Various winter memories

There are several memories that I have that I associate with winter;

1) I remember the first time I saw snow when I was 7 or 8 and lived in Pensacola, Florida. My dad and I made a snowman outside and it melted the very next day.

2) I remember driving up to Kyoto with my mom and sister during the winter months. It snowed so hard that we had to have chains on the tires and driving took forever, but it was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen – so much snow on all of the mountains.

3) When I lived in Indiana, I worked at the student newspaper and lived off campus – we had a breaking news story (the weather) and I drove through a blizzard to get to the newspaper. I left later that evening and there was about a foot of snow. The plow trucks had come through and I couldn't find a parking space and had to go several blocks to a fast food restaurant and walk back home. My boyfriend's dog had so much fun in that snow, though, leaping through the snow drifts.

Fuji: a natural beauty

Saturday Morning Live – Mt. Fuji

It's hard to pick from, but probably the top of Mt. Fuji. It was such a ridiculously hard ascent and the descent was even worse (for us); this made the setting more memorable.

Baz Luhrmann – Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)

Wow … this was from my graduation year.
Found via Facebook / Alan Smith

Yummy! Lucy Kinsley’s Comic Chai DIY

Chai is one of my favorite drinks (3rd place to morning ritual of gargantuan cup of coffee + 2 shots and the evening Tazo Passion Tea) and ALWAYS makes me feel better about the world.

Often it’s more of a comfort than warm milk and a hot bath at night. Yes. I love Chai.

So finding this comic on how to make it at home made my day. I’m anxious to get away from the rainy day, snuggle in jammies and make it!

Closing one door to open another

You might have seen hints that I said goodbye to my friends and colleagues at The Tennessean yesterday, and today I’ll expound on my new role and responsibilities.

Two weeks ago, I accepted a position with South Central Media and since then have been quietly preparing myself and the news organization for the transition. My new position at SCM will be as a project manager. It will be similar to what I did several months ago in the Online Development (OD) dept. of The Tennessean. This opportunity will allow me to explore a structured development process, actively participate in building new Web sites from inception to completion, and interact with a different type of media.

I’m extremely excited about the position and ready to get started with another great group of developers and designers.

The Tennessean Brief History:

I’ve thought about some of the changes that has happened since I joined The Tennessean. If you don’t mind taking a brief trip, join me while I walk down memory lane.

Almost two years ago, I joined The Tennessean as an intern in the print design dept. I was fresh out of college and had gone through a six-week fellowship at Poynter. I moved into online as a digital designer and was involved, in some way, in literally every Web project that came through our doors.

I had opportunities to do with so much, from working with a team from Gannett Digital implementing IDEO training to building Web sites such as NashvilleWeddings.com from the ground up.

When the Online department dissolved, as a result of layoffs, I moved back into the newsroom and took on the position as Social Media Coordinator/Director. In that new position, I took all of the technical skills I learned and combined them with my love for connecting with people in new ways.

I’ve had the opportunity to work with some of the most creative, talented and intelligent people who have transformed my life. I’d like to introduce you to some of them: Fred Menko, Patrick Rains, Angi Woosley, Knight Stivender, Jim Porter, Michael McCann, Pavel Bukengolts, Elmer Mobley , Scott Andrews, Colby Sledge, Jamie Sarrio, Kate Howard, David Yunker, Chris Rapking, Karen-Lee Ryan, Mark Wood, Arienne Holland, Jeff Glick, Katie Horrell (and The Nashville Lifestyles team), Karen Kraft, Andrew Oppman (and the DNJ team), Michael and Heather Cass, Amanda Gargus, Nancy Hagan, Dena McDonald, Bob Faircy, Heidi Hall, Daniel Whited, Elaine Turner, Broc Borntrager, Kyle Bellino, The Jennifers, the incredible Photo team … I know I’m forgetting so many people, but everyone has influenced me in some way. Also … it’s starting to get a little “Thank you at The Oscars.”

This says it all: “Thank you to everyone at The Tennessean for all of the memories, well-wishes
and opportunities. Now here’s a song: http://blip.fm/~4wvl7″

Huffington Post: To Newspaper Moguls: You Blew It

Excerpt:

“Your Google snits don’t even address your far more profound problem: the vast majority of your potential audience who never come to your sites, the young people who will never read your newspapers. You all remember the quote from a college student in The New York Times a year ago, the one that has kept you up at night. Let’s say it together: “If the news is that important, it will find me.” What are you doing to take your news to her? You still expect her to come to you – to your website or to the newsstand – just because of the magnetic pull of your old brand. But she won’t, and you know it. You lost an entire generation. You lost the future of news.”

In my job, the understanding is that I assume people don’t visit our site. I go where people are and try to communicate relevant information in a variety of ways: minor podcasts, twittering, updating facebook, connecting and socializing.

What most people still fail to understand: one person in an entire news organization can not meet everyone on their platform. Every person in the news industry is responsible for maintaining, updating and broadcasting information.

READ MORE: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-jarvis/to-newspaper-moguls-you-b_b_184309.html

Usability Checkpoints

Exerpted from Smashing Magazine:

8 Usability Check-Points You Should Be Aware Of

1. You don’t use pop-ups.
Pop-ups interrupt the browsing session of the visitors and require an instant feedback. Respect your visitors.
2. You don’t change users’ window size.
The same argument as the one against pop-ups holds. Some browsers, e.g. Internet Explorer, saves the browser dimensions and uses them for further browser sessions. As Ben Bodien commented, “it’s just plain inconsiderate to assume that you know better than the user how their software environment should be configured?”
3. You don’t use too small font sizes.
Long passages are harder to read, and to read brief sentences readers need more time. It holds also for links, buttons, forms, search boxes and other elements. Good news — in Web 2.0 the opposite is the case.
4. You don’t have unclear link text.
Links have to be precise and lead to the destination they describe. Ambiguous link descriptions should be avoided.
5. You don’t have dead links.
There are too many of them anyway; why would you want to point your visitors to a dead end?
6. You have at most one animation per page.
If blinking images are wide-spread through the site, it’s extremely hard to focus on one single site element. Give your visitors an opportunity to perceive your content. Using animated ads, don’t place them right along your articles.
7. You make it easy to contact you.
Maybe because you just don’t want to be contacted, but If visitors do want to get in touch with you, but can’t find any contact information, you lose their interest and trust. Disastrous for online-shopping, a missed opportunity for the rest.
8. Your links open in the same window.
Visitors want to have control over everything what happens in their browser. If they’d like to open a link in a new window they will. If they don’t want to, they won’t. If your links open in a new window you make the decision which is not your decision to make.

Web Technology Trends for 2008 and Beyond

Web Technology Trends for 2008 and Beyond, March 08

View more presentations from Richard Macmanus.

A look to the future (Web 3.0), by looking at the past

I found a comparison of Web 1.0, Web 2.0 and Web 3.0, via my Twine newsletter (Twine, incidentally, has improved tremendously since July of ‘08). While newspapers (and news organizations) play ‘catch-up’ on the web, someone needs to prepare for the future: for Web 3.0.

I’m not going to pretend that I’m an expert on Web 3.0, or a futurist, but I can tell when something feels like it’s about to implode. A quick scan of the interwebz provides me with a pretty clear indication of what is building up and about to happen in the digital world.

The new rallying cry of Web 3.0 is that anyone can innovate, anywhere. Code is written, collaborated on, debugged, tested, deployed, and run in the cloud. When innovation is untethered from the time and capital constraints of infrastructure, it can truly flourish.

Everything I read, iterates how critical data sets are going to be: And of that, how it’ll be used to tell a story or provide context to stories. The use of ‘linked data‘ at the most basic level, is linking stories to outside stories and sources.

One things for news organizations that are holding back content? Look at the bottom of the table. If you’re going to prepare for Web 3.0 … open up the archives and allow equal and open access to content.

“Return of the JEDI (FORCE emerges and facilitates decentralization from “Identity” all the way to “Open Data Access” and “Negotiable Descriptive Data Representation”)”

Help educate me, correct me where I’m wrong or add on to the points that are right.

Print out Mockups

The physical comp, originally uploaded by juhansonin.

This truly offers a different perspective and visual experience than when looking at it on a screen for by a letter size sheet of paper.

As in drawing, sometimes you have to get away from the micro and look at the macro, squint really hard … to make sure that the composition really works.

In the future, I’ll probably print out massive iterations of a Web design to look at the over all page structure, rather than relying purely on monitors and 8.5×11 screen shots.