Entries for category 'Trends'

Yes.  Really.  And it’s called Google+.

By now you’ve probably seen the news headlines, heard the rumors or even noticed the ominous black line across the top of your Google homepage. What does it mean? The folks at Google are planning something big, and we can’t wait to check it out ourselves. 

When I first heard about Google+ and the possibility of it becoming Facebook’s “competitor” I didn’t believe it.  However, after researching a bit and taking the interactive tour online, I think they’re really onto something.  Yes, it’s another social networking tool.  Yes, it’s kind of like Facebook, but it’s different in a way that makes social networking much more personal. 

With the recent announcement of Internet Explorer 9, the discussion of which browser is the best seemed approprioate.  For many people out there, Internet Explorer is the browser of choice if not simply because it came with their installation of Windows, and it's what they are familiar or comfortable with.  Though many people have been flocking to the many other browsers out there.  There are plenty of reasons for that too.  Hopefully we can cover a few of those reasons here.

We all hear the words “social media” every day; this is just one of the new buzz words. The overall number of businesses using social media to market their business grows rapidly each day. The goal for most of these businesses is trying to build relationships with their customers.

Common Factors of Social Media Success

Question: Don't you think its tough to measure social media?

After spending a little more time with the mobile web, there's a bit more to be said about issues surrounding designing websites for the mobile browser.  Differences in phone technology as well as new software technologies in development are changing the field of mobile web design.  This post takes a look at some of those phone issues and new developments.

A few months ago, I developed a ColdFusion/Mach-II implementation of the reCAPTCHA API.  This type of CAPTCHA requires the person to enter two words rather than a single sequence of random letters.  In addition to protecting your website from spam, reCAPTCHA helps digitize text books.  They do this by using a mystery word as one of the two words, until there is a consensus about what the correct answer for that word is.

With the rise of the iPhone, Google Android, Palm, Blackberry and several other touch screen phones out there that are not only web enabled, but offer a browsing experience similar to the one we are familiar with on desktop computers, the need for mobile friendly websites is becoming greater. I've had several web enabled phones, but the most recent one I purchased has given me a much more fluid and intuitive web experience. It's shown me, though, that most websites aren't coded with mobile phones in mind.

We’re not going to focus on the design or the layout of a website, although we may mention some basic elements that will relate to the design, but more importantly, we’re focusing on how the website is structured so it can be successful.

There’s no question on arguing how a website can help you obtain a successful online presence and that it’s the most effective marketing strategy one can have as a designer or a company. A successful website should already have basic information where a site visitor can learn, identify and quickly understand how you can help. Essentially, a website provides a solution to a problem.

CNN Money is reporting that Microsoft and Yahoo have reached an agreement to integrate search technologies and share revenue in their ongoing battle for search supremacy. Both companies trail Google, who currently enjoys a 65% market share. Even though Microsoft attempted to purchase Yahoo last year, this is a somewhat surprising development in the world of search advertising.

Read on past the break for more details about this new deal!

Not content with Chrome browser for desktop platforms and the Android OS on mobile devices, Google is planning to release Chrome OS later this year. Beyond that, it has plans to partner with hardware manufacturers to include the new OS as a standard install on netbooks.

According to the news posting on their blog, "Google Chrome OS is an open source, lightweight operating system that will initially be targeted at netbooks. Later this year we will open-source its code, and netbooks running Google Chrome OS will be available for consumers in the second half of 2010. Because we're already talking to partners about the project, and we'll soon be working with the open source community, we wanted to share our vision now so everyone understands what we are trying to achieve."

Read Google's blog here, or read some additional thoughts about Google's Chrome OS after the break.