With a concept shamelessly copied from a piece on the radio today, here are the rules:
So, here it goes.
If you want to play the game as well, leave a comment.
So, I have spoken before about QR codes, and their place in the world currently; but I do use them myself — mainly as a curiosity as to where they lead (IMO each QR code should have a URL attached, but that topic is for another day).
“Every agency wants a happy client.
There are two ways to do this.
One: do the best job possible.
Two: do what the client wants.
They are the short-term view, and the long-term view.
In the short term the client will be happy if you do what he wants.
If it doesn’t work, he won’t be happy.
The alternative is you insist on doing what you believe to be right.
In the short term the client may be unhappy.
But if it works, he’ll be happy.”
A quote by Dave Trott in the book Creative Mischief. It’s a fantastic book; it reminds me of the books Paul Arden wrote.
I have always found it hard to read a lot of content online. There are numerous reasons for this: poor layout design, bad typography and a lack on concentration on my behalf.
It is clear that this is a problem not unique to me. There have been many attempts made to make the experience a better one. From Safari’s built in Reader mode to Readability, designed to ‘zap online clutter and save web articles in a comfortable reading view’.
The purpose of these systems is to remove the other distractions of adverts, additional links or related stories. At a much deeper level, Information Architects understood this whilst building their iA Writer they created what they called Focus Mode:
Thought goes into writing, not using: Focus mode allows you to think, spell and write one sentence at a time. This lowers the temptation to cross edit and keeps you in the flow.
I like the idea of keeping people ‘in the flow’ and so created a very quick mockup of a ‘focus mode’ for reading posts, not just writing them.
https://paulrandall.com/experimental/focus-mode/
This could be made into a JS snippet, or as an idea for someone to use on their own site.
Because the script uses :hover this wouldn’t currently work on a phone, but I’m open to suggestions.
Recently, a lot of clients have felt that they need to be on Twitter, and so have signed up, tweeted a bit and followed a few people. The question that seems to follow is: “Whats next?”
There seems to be the feeling that, especially at the start, without many followers you are talking to no one, and have no one listening. In discussing this, I hope some of these points help you get the most out of Twitter.
You’ve probably heard that content is king. Well it’s true. Good content will always find readers. So spend time to generate great content. Now Twitter can be tricky to get your point across in just 140 characters, so if you don’t already have one, setting up a blog should be the next thing to do. It allows you to go into a bit more detail and elaborate on your points.
Then, by tweeting out the link, your followers may want to retweet (publish your tweet to their followers) or promote it themselves.
Now, generating posts like that takes time, so not every tweet will like that, so follow your peers, and follow industry leaders and link to their posts.
You may be initially sceptical about this, but becoming a curator, and reposting other peoples good content makes you a valuable person to follow. If you constantly talk and link to interesting stuff, people will want to listen.
One of the fantastic things about Twitter is its instant, real-time feedback so if people are asking questions, or looking for an opinion on something, converse with them. Firstly, they’ll notice who you are (if they don’t currently follow you) and if your opinion is a good one, you’ll be known as someone with a decent opinion.
This book seems to have gained more column inches for a type book than any other I can recall in recent times; probably because it can appeal to people who are just casually interested in type.
Part history book, part modern day news stories, the editing makes the book feel awkward; like a cobbled-together school project made up of historic articles and personal opinions by the Author, Simon Garfield. Continue reading
I’ve been looking back on the amount of online content I read recently and I think I am probably like many who over-consume on a regular basis.
Technology today means we can gorge on content from the moment we wake up until we go to sleep, constantly throughout the day without hesitation; But how much of it can we actually take in? Does it reach a saturation point where we keep consuming even though our minds are full?
These square images are being used more recently in the last few years as a tool for interacting between two different media. In a study conducted recently the most interacted placements of QR codes were on magazines, packaging, websites and posters.
So, I saw an article recently that posted a screenshot of what Twitter (or Twttr as it used to be known) used to look like.
Continue reading
I recently bought 79 Short Essays on Design (which is awesome by the way). One of the articles that really talked to me was this one called The Mysterious Power of Context.
“We decided to recommend a straightforward sans serif font. Predictably, this recommendation was greeted by complaints. It was too generic, too mechanical, too unstylish, too unrefined. I had trouble responding until I added two more elements to the presentation.”