Website Design Classics - Feedburner
A lot of the so called Web 2.0 is hype. We hear stories everyday about the next web company that is going to be big. It inevitably offers a business aimed at a tiny niche and will most likely fold within a year. Techcrunch have based a business on charting the rise and falls of this movement. Read More
Posted 17.10.07Website Design Classics - Google
If I ask a bunch of students what is their favourite website in terms of design, Google always come out as number one. Why is that?
In the same way that Coke is not the best drink in the World, people often choose it when their are asked “What would you like to drink”. The key to why people choose them is familiarity, consistency and simplicity. Read More
Posted 16.10.07Website Design Classics - New York Times
Arguably the most important Newspaper in the World, the New York Times has the highest readership of any online broadsheet. In a world of new media and social news, the New York Times shows why in some ways the old ways are the best while at the same time embracing the good parts of web 2.0. Read More
Posted 15.10.07Irish Insurance Companies Uncompetitive - Go to Your Broker
I saw this story on the Irish Insurance industry on the RTE and I laughed “Insurance companies cutting premiums“. Read More
Posted 13.10.07Apple Website Design through the Years
Apple are well known for their high quality and innovative design. In this article I look through the iterations of the online store throughout the years. This article was inspired by Apple related discussions on Brainfuel and Veerle’s Blog Read More
Posted 12.10.07New Vodafone Website Design Review
Now that Vodafone have relaunched their Irish website I thought I’d give my 2 cents on the matter.
First of all it’s a definite improvement. I like the use of colour, they use a lot of colour but it’s not over the top. It definitely makes them stand out from their competitors. However it is not there yet. The primary visual real estate is taken up by an ad for a Motorola phone. It is far too big and likely to be irrelevant to 95% of customers. The users of the site, those with MyVodafone accounts have been demoted further down the page but at least they are still above the fold. Read More
Posted 11.10.07Cheating in Professional Sport
This follows on from yesterdays post. I don’t want to appear like I have a vendetta against Rugby so in the interest of fairness I want to be as wide-ranging in my questioning. After a lot of research the top level of every sport is corrupt it seems. Please voice your opinions if you agree or disagree.
American Football How many 6′0 tall 280lb men have you seen in your life that weren’t obese. Not only that but these guys can run like sprinters and take hit after hit after hit. How does anyone not take drugs in the NFL? It’s a freakshow, how come the american public don’t pick up on this? A 4 game ban for Growth Hormone - Where is the deterrent?
A picture of Ben Johnson from Seoul 1988. Compare him to your average US Football Player/Rugby Player
Soccer How can we expect players to be clean given the huge stakes involved. C league professionals in the UK make as much money as top professionals in athletics or cycling. We’ve had Chelsea involved in Blood Spinning to cure injuries. While Arsene Wenger has stated that he’s had players not tested over a 6 period
Horse Racing WAKE UP! If there is one sport that has a hidden problem it is here. If people inject crap into themselves, they won’t have trouble doing it to an animal. There is so much money at stake. This is an industry. A top stallion can be worth up to $100m in stud fees. Horse Racing has a major drugs problem
Baseball A noted problem with steroids as seen in the Balco scandal. Long associated with match fixing and now the ethical practice of Tommy John surgery where players have seemingly superhuman elbows after surgery
Golf They don’t test because it is assumed to be a gentleman’s sport. Golfers have elective laser eye surgery for better than 20/20 vision, they take beta blockers to get rid of involuntary movements. When people cheat for a pittence in other sport, how do they not cheat when the rewards are hundreds of thousands per game?
Cycling Obvious problems with a definite drug culture in certain European countries. At least they test regularly. I find it amazing that people become disillusioned with cycling because they are trying to find the cheats. Wake up - it’s in every sport, don’t punish the ones who test
Athletics Long having such a problem mainly from Eastern European countries and recent years in the US. Why do american sprinters obliterate their opposition from the UK. It’s not a genetic advantage, it’s not a coaching advantage, yet they earn nearly all the money that is available on the circuit. To quote Tyree Washington “The question is - if the cheaters out there continue to raise the bar so high, then what money will be left for the clean athletes to make?”
Update There is a good discussion going on at the Guardian website on Steve Cram’s column on a similar topic
Posted 10.10.07Irish Sports Council Priorities Messed Up
In this post I’m going to analyse the Irish Sport’s Council’s 2006 Anti-Doping report. I’m doing this as it seems no else has bothered to do so Read More
Posted 09.10.07Number 1 Productivity Tip.
Don’t subscribe to Lifehacker and if you have it, unsubscribe!
I like being a productive guy but if there is one thing I don’t like, it’s information overload. Lifehacker is supposed to be about tips that save you time, well they don’t. They post about 40 messages a day so if you subscribe to the RSS link you are swamped, and if you actually go to the site well then you are certainly not the target audience.
What annoys me most is that they don’t do the majority of the content themselves. They give a summary and link to another article, so you have to read the same thing twice. Another annoying trait is that they recap what they did on this day last year - who cares?
Now part of my anger is because I actually tried out their most interesting tip of the year, that you can get 32AA batteries from a single 6V block. I saw it about 3 months ago and figured I had to have a go. Well not only does it not work but I cut my finger doing it! I did it not because I was cheap but batteries are a mystery to me and it looked interesting.
So following my accident and the discovery that there were 4 weird tubes inside instead and no AA’s I revisited their site. I looked back at it and lo and below they finally put in the editors note that it does not work. 3 mins reading a tip, one wasted 6v and a cut thumb are all I’ve got out of Lifehacker so far. To have any authority they should at least test it themselves. It’s dangerous too as one those 4 batteries inside managed to overheat badly in my kitchen. If I hadn’t be more careful I could have burned my house down.
Lifehacker is not an expert and this is the problem with the Internet. If you talk enough about something, people assume you are the expert. The great coach, Vern Gambetta talked about this last week in his blog. It is hard to differentiate yourself by quality online and this is something that needs to change. A loud fool will have more impact on their field of work than a true expert in the current climate.
To conclude I will use a proper source on the matter of productivity. The rules of MIS here apply to the Internet also. “Information overload has the effect of negating any effective use of such an MIS”. (Kostetsky, 1966) Like lifehacker, like my shorted battery - Overload is always a bad thing.
Posted 08.10.07The Day of the Underdog
Last Saturday at the Rugby World Cup will long be remembered as the day that people reassessed the importance of “Form” for International Rugby games. Who needs to have form or even confidence, if you can just go out and get the job done. Read More
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