Category : Internet

20 Things…

Have you ever wished that someone would just write a book about the internet? A book that would answer questions such as, “What is the Internet,” for instance?

If, hypothetically, such a book were to be released, who would write it? A well-informed corporatio, certainly; a power player in the Internet world, definitely; a company that everyone knew enough about to trust, for sure.

Who better than Google?

The Google Chrome Team has put together a book all about the internet. The simple, easy-to-read book that thousands of internet-users across the nation have been holding their breath to read has finally arrived. Not only that, but it features the illustrations of the award-winning German illustrator and children’s author, Christoph Niemann.

Still not convinced? Well, one more thing… it’s free.

20 Things I Learned About Browsers and the Web, describes itself as “a short guide for anyone who’s curious about the basics of browsers and the web.” It discusses topics as basic as ‘the internet in general’, all the way to things such as ‘protecting yourself from malware and HTML5.’

The combination of Neimann’s illustrations and the Google Chrome Team’s knowledge has led to a clever and informative booklet, full of information that everyone browsing the internet ought to know.

Unfortunately, like everything else, 20 Things has some problems. Although the pictures add to the fun of the book, it does have a total of 62 pages. It doesn’t seem like much, but to our attention deficit society, that might prove to be a drip too long. However, this is an e-book (of course) so if you leave and come back, it will ask you if you’d like to resume reading where you left off! That should help people get through the full content.

So take a moment and head over to http://www.20thingsilearned.com/ and look through the book! If you don’t have time to read it, at least take the time to enjoy Neimann’s colorful drawings.

Read the full article…

Website Fonts Get a Push in the Right Direction

Thanks to the efforts of type designers, web developers and browser companies’ web sites now can use high-quality typography to enhance their company brands and make pages even more readable for users. This is great news for the industry—and for customers of Smart Solutions.  Here’s why:

For years, web developers have wanted to use a broader selection of fonts similar to what’s available for print, but many issues blocked their path. One was the fact that commercial font licenses were only for desktop computer use; others were rendering inconsistencies across multiple browsers and huge increases in page size and loading times.

Beyond these technical issues, the idea faced similar piracy controversy that hit the music recording industry, which is how to protect intellectual property over the web—be it music or a unique type font.

Now Larger Palette of Fonts to Choose From

By using CSS embedding techniques, Smart Solutions can bring this industry breakthrough to our clients by:

• Making Adobe Photoshop fonts available for use (see options)
• Ensuring that usage is done legally
• Testing and verifying new font displays well in 90% of all browsers (IE, FireFox, Safari, Crome and Opera)

We can also work with clients who acquire a non-Adobe Photoshop font and wish to use it by converting format using the TypeKit service.

Design Considerations: The emergence of more type expression can bring some challenges especially for web designers. Smart Solutions can work with your team to choose the right type face that:

• Complements your web design
• Conveys and embodies the message you want to communicate
• And offers contrast that’s aesthetically pleasing to the eye

On the Horizon: Smart Solutions expects more progress in the typography area. W3C is actively leading discussions on a new Open Web Font Format (WOFF), which encourages even greater backing and support from browser companies and font vendors.

The Facebook Rise and MySpace Demise

Facebook… over 550 million users; over 70 different translations; a movie was born out of its existence; a Dummies Handbook has been written for it; and one out of every dozen people on the planet have a Facebook account.

We don’t need to tell you what Facebook is; everyone has at least heard of it, and as you can tell above, a large portion of the population are frequent users. Alexa ranks Facebook as the number two top site on the web, second only to Google.

But do you remember a time before Facebook? Before this blue site infiltrated every aspect of our lives? There was something else, think hard and you might remember… MySpace.

In this blog post, we’d like to compare and contrast the workings of Facebook and MySpace. Why such a quick growth? Why such a quick fall? And why does my computer recognize “Facebook” as a word, and not “MySpace”?

Things to think about…

• MySpace was launched in January of 2004, by Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson, ages 37 and 33.
• Facebook was launched in February of 2004, by Mark Zuckerberg and three friends, none of them over the age of 23.

• MySpace began with two men who had worked in internet marketing and social media all their lives.
• Facebook began with four guys in a dorm room.

• MySpace founders launched it as a social networking site, and always planned for it to go global. It started out locally though, in Southern California, with local musicians and actors. It reached one million members in a month, near the time that Facebook was first launched.
• Facebook’s founders originally intended it to be a Harvard community website, but by March it had expanded to include Stanford, Columbia and Yale University. It reached one million uisers by December of 2004, ten months after it’s launch.

• It took MySpace a little over three years to reach 150 million members.
• It took Facebook a little less than five years to reach 150 million members.

At this point in the story, it looks like MySpace is coming out ahead. It certainly got moving faster, led by two men who were internet savvy, but Facebook was the tortoise… “Slow and steady wins the race.”

We know for a fact that Facebook is more popular now, but MySpace definitely had the lead in the beginning. So what contributed to its downfall? An article in the New York Times referenced the site’s basic framework as ‘just unattractive’. Because it was bought out by a big company, the ads and overall look of the site became unappealing. Facebook, on the other hand, features advertisements that are relevant to each individual user, based on keywords used most often by each person, as well as thei claimed interests and hobbies.

Another problem is that MySpace focused on the money, while Facebook has been more attentive toward growth. DeWolfe talks about his focus, saying “The paradox in business, especially at a public company, is, when do you focus on growth, and when do you focus on money? We focused on money and Facebook focused on growing the user base and user experience.” It’s working out better for Facebook, we think.

Speeding up to the present, what has happened lately on both fronts?

• Near the end of 2010, MySpace changed their logo to “My___,” promoting their site as a way to now  “Connect with entertainment,” rather than a social network in competition with Facebook.
• Near the end of 2010, Mark Zuckerberg was named the Times’ 2010 Person of the Year, for “connecting more than half a billion people and mapping the social relations among them…”

• Mid January 2011, MySpace announced that they would be laying off 47% of their global workforce, impacting “about 500 employees.”
• Mid January 2011, Facebook paid the American Farm Bureau $8.5 million for the domain name FB.com, which simply redirects to facebook.com.

The kicker is this: you can now log on to MySpace through your Facebook account. If that isn’t the ultimate surrender on MySpace’s part, we’re not sure what is.

But what happens now? Is Facebook going to suffer the same death as MySpace? Will Mark Zuckerberg sell out to some big corporation? Only time will tell if Facebook will follow in the footsteps of MySpace and become just another “social networking site of the past,” making way for some other up-and-coming site to follow in its path.