Rolling out across English Google over the next few days is a new “+1″ feature that allows you to endorse URLs. If you’re not yet seeing it in your search results enable it in Google experimental. Once enabled you see a little grey +1 next to all search results – including adwords listings..
Kiwis urged to make fuss on slow internet
Google’s hi-tech Kiwi guru Craig Nevill-Manning says New Zealanders should complain more about the slow internet they get from internet service providers.
Mr Nevill-Manning, who is based in New York, was in Auckland for the World Class New Zealand Awards event yesterday and said internet speeds in New Zealand were significantly slower than services in the United States.
“I am shocked that the people aren’t up in arms to demand from their service providers that the service be more reliable and faster.”
- haven’t we been saying this for what seems like forever!!
New Asynchronous Google Analytics tracking code
In December 2009 Google released new asynchronous tracking code for Analytics tracking on websites. The benefits of this, from the Google blog are:
- Faster tracking code load times for your web pages due to improved browser execution
- Enhanced data collection & accuracy
- Elimination of tracking errors from dependencies when the JavaScript hasn’t fully loaded
The way the new asynchronous code works is that most browsers will load the asynchronous tracking code in parallel with other scripts on the page, thus reducing the web page load time.
Steve Jobs’ thoughts on Flash
In a recent post Steve Jobs talks about his thoughts on flash and why it is not supported on apple’s mobile devices such as iphone and ipad.
“Adobe’s Flash products are 100% proprietary. They are only available from Adobe, and Adobe has sole authority as to their future enhancement, pricing, etc. While Adobe’s Flash products are widely available, this does not mean they are open, since they are controlled entirely by Adobe and available only from Adobe. By almost any definition, Flash is a closed system.”
Page Elements to make websites manageable
Its been a while since I started writing a plugin for Silverstripe CMS: “Page Elements“.
I felt myself running into the same problems every time when we build websites, no matter which CMS we chose:
- Multiple columns and content areas on websites are difficult to manage
- WYSIWYG editors leave little room anything else other than formatted text and images, such as flash elements, forms etc
So what I wanted was:
- An interface that is fun to use when dealing with complex layouts
- No more limitation for layouts
- Straight forward extendability
- Re-usability of code and components
- Seamless integration in existing CMS Interface an Workflow.
Starting Out Organized: Website Content Planning The Right Way
We spend a lot of time carefully crafting the visual aspects of websites. This important aesthetic quality helps to shape someone’s first impression when they visit your website. However, as a greater length of time is spent on the site there becomes a blindness to this outer shell, and the content that you have within it is what should shine.
This is often a forgotten or neglected aspect of website creation. In her article “Starting Out Organized” posted on Smashing Magazine, Kirstin Wemmer explains different methods of content planning and organization. These are all important tools to be used (when needed) at particular stages in the website creation process.
Books in the age of the iPad
This article by Craig Mod has sparked a very interesting debate amongst his readers – paper ‘vs’ digital. While many people commented about environmental factors (less trees being cut down) or the timeless qualities of print, I didn’t see anything about how through making content digital it allows for speedy duplication and dissemination. For a child in with an OLPC in Mozambique to a iPad in New York, they would all have access to content and stories without being reliant on having to purchase it in paper form.
Read the article: http://craigmod.com/journal/ipad_and_books/
TV ad budgets starting to move online in 2010
Citi Research analyst Mark Mahaney talks about growth areas across the Internet this year
View the full article here.