Easy breezy recipes
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 03/28 at 09:19 AM |
A big issue I have with trying new recipes is that I find a lot of delicious looking recipes online. Because I have to print these out, I usually end up with a stack of a zillion pages which I rarely, if ever, use... and this is shoved somewhere just to collect dust.
Pandigital's making cooking fun again with an HDTV, cookbook, photo frame that's perfect for use in the kitchen.
It's a little pricey ($399.99) but I think it might be good enough for the birthday/christmas list. :)
Into the New... er, Blu
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 02/21 at 01:47 PM |
I've been waiting for the Blu-ray v. High-Definition DVD war to settle down so I can finally use some holiday gift cards. Why am I waiting? Mainly because I wanted to avoid having any more DVDs that would sooner (rather than later) become obsolete... I'm also just not the type to run out to get the latest and greatest and would have been especially ticked if Blu-ray had ended up losing the battle!
But things are slowing down on who will prevail as Toshiba becomes the latest supporter of Blu-ray (joining Wal-Mart, Netflix, Warner Brothers, and a number of others) to abandon HD technology.
While technology is always changing, it's still a little, well, frustrating, to me as a consumer. Not only does it mean that my husband will be "forced" to buy yet another DVD player, but it also means new DVDs, a number of gadgets, probably a PS3, and so on as HD begins its path towards extinction.
And if you're a Blu-ray supporter, don't think you're better off than those who may have been more hesitant as even current Blu-ray users will need to upgrade their players or have an obsolete product next year... You'd think I might be accustomed to constant changes in technology working in the web industry but I'm still wondering if our gift cards can wait for the dust to settle just a bit more! I guess I should keep in mind what I'm always explaining to clients when they ask why their new web site is not compatible with older browsers and vice versa! C'est technologie...
Vroom, Vroom... Increasing Traffic Online
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 02/06 at 03:46 PM |
In the spirit of my post-Super Bowl glow (yay Colts!), I came across this blog about Toyota Tundra’s commercials’ “actual demonstration” disclaimer.
Now, I usually don’t pay too much attention to the ads unless they’re pretty funny but I did in fact see one and thought something along the lines of “Actual demonstration? That’s weird they’d put that there since that would take a lot of work.”
Turns out I was wrong as well. More interesting to me now is that the end of the video had no compelling call to action to go to toyota.com to see the behind-the-scenes video.
Well, I went to the site today and the video -- although shorter than I expected -- is surprisingly interesting. Even though it's a great idea, I just can't help but feel that if you were going to spend money on an ad during the pricey Super Bowl timeslots, then there should have been a call to action to push viewers to go online for the video. By using a cross-media reference, the web site's traffic would have increased as well as audience exposure (to more than just the one truck) without costing any more.
Though I’m now promoting the video myself, I would be curious to see the ad campaign results in relation to the behind-the-scenes page views and compare the ad's success vs. how many people will “happen across” this page. It’s not likely I’ll find out, but I’m still curious.
One HUNDRED MILLion Web Sites (ah-ha)
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 11/06 at 11:15 AM |
Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox email came in and the “100 Million Websites” title caught my attention (as well as started me quoting Austin Powers / Dr. Evil lines in my head). Those who use the web always talk about the internet in terms of “large” and “vast” and that weird cloud image but probably never really think about what those words really mean when it comes to numbers. The article quotes "even if only half the sites are maintained, there are still more than 100 M sites that people pay to keep running” --- that’s a lot of information out there… 101,435,253 million and growing to be exact.
Nielsen, one of the founders and advocates of web page usability (read his bio), further goes into a little bit of the history of web sites, the growth stages, web usability changes, and future predictions. Ultimately it’s just a teaser for an upcoming seminar on web usability but I thought this information was interesting in showing how many people currently use the internet and not just for searching.
So… 200 million by 2010? I agree with Nielsen, I think we’ll surpass that as more and more companies recognize the benefits of having a presence online (not to mention the personal sites, blogs, etc.).
Shooting for… Reality
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 04/14 at 10:46 AM |
Almost everyone looking for a new Web site wants it to be the latest and greatest, to be better than the competition. But more often than not, the wow factor is not practical and you have to bring them back to reality gently in order to achieve a successful online presence while remaining practical.
MSN has a great example of a wow factor that is not realistic for this type of media: high-definition videos online.
Things like bandwidth and filesize are constant concerns for those involved with online media. In this case, high definition filesizes almost triple the standard filesize – resulting in enormous delays during download, a much slower internet speed, and poor quality of video… It would be hard to find a practical reason for using that level of clarity online for most Web sites out there.
One part of the article that stuck out in my mind was a comment by Josh Martin, an analyst for IDC:
"Is that story less compelling because it's not high definition?" Martin said. "I don't think so."
When it comes to the Web, the ability to browse through sites quickly is one of the most compelling reasons to go online. While you should always want to shoot for greatness, it's more important to accomplish your users' goals successfully than to overshoot your own.
What was that? I can't hear you.
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 01/05 at 05:34 PM |
I was browsing MSN's news yesterday and The Who's Pete Townshend warns iPod users caught my attention. The article is about the guitarist's concerns regarding headphone popularity and concern with the inevitable result of future hearing problems. He, along with some others -- electricnews.net, slashdot.com, and headwize.com (see their article on "Preventing Hearing Damage When Listening With Headphones") to name a few -- all bring up important points [that should be common sense but aren't usually even top-of-mind] regarding the headphones and hearing loss. More specifically the growing popularity of headphone usage with any sort of sound interaction and the increasing likelihood of hearing damage.
With the continuing advancement and ease of technology, it's just something to keep in mind when it involves your overall health and wellness.
Television 2010?
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 12/15 at 04:13 PM |
I honestly had no idea my last topic would spin off into even more but so it has. After doing some research on the video iPod's network episodes downloads, I found some news (to me at least) that the advertising revenue losses studios are experiencing are making them start to freak out and consider having viewers pay per television episode in general (similar to on-demand shows). Post-gazette.com has a "Q&A: TV's future" article with some interesting details - also touching on the benefits of using "added extras" as an incentive for increasing interst, i.e. go online to chat about a show, view web-only extra scenes, etc. Even the big networks are looking to offer online downloads the next day, commercial free, for a price.
While I am absolutely for the benefits of "added extras" online, I'm pretty torn about the new direction the television media might be going in general. On one hand, it'll give networks an easier time keeping up with shows that aren't as popular off-the-air and still accessible. On the other, why not buy the DVD if you really want to the show - Best Buy has several aisles dedicated to this. And I can't even imagine how this will end up affecting the cable companies with their already high prices.
In the end, as Steven Spiecher ponders the problems with per episode charges becoming an epidemic, I think -- ok, I hope -- that people will simply become more interested in finding other interests to occupy themselves versus losing themselves in front of the television screen. For everyone's sake... picnic, anyone?
Television 2005
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 12/13 at 02:18 PM |
I was watching a show the other day promoting the new video iPod and how you can now download actual television episodes and thought -- What a great way to promote something: offer it on TV, available for download, maybe even include it to view online. -- Two seconds later, they mention that it costs $1.99 per episode. $1.99?? Most of these shows are on the local stations, not to mention I already pay some crazy amount for cable. Why would I want to pay more - especially when I can DVR them?
Now, I'm not a huge iPod user - I find mine works well for airplanes and working out - but it seems like this is asking for a lot more out of the user than it really should considering the popularity of TiVo and DVR which are already endangering advertiser revenues. I understand the reasons to charge people money to download the video (maybe even make up for lost revenues), but I think it would be a better direction to offer network television downloads for free, and charge for other more valuable items (music videos, maybe actual cable channels, or special artist interviews - I haven't really thought this part through but I'm sure there's something better that could be done).
So, while I feel networks are losing out on growing their audiences with download incentives such as iPod's network downloads, my very small point to tie this in to Web sites is that it's important not to ask your visitors (or potential visitors) to jump through hoops to do what you want them to do. Find out what makes your customers loyal (or brings them in initially) and focus on building from there. In my case, I would be much more receptive to the video iPod's episode downloads if there was an incentive - such as free network shows - to draw me in.
Have a Happy Turkey Day!
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 11/23 at 11:43 AM |
Today's MSN site features a Happy Holidays page which has some very season-appropriate stories, tips, etc. to help you out this Thanksgiving holiday. I really like the additional emphasis they put on special occasions and the easy access to this sort of information without having to search all over the Web.
A few that caught my attention were:
- Thanksgiving Shopping Guide
- Holiday airport guide
- Thanksgiving myths by Martha Brockenbrough
- Celebrating the Season
Hope everyone enjoys the holidays and has a safe and Happy Thanksgiving!!
The answer to splog.
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 11/18 at 09:19 AM |
I've mentioned the issues with email spam attempts in a recent post but am becoming pretty disheartened with splog's increasing popularity in my life. Lately, I have been spending more and more time babysitting posts, specifically comments, to move one here, another there, to be filed in the junk section. While it's not a huge time eater, it does become tiring to deal with over and over and over and... over again. Yep, good ol' splog.
What's splog, you say? Well, some compare it to the zombies in Night of the Living Dead - seriously, read the article. But it's really spam + blog and can vary from nonsensical content, to adlinks that link to unrelated Web sites, to stolen content that falsifies search engine results (hurting those who deserve those results).
So I decided to look around a little and not only found that people who do this have nothing better to do with their time but that splogs cause major search engine issues, require you to constantly watch for malicious activity (especially if you don’t have a junk filter), and who knows what else will develop should it continue. I also came across Frank Gruber's "Spam + Blog = Splog : How Is It Affecting The Blogosphere?" post which led me to his answer to splog: SplogReporter.com. According to the site:
Splog is a terrorist to our blogosphere and needs to be stopped. This site was created for "good willed" bloggers to report splog in an effort to help to clean up the blogosphere of splog. It was spurred by the called to arms of Mark Cuban here and then followed up by a post on Somewhat Frank.
So, if you are dealing with splog, please report the site to SplogReporter.com -- if anything, so these people can find something else to do with their time. Thank you.
Hello, my name is __________.
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 11/16 at 05:28 PM |
I'm sure our office remembers the discussions we had when trying to decide whether we should add author photos to our blog (not to mention the trouble actually determining a shot to use). Well, here's more proof that we made a beneficial decision to the Web world -- and that what used to ooze with anonymity is now becoming pleasantly personable.
Tony Ruscoe, on the Forty Faces site, commented on the benefits of including personality online and "to some extent" agreeing with Jakob Neilson's Web Usability: The Top 10 Design Mistakes regarding Web and real worlds. He also made note of these ideas becoming potential upgrades in the future for Philipp Lenssen's (the creator of Forty Faces) project.
...Jakob Nielsen claims that a photo “offers a more personable impression of the author” and connects the virtual and “physical worlds”. To some extent, I think he's right. He also suggests that author biographies add credibility to the opinions and thoughts expressed in a blog, so it will be interesting to see whether Philipp adds these to the Forty Faces site too.
With my face added to the list, I am looking forward to seeing where this will take us. To INFINITY and BE--wait, we're supposed to be people here. You didn't read that.
Searching Sites or Blogs
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 11/11 at 04:00 PM |
We've talked before about search engines’ expanded options (Web sites, photos, news, and now blogs) but it's interesting to see the increasing popularity of blogs and how this will affect searches. While there are a lot of people who still ask "what exactly IS a... blog?" (their tone dripping in utter disgust that you would mention such an awful thing), there are many others who are quickly embracing the growing community of bloggers.
Before blogs, you might have been perfectly happy to do a search for something you're interested in using Google or Yahoo!'s indexed sites. But now, with the help of blogging communities, search engines' blog searches, and actual blog search engines such as Technorati, you can also look for other people's (real people's) thoughts, ideas, and even comment on a topic whether it be healthy lifestyle tips by Kathy, traveling ideas, even movie reviews.
The options online are truly endless but will one become more popular than the other or will it always be skewed to what people have been used to? And how do you get non-technical people to understand the word ‘blog’ without going into a huge discussion?
Be Cool. Upgrade your iPod
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 11/10 at 03:25 PM |
Wondering just what you can do with your old equipment when you want the newest iPod out there? Trade it in, of course. And the options becoming available won’t make you laugh or cry (unless it’s with joy).
Apple itself will give you a 10% discount via their Recycling Program but they’ve also been known to shut down sales before. Regardless, there are also others out there that will offer you a higher percentage for your iPod. And, if you want to try out a used iPod yourself, you can find some decent perks as well as competitors trying to get you to try their mp3 players.
According to CNN.com’s “Market growing for used iPods” article:
…Several iPods up for auction include the sellers' music collection and instructions on how to transfer the music from the iPod to the buyer's computer. Some even take requests for additional songs to be added prior to shipping.One video iPod for sale contains an entire season of TV show "King of Queens" included.
Even Apple competitors have tried to use the swap as a promotional tool. Dell offered a $100 mail-in rebate to any customer turning in an old iPod when buying one of its MP3 players…
Not a bad idea considering the ever-changing iPod models and the costs to keep up with the popularity contest.
Search Engines: Taking Phone Books Down
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 11/07 at 02:10 PM |
I was meeting with a client about their Web site redesign and we started talking about how important it is becoming to ensure that your Web site is search engine friendly. So many people (including myself) simply throw out their bulky phone books – preferring to search for companies online (in turn making their homes less cluttered and not quite as bug-friendly – yes, another bug reference, sorry it fits).
Smileycat.com posted the other day on “10 Tips for Search Engine Optimization”. While the article referenced is very sales-y, I think some of the guidelines are important enough to repeat.
- Optimize your site for your target audience, not search engines. [You know what you’d look for to find your site, but what would your audience look for?]
- Research your keyword phrases extensively. [Make sure your keywords have a purpose and will be used by your audience.]
- Program your site to be "crawler-friendly." [If search engines can't properly read your site, they won't list your site... meaning no one will be able to find you from a search.]
- Label your internal text links and clickable image alt attributes (a.k.a. alt tags) as clearly and descriptively as possible. [A picture is worth 1000 words, but not to search engines. ALT tags are your way to tell search engines what that image is about.]
- Incorporate your keyword phrases into each page's unique Title tag. [The Title tag is one of the easiest places you can include a variety of keywords. Don’t be afraid of variety.]
Yahoo! Maps Comes to Town
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 11/03 at 01:54 PM |
The competition is increasing for Google... Yahoo! is launching its response to Google Maps. Yahoo! Maps, naturally. It's still in the beta stage right now but the bonuses are: Multi-point driving directions, Live Traffic stats, and an excellent integration with Yahoo! Local to name a few. Yes, I do like being able to know how I get from my house to a friend's house to that restaurant near my friend and if I'll run into any major traffic issues.
TechCrunch's Michael Arrington has an in-depth review of the power of Yahoo! Maps. Pretty impressive.
Ph-Fishing Fun
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 11/03 at 10:14 AM |
Comparable to the cockroaches of the world, phishing scams are now targeting more precise groups (it's called spear phishing) to ensure that their scamming plans last as long as annoyingly possible. In June, small, local institutions (i.e. banks and credit unions) were the target. Today, small businesses, eBay members, and even cell phone users --to name just a few-- are the prime targets.
If you're wondering "Why are you calling fishing, phishing?" Well, it's time to be educated. Phishing, according to The Daily Item's Business News, is an:
... e-mail that tries to trick you into giving away personal information such as account login names, credit card numbers, bank account numbers, passwords, PIN codes, and social security numbers. The e-mail will pretend to come from some financial or shopping site online. It will probably even use the standard graphics and advertising look of that site. And the message will claim that you need to click to go to the website and enter your numbers or codes to activate, secure, reopen, or somehow protect your account. But the message is a fake and the information will actually go to some crook who will quickly steal your money and identity.
It's also time you learned how to protect yourself by avoiding the schemes, defending yourself, and not taking the bait. While wiping out the scam completely won't be a simple task, educating yourself on how to avoid the risks will only help keep these creeps at bay.
Finding Face
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 10/28 at 10:52 AM |
Micro Persuasion's Steve Rubel posted about the up and coming launch of Riya, a photo search site that allows you to search for people within digital photographs.
One of the comments to the post reflected my own initial thoughts: 1) this is a cool idea and 2) is all this really necessary? After pondering this and several other slightly paranoid possibilities, I was intrigued enough to learn more.
After researching the purpose, taking the tour, and reading about its development, I can see how this can be a life-saving (yes, life-saving) tool for digital photographers. But the most convincing reason to use this product was noted in one of Munjal Shah’s blog posts -- After all, it's not too out there to think that we'll all come across our own issues with 31,000 (and counting) digital photos to deal with.
Googling Ghosts and More
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 10/25 at 04:39 PM |
With less than a week until Halloween, I thought it was time to start getting in the spirit of things (Yes, pun intended). So, here are a few sites I found to help put you in the mood to have a ghostly good time this Halloween season. It's also an example of how important it is to use the right keywords on your Web site. Some might even say it's a matter of life or death. Ok, maybe that's a little drastic, but using the right keywords is definitely important for search engines to allow people to easily find what they're looking for.
- Costume ideas, decorating tips, ghoulish recipes and everything else you need for a fun and creepy Halloween from About.com
- Carving Tips from the Pumpkin Masters
- Graveyard, Lockergnome's Game of the Day to celebrate Halloween
- Sesame Street's Trick or Treat Tips for Children
The WB Brings Podcasting to Viewers
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 10/21 at 09:55 AM |
Last night I was watching this week's One Tree Hill which mentioned podcasting not once, not twice, but three (!) times. The third time was during the ending which referenced "For more information on Peyton's podcast, visit theWB.com or iTunes now." If you have no idea what this refers to, Peyton's Dad suggested she talk to a therapist so she decided to broadcast her thoughts to the world via podcasting in an effort to clear her head. Listen to Peyton's Podcast.
Anyways, I just thought it was interesting how all the talk about podcasting is spreading in popularity regardless of an individual's positives or negatives on it.
While finding the actual link for the podcast wasn't exactly effortless (iTunes required), the TV/Internet media integration has many benefits: improving ratings, captivating audiences and giving viewers an opportunity to develop a relationship with the characters. Just something to think about for other media avenues as well...
Web Writing Made Easy
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 10/19 at 04:09 PM |
I was scanning through abstract after abstract of news stories and articles --immediately dismissing two (maybe three) here, selecting one there, ignoring another one a little further down, and so on-- and started thinking about the lack of attention people have when surfing the Web and how different getting, let alone keeping, a visitor's attention has become.
In the middle of this, a client calls to tell me they're having trouble with copy for their Web site and, although they know they really wanted to finish their site asap, they're going to need some time to figure things out. This doesn't surprise me in the least as I've become pretty accustomed to the difficulties clients run into when developing content. I'd even say that it is probably one of the most intimidating tasks a client will come across, even more so than the initial design phase, if it’s done right.
While a client didn't really call me to tell me this in the middle of my thoughts, let's pretend that one did as it is pretty believable this would actually happen. Not to mention that I really wouldn't be surprised with the notification. So, a client tells me they’re having trouble and I respond with some variation of the usual pep talk --don't worry about it, you'll be ok, we offer copywriting services, no? ok, just keep it simple, concise, descriptive, etc.-- but I wondered what other advice there was out there that might be a little more in-depth and useful across the board.
After some searching and yet another episode of sorting through lots of rejects and a few potentials, I finally came to peace with what I felt would provide a decent overview on writing for the Web. Hopefully you will feel the same. If not, well, we do offer copywriting services.
- Effective Web Writing by Crawford Kilian
- What’s Different about Writing for the Web - 8 guidelines by Trenton Moss
- Writing Well for the Web from webreference.com
Hits Trafficking Hits
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 10/13 at 04:09 PM |
Knowing your Web site's traffic can be a pretty common obsession for many Web site owners and managers across the board. Checking page views, seeing a growth in interest and documenting successes is a great thing to witness and be able to brag about.
But have you ever felt a tiny bit unsure of how to properly use the terminology or respond to a probing question? If so, here's a pretty good article that helps explain common Web analytical terms, what information you need for measuring stats, and how to use it when discussing your Web site.
Once you have the basics under your belt, the next time a discussion about your Web site comes up, you'll be ready.
Halo Hits Hollywood
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 10/11 at 10:17 AM |
There are a lot of people in our office alone who will be excited that the rumors are true: Halo will be coming alive as a movie thanks to Peter Jackson's direction. Here's bungie.net's story as well, if you are interested.
For the video game enthusiasts, do you think the movie will live up to the video game's obsession or will one of the two --the movie or the game-- end up losing interest if it is over-hyped and under-delivered?
Google is Going --->Enter Your Idea Here<---
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 10/05 at 09:31 AM |
Not only have Google's recent adventures been a frequent topic to post on around here, but they are really working hard at spreading the word. Just this past weekend I was looking through Real Simple and saw a feature on Picasa, a photo editing and organizing program of Google - who knew that would be something shared in a women's lifestyle magazine focusing on organization, design and inspiration for everyday lives? Well, obviously not me.
While the online company won't be launching Google Purge to "destroy any information that can't be indexed" anytime soon, there are growing theories on whether the company is "simply exploring different ways to distribute the ads" or "pursuing a much grander plan that ultimately will transform the way people work, communicate, shop, read and even watch TV."
With word out about plans to challenge Microsoft Office and their already long list of tools and services, only those inside the company really know where Google will be tomorrow - leaving the rest of us to fill-in-the-blank.
PPC: Making People Feel Good
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 10/03 at 03:42 PM |
Pay per click ads have never been something that has caught my interest on search results. I understand the reasons, purpose, and actions of the marketing campaign but the forced "Hey, look at me and not those results that appear naturally" just isn't a form of advertising that works for me... meaning I prefer to ignore the ads completely. It's almost like they are the old school car salesman to me - except in reverse as I prefer the old search engine results pages.
What is surprising is that, even with all the negatives that have, can and are happening (price points, fierce competition, fraud issues - and end up leaving PPC participants pondering what just happened), studies are showing that people are feeling better about this particular marketing technique's overall effectiveness.
Perhaps the increasing popularity of media in general will produce marketing techniques that will not only be popular but also effective, unlike the incredibly intrusive idea of the pop-up banner ad (and PPC in my eyes).
Calling All Mouse Potatoes!
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 09/28 at 01:29 PM |
I've seen the commercials for Microsoft's media centers that use a monstrous (well, monstrous in the ad) computer monitor to surf online and/or watch your favorite television show. My first thought was - well, that's not going to give anyone any sort of privacy. But I'm a "stop reading over my shoulder" type of person.
Apparently, UPN and Google are not. Both companies have agreed to run an exclusive four-day streaming screening of "Everybody Hates Chris", UPN's newest fall lineup.
So, if you missed the season premier, you can always see it on http://video.google.com until, well, until tomorrow.
Hot Zone or Hot Water?
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Posted By Rochelle Knight on 09/26 at 09:42 AM |
My search for an interesting yet on-subject topic somehow stopped at Yahoo's new project called "The Hot Zone", a "unique, multimedia perspective on some of the world's most troubled and dangerous places." The goal is to provide a "much-needed look" at war-torn regions that have little to no media coverage.
While the ongoing interaction of video, audio, images, and stories will provide a refreshingly different user experience and entice visitors' personal investment in the project, it will be interesting to see how involved the company itself becomes in its newest endeavor. Without any posts to date on http://hotzone.yahoo.com, there is already news that Yahoo agreed to censor its search engine and e-mail accounts.
With this incident, I wonder what the future will bring. On one hand, for Yahoo to successfully continue with an international movement, they would have to abide by another country's regulations as Microsoft already has. But on the other, when does Yahoo decide whether they are a news reporting agency or an Internet Service Provider? Until some decisions are made, there could be some definite issues for their tens of millions of e-mail users here and abroad.
Maybe this movement and a blog handbook will help Yahoo (or at least the bloggers out there).