Out Corrupts Within.”

As an example of why not to use PowerPoint for technical reporting and presentations, he details its use by NASA in the analysis of the causes of the space shuttle Columbia disaster. His conclusion, and that of others, is NASA’s use of PowerPoint with its presentation limitations to communicate the data on the takeoff damage, while the spacecraft was still safe in space, grossly affected how it was interpreted by NASA management and thus resulted in the deaths of the Columbia astronauts. Powerful stuff.

Other examples of PPT’s inadequacies include showing statistical data in table format displayed as PPT slides (they are completely incomprehensible), the Gettysburg Address as a PPT presentation (pretty funny) and several references to business presentations of various purposes.

Several factors contribute to the skewing of information when using PowerPoint: limited space for meaningful test, segmentation of the message with slides, bulleted lists, hierarchical display of text, and useless phluff. Mr. Tufte continues to make the case that PowerPoint has a high signal to noise ratio, an extremely low transfer of information rate, dilution of information, and absurd style sheets, templates and effects. I can’t agree more. I hate PPT presentations and don’t use them myself. He favors text documents with paragraphs, sentences, diagrams and space to completely tell the story. I agree and by distributing handouts for meetings, people have something tangible to take away.

Put some creativity and effectiveness in your next presentation. Don’t use PowerPoint. I recommend this booklet for anyone needing some good reasons not to use the ubiquitous and dubious software – ever.

When and Where
Monsanto on Friday, November 10, 2006 from 8:00a.m. - 5:00p.m. The conference is filling up fast. Only 100 participants allowed to register.

How Much
$30 before July 31st and $45 after August 1st. All proceeds from registration fees are used to fund conference logistics. The conference continues to be maintained by a "grassroots" organization -- all planning, coordination, presentations, etc. are done by user experience practitioners for user experience practitioners.

Keynote Speaker
Dirk Knemeyer. Dirk will be presenting "The Future of Digital Product Design."

Interactive Poster Session
New this year -- a poster that will be created by participants during the conference. We'll provide a space for you to share your favorite research, technique, and tool sites and we'll publish it after the conference for all attendees.

Click for Agenda

Registration
When you register for this year's conference, you'll be asked to complete a section with your personal information. You'll then be asked to pre-select the sessions you would like to attend. This allows UX06 to ensure that they have the proper facility arrangements for each presentation. Spaces will fill up fast, so register as early as possible to ensure you get to attend the sessions of your choice.

After you complete registration, you'll see a link to PayPal. A special thanks to Gateway CHI for kindly offering their PayPal account as a way for us to collect registration fees. Your registration payment is a separate step and can only be completed by using a PayPal account that is either linked to your bank account or by using your credit card to pay your registration fee.

All proceeds from registration fees are used to fund conference logistics, meals, etc. If you cancel your registration, your fee WILL NOT be refunded. Registration for STLUX06 is open now through November 1st. Register by July 31st to receive the Early Registration discount. For security reasons, no on-site registration will be allowed; if you want to attend, you must register by the November 1 deadline. Register using the link below: (a big thank you to Maritz for the very generous donation of their registration tool)

https://www.meetinghq.com/group/101005647?wslid=attendee

Questions?
Jennifer Ruffino
jennifer.ruffino@monsanto.com
314-694-4649

I’ve been a member of LinkedIn for over a year. Although the idea of an exclusive way to make business connections seems great, I have some reservations about the idea of exclusivity and accuracy. The concept of endorsing someone, a mini testimonial, is totally self-serving. How can that lend credibility to one’s self-described professional abilities?

The social fabric created in LinkedIn - the ability to see who is linked to whom and the degrees of separation - is interesting, but what real purpose does it have? I guess it allows one to use someone to gain access to someone else - a connection pimp. I haven’t really connected with anyone via an existing connection and I view this site and my participation as an experiment and don’t have any expectations. Only time will tell if this virtual network has validity.

If you are a member, contact (mail at jamesbielefeldt dot com) me, let’s get connected.

I’m working on several projects for a corporation to improve different processes centered on their web development efforts: better proposals, better cost estimating, better cost reporting, and standardization of workflows.

Each of these assignments is independent on one level, but also interrelated on another. Herein lies the rub. Every time I make progress, a meeting is required to communicate my findings – emails don’t get replied to; phone calls are out of the question; if it isn’t in Outlook it doesn’t exist. At every meeting a new caveat is introduced eradicating any realized progress.

Should Sue be involved? You need to double check that with Bill. That’s not how we do it. That won’t work. Isn’t that related to John’s initiative?

Maybe Sue should be involved but she is way too busy already. Bill didn’t reply to my emails and after three weeks I guess he doesn’t care. I know that’s not how you do it. Your way isn’t good. That’s why I’m suggesting a different approach. Let’s try it to see if it “won’t work”. Yes it is related to John’s initiative, but what’s the chance of accomplishing anything by getting more people involved?

All I hear is “We want change, but only if we don’t have to change or do anything”

Typical corporate grid lock. A small smart company tries things out, changes constantly, accepts failure, adjusts and moves on. There is a lesson here. By tackling issues one at a time, whether related or not, incremental change can happen and results realized much faster and painlessly than forming a committee, having umpteen meetings and waiting on everyone and their brother to weigh in. Assume the risk and go for it.

When I first got into web development I didn’t realize the difference between Interactive and IT disciplines. Perhaps it was naiveté, or perhaps they weren’t so well defined at that time. I thought building web sites was technical; anyway, it was the first time ad agencies employed programmers.

The Internet was born out of IT. So I guess hardcore ITers have a sense of ownership over it. But IT blew it. They could have kept the Internet for themselves and dominated the web market, but IT didn’t have what it takes to create web sites that effectively communicate and still doesn’t.

Along came Interactive born from ad agencies and communications firms. Interactive’s initial job was to convert traditional messages to the web, the new medium. Since that meager start, Interactive has grown into a full fledged discipline, pushing the web farther and faster than it ever would have gotten with IT alone.

My experience in an Interactive environment is much different than mine with an IT one. Interactive folks usually love the increased capability to do something cool technologically. Interactive designers are always fighting technology’s boundaries and good IT people help enlarge their sandbox. They like that, but they don’t like it when their work relies on an IT person to implement it and can’t execute it properly. In an Interactive environment, an IT person quickly learns about details. IT folks don’t seem to have any respect for Interactive. Graphics are not important when compared to functionality and a lowly script monkey can’t have a better approach than a “real” programmer that knows C++.

Interactive has grown up and there are very talented, intelligent programmers that do not have the IT mindset. The tools used in Interactive work have become powerful and complex. Interactive is encroaching on IT’s space, but IT hasn’t countered. They still can’t communicate well and can’t create good interfaces.

However, these two strange bed fellows need each other: art oriented Interactive and science based IT. A few companies have successfully merged the two, but that is a rare find. What strikes me as odd, today, at a time when the two disciplines are closer than ever before when it comes to level of skill; the two are no closer in how they are perceived in the corporate world. An example of this is how Human Resources Departments treat the two disciplines. A web developer from an Interactive shop does not compare well to a web developer from IT department of a large corporation even if they have the same skills. Job title and pay scales are often different. Another instance is many companies’ web departments are part of the marketing department. Why not the IT department? It seems IT is trying to keep Interactive people from crossing over into their world - competition I guess.

Good work is both technical and creative and a web site cannot succeed without either. It is information technology AND interactive. The sooner these two disciplines learn to play nicely the better off the industry is. After all, we’re all working for clients and share similar experiences.

A creative fellow, Transfatty, with a terminal disease trying to make a difference.

I’m for copyright protection as much as anyone, but it seems there are times when it goes too far. Three examples come to mind. The most recent is the litigation surrounding the term Web 2.0. The term was coined by a company for a conference, but has grown to represent more than that.

Two other, bigger, instances of copyright protection gone awry are Final Four, the NCAA basketball tournament, and Superbowl. Recently broadcast media and advertisers have had to awkwardly dance around these two terms. Copyright them if you like, but allow the use for reasonable purposes. They have grown to larger than life proportion and it doesn’t make sense to prohibit their use, since most uses benefit the authors. Copyright can still be enforced in case of malicious activity.

I have a peeve and need to rant.

I don't know how many times I've seen companies with a positioning statement that begins "The Art and Science of..."

Business is not art, or science. Business is business and most companies do "something" to make money and "something" is perceived as a necessary evil.

Another phrase beat to death is "Exceeding customer expectations".

No kidding. Who strives to disappoint?

Advice to corporate marketing gurus: Be specific. What makes your company unique? If you can't think of something, don't say anything.

Although the web is still an infant, it provides more possibilities and more potential than other any medium. With what other channel can you control when, what and how you are presented information? Interactivity, personalization & on-demand content are the web’s strengths.

Interactivity is a powerful attribute. Joseph Jaffe calls it the fourth dimension. I like that. TV is highly entertaining, but one call yell at the TV till hoarse and it doesn’t do any good. On the other end of the spectrum are video games are the ultimate interactive experience where one controls almost every aspect of their environment. However, a game doesn’t have a goal of communication.

Good web sites are somewhere in the middle and capitalize on interactivity by collecting information, and presenting content to users based on events, or preferences. Interactivity leads to personalization. This is how a site “remembers” one’s name, what happened on the last visit, or what content to display. Broadcast media cannot do this; it shotguns content at the world in hopes of its message is understood. Every time one watches a movie, it is the same sequence of events, but each time one visits a web site, the experience can be totally different - powerful stuff.

Another huge property of the web is on-demand content. Broadcast media air content on a schedule - the show starts at 8:00 o’clock. One the web, the show starts at the click of a button. Tivo has given us some control over TV and its popularity proves we live in an on-demand world.

When I plan a site, especially as part of a cross-media campaign, I try to think how the site can use these traits to effectively communicate. This in turn leads to how the message is formatted and delivered. The message needs to be “Webified.” If not properly conceived, too often a site ends up being an on-line TV commercial, or just a digital brochure. It does not gain strength from interactivity and fails to provide the positive experience to make it successful.

This site is unbelievable.

Archive.org - The Internet Archive is building a digital library of Internet sites and other cultural artifacts in digital form. Like a paper library, we provide free access to researchers, historians, scholars, and the general public.

They have a Live Music Archive with over 34,000 live shows by over 1900 artists. Awesome!

It seems data security is becoming a big part of the projects I work on. Identity theft has demanded increased security measures for the storage and transportation of personally identifiable information (PII). PII can include name, country, street address, e-mail address, credit card number, Social Security number, government ID number, IP address, or any unique identifier. The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AIPCA) and Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants (CICA) have created an extensive privacy framework that a lot of companies are adopting. The Payment Card Industry has also created a Data Security Standard based of requirements developed by VISA, MasterCard, American Express, Discover and JCB. These standards and requirements affect e-commerce, travel, authentication, human resources, medical, and other similar applications on web sites, intranets, extranets, other client server and legacy systems.

If your current, or next project collects and processes PII data, do yourself a favor and find out the requirements and necessary steps to meet them. Many of these requirements are fairly new and changing. Clients may not event know them, but if something happens and losses occur, as creator, or administrator of the application you could be liable.

I’ve owned and used both Macs and PCs. I love the Mac brand. The machines look great. The GUI is slick. Steve Jobs is cool. Their stock price is way up. Why do I still like PCs better? I have designer friends that will fight over dissing a Mac. I ask them, “Have you ever used a PC long enough to be comfortable with one?” “No”, they reply. Such loyalty. If it weren’t for font availability and compatibility, and this passionate loyalty, Macs would not exist today. Since the Intel PIII processor, PCs do graphics as just well. 

I'll admit Microsoft does make some really clunky GUIs for some of their software. Ever use PowerPoint, or for heaven's sake Visio?

Now everybody is excited that Macs can run Windows. Why is that such good news if the Mac OS is superior to Windows as Macs pundits tout? Could it be that deep down Macs lovers are tired of being the minority?

Can people finally have their cake and eat it too? Imagine a cool guy at Starbucks on his Mac laptop wearing his headphones. The stereotype is creative, iTunes loving, individualist. Further investigation reveals he is running Windows and listening to some right-wing podcast while doing his taxes. What is happening?

My prediction is the Macs OS will become another OS one can run on their Dell. Open Type fonts will take over. Steve Jobs has a coronary and people will be sitting around remembering the good old days when they lost four hours of beautiful design work because their Mac crashed again.

It’s tax time. I think I’ll buy a Mac laptop and a cappuccino, but only if I get one on sale.

Top 6 domains in terms of page-views in February 2006 according to Media Metrix were: 1) Yahoo, 2) MySpace, 3) MSN, 4) Ebay, 5) Google, and 6) Hotmail.

4 of the top 6 sites (MySpace, MSN, Ebay and Hotmail) run on IIS and Windows.

Linux and Apache may have market share, but enterprise, mission-critical sites rely on Microsoft

Source: Scott Guthrie

http://www.metacafe.com/

On Wednesday, March 22, 2006 I posted comments on the closing of Arnold Worldwide in St. Louis and the state of the ad market here.

In today's St. Louis Post-Dispatch newspaper there is an article about the changing industry. I wanted to bring the article up because it supports some of my observations.

It also has some vague information on Kupper Parker Communications morphing into a new entity. Too bad Kupper isn't as good at producing good ad work as he is at corporate shananigans.

I failed to mention in my post that two large ad firms are recent new comers, J. Walter Thompson and VSA Partners, but I'm not sure how much creative is actually produced here.

I'm new to blogging and just found this. Cool.

Technorati

Currently tracking 31.9 million sites and 2.2 billion links, Technorati is the authority on what's going on in the world of weblogs. Technorati is a real-time search engine that keeps track of what is going on in the blogosphere — the world of weblogs.

Is TOKY That Good?

Yes, TOKY is that good. The best graphic and branding shop in STL.

"TOKY took home 19 out of 79 professional awards in the 11th annual AIGA Awards, more than any other firm." - from TOKY.com

What is important to me is they are good at web - way better at web than most shops. TOKY has risen from the ashes of Influence, which at one time was the leading web shop in town, and has eclipsed its success.

How?

1. Eric Thoelke, the leader, and great designer in his own right has built a team by thinking bigger than St. Louis. Most of his talented resources are from out of town.
2. They measure their work on a global scale.
3. Every project is executed as it if were a dream job. They make them dream jobs.
4. Style with substance that meets qualitative and quantitative measure.

Kudos to Kuhlmann-Leavitt, Inc. for also creating kick-ass design, but I don't think they do web as well as print. Too bad.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

It has always perplexed me to look at what is possible to bring to the marketplace compared to what is accepted. So much work sucks and so much more is so bland it has no meaning. Is it the fault of the creator or the buyer, perhaps both. On one hand the creator, because more often than not the person paying for it doesn't know better. On the other, companies should have more savvy buyers. It's a complex issue for which I have no answer other than don't do work you are not 100% proud of and put 100% effort into.

A Call to Arms

Let's use the caliber of work produced by these 2 firms as inspiration to help us do better work. Be proactive and take the expert approach to get good creative out of the conference room and into the public domain. Teach your clients what is good and what should be.

St. Louis is loosing ground in the world of creative communications. Agencies are closing. Talent is leaving. Clients are going out of town for work. No one can stop this cycle except the people doing the work. Do your part to do your best.

The St. Louis Web Developers Organization has an annual awards show. I am please to announce that a site I created won second place for Best Non-Profit Site. The site is the Walter C. Richards Collection, an online gallery of photography from the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair. It is part of the Webster Groves Historical Society's site and also included in the Missouri State Libraries Digitized Collections database and ViruallyMissouri.org. Thanks for the recognition.

I looked at the other winners and I have to say the work this year was very average. This organization has lost traction in the community the last couple of years and the best work was not entered - what a shame. It's nice to have strong industry communities. Perhaps it will come around.

I had been involved with a similar group, the Not Just An Art Director's Club. It was difficult to get people to help run it and it fell by the wayside. Small organizations are hard to sustain. It's always a few core people that keep them going and they get burned out.

Arnold Wordwide announced it is closing its St. Louis office this year -- another nail in the advertising coffin for St. Louis. When I first began in the industry in 1987 we had several large agencies that produced work here for large clients: BHN, TBWA, DMB&B. Luckily, we still have two players in sales promotion, Zipatoni and Momentum, that are owned by big corporations and have national accounts, but that’s about it. Oh, and Fleishman Hilliard, but that’s not advertising.

Why has St. Louis continued to decline as an advertising hub for the Midwest?

Globalization? It allows companies to work wherever they want.

Chicago? It is a CITY with talent and resources for which St. Louis cannot compete.

Specialization? The typical agency has evolved into small agile firms that provide a narrow range or services and have relationships with only a few clients. The best work comes from these companies founded by big agencies refugees.

Few Good Clients? St. Louis has lost a few big clients. SBC moved to Texas, but still brings enough work to support Rogers Townsend agency (old DMB&B people). PET moved. No retail type of business here, except AB, or at least no one with sizable budgets and good taste. St. Louis is an industrial town with transportation and manufacturing at its core. The old money has tight purses and does not use innovative advertising.

No Talent? Inability to keep talented creative resources and the ability to attract them leaves St. Louis a bit dry. Who is to blame for that?

It’s a shame. We DO have a lot to offer. I know a lot of talented people, but they are not producing work up to their ability. If only there was an answer.

So come on clients. Get your head out of the sand. Listen to the ideas presented to you daily and don’t make your next brochure like the last one. Don’t make your web site so your wife likes it. Do something interesting. Remember, you don’t have to understand and like It for It to be effective. Help the St. Louis advertising community pull its foot from the grave.

Props to the people actually getting good work out the door: TOKY, Oliver Kuhlman, the little boutiques and the younger talent.

Blogs, blogs, blogs everywhere. So on the bandwagon I jump. Jim Coudal, of Coudal Partners convinced me; not personally, but with his site and commentary.

I have been writing a bit lately, so this will be my testing grounds. I plan on publishing professional ideas and information on web development and project management, my areas of expertise, and sharing good stuff I find around the web.