Thanks for your email. I will be away on holiday at a fab beach house in the Outer Banks (thanks Dad!) until mid-August and I will not be checking email during that period. If something is very urgent, look for me on the other side of the dune.

06:35 PM | | linkme | home

Want more email? Then check out the Design Studies Forum list:

Design Studies Forum (DSF) is a College Art Association Affiliated Society. Founded as Design Forum in 1983 and renamed in 2004, Design Studies Forum seeks to nurture and encourage the study of design history, criticism, and theory and to foster better communication among the academic and design communities. DSF's 225 members include practicing designers, design historians/critics, and museum professionals.

Thanks to Ken Friedman (of PHD-DESIGN list fame) for the pointer.

06:20 PM | | linkme | home

After he accepts the nomination for president tonight, John Kerry is expected to accept $75M in public financing, which means he can no longer accept (or spend) money from donors. George Bush is expected to follow the same path, but because the Republican National Convention is 5 weeks later than the Dems, he has more time to spend the $$$ he's raised.

According to Salon, Joe Trippi thinks that Kerry should take the risk and reject this public financing. But Salon points out that this route means that "if Kerry revved up his fundraising machine again he'd be competing with national Democratic congressional and state candidates." There's also the risk of "unleashing a new campaign-contribution arms race that the GOP would in the end win, given its superior resource base."

Well, what this means to me is that for the first time, I'm planning to donate money to the Democratic National Committee, which has just pledged to spend $6 million in August to make sure that W isn't the only one on the airwaves.

Please...pass it on.

05:49 PM | | linkme | home

I've been waiting for Lou to go first, and he has:

What if...

... you could find out about all the local events and meetings relevant to your work that will take place in your area over the coming weeks?

... your AIfIA membership got you a discount on a subscription to ACM's Interactions magazine? Or your STC membership got you a discount to attend an AIGA event?

... there was an easier way to meet and network with colleagues in your community who cared about developing great user experiences?

... the annual UPA and STC conferences took place in the same location in succession, instead of (frustratingly) in different cities at the exact same time?

... UX (User Experience) emerged as the thread that ties us together--whether we're software developers, interaction designers, content strategists, usability engineers, graphic designers, editors, information architects, or whomever--and allows us to better understand and work with each other?

Besides a minor quibble (it was UPA and DUX that were scheduled at the same time), Lou has really said this wonderfully. Please read the whole post and not just the part I've shamelessly stolen. Or visit the UXnet site and become part of the community. As Lou says:

But there's so much promise in this concept; what we right need now is support, encouragement and, perhaps, a little courage. And soon, volunteers.

Oh, and we're working on the $$ issue too :).

05:51 PM | | linkme | home

Well, perhaps it's not as bad as the Washington Post handing out "10,000 copies of a special convention issue of the daily, complete with the dated banner headline 'Election 2000'" (ouch!), but I was amused to see this typo splashed up on yesterday's ultramercial on Salon:

05:34 PM | | linkme | home

Do you have something to share about information architecture, usability, or information design? Then STC, the Society for Technical Communication, would like to hear from you! We're currently accepting proposals for our next annual conference.

"That's a tech writers conference." you say. Well, yes, there are many tech writers who attend. But STC is home to several thousand members who belong to its usability, information design, online, and indexing special interest groups, and our conferences attract many outside the "traditional" realm of writing and editing.

Here's just a sampling from last year's conference in Baltimore:

• Keynote by Ben Shneiderman
• A panel on the future of web design featuring Steve Krug, Ginny Redish, Karen Schriver, and Whitney Quesenbery
• Low-cost content management with Ann Rockley
• Strategies and tools for IA (and the closing session) with Thom Haller
• Design Standards and the Development Process with Bill Killam
• Brand Experience with Dirk Knemeyer
• Paper Prototyping with Caroyn Snyder

You can also see more sessions from last year.

Speakers receive a discount on an otherwise value-priced conference. We also welcome speakers from all levels, as our conference attracts those who are new to the field as well as those who have been in the field for decades. And Seattle is a *wonderful* conference city, with the conference is located in the heart of downtown.

To see the full Call or to submit a proposal, please visit the STC CFP site soon.

The deadline for proposals is 12 noon ET, August 12, 2004.

06:45 PM | | linkme | home

After posting a deadline reminder last week about STC's Seattle conference on TECHWR-L, a list for tech writers, Eric Ray (the listmom) spanked me via the list:

Beth,

As you know from your time on TECHWR-L, ads may not ever be posted directly to the list. Please contact me directly. I've suspended your posting privileges.

Eric
ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com

Ouch. He also included the list rules. They say that "If it is an ad of any sort, don't post it." And that I'm to "Direct all commentary about this message to my address, not the list."

Well, as I was spanked publically, I'd like to respond that way:

Mea culpa...I didn't make the "call for proposals" == "ad" connection. I guess it's a lame excuse, and it's your right to generate revenue. Had I even remotely thought of it as an ad, I would probably have checked your no ads unless you pay policy.

I guess I was suspended because I made this before, but if Eric emailed me last time, I blanked it out of my mind because it doesn't make any more sense to me now than it would have in the past. And I think I'm also guilty of misremembering a more friendly connection between STC and TECHWR-L years ago (having more senior moments these days). Fortunately for the list members, my suspension will prevent me from making this mistake (or intentional list abuse -- your call) again.

My public thanks to the listmoms of the InfoD-Cafe, SIGIA, and UTEST lists for their much more friendly policies.

06:40 PM | | linkme | home

For quite a while, I've been moderating comments as a way to deal with blog spam (here are the the steps I followed back then).

This has worked relatively well, except for the case where you get auto-spammed...where someone posts tens or hundreds of a spam at the same time. So, what I've done is modify the version of mt-comments-pending.cgi that David Raynes wrote to do two things:

1. Swap the order of the "Deny" and "Allow" buttons. This way, if you are deleting a bunch, you don't have to move the mouse...the button comes up in the same location for each entry.
2. Add a "Deny All" button at the top. Clicking this removes all the pending comments.

You can find my version of mt-comments-pending.cgi here (saved as mt-comments-pending.txt). I also recommend that you check out Elise's great spam tutorial for other ways to get a handle on blog spam.

08:02 PM | | linkme | home

So David Weinberger pointed to an entry of Tim Bray's on photo integrity -- or rather the "lack" of it. In other words, in the world of digital cameras and Photoshop, don't go looking for truth in pixels.

But what I found very amusing were the ads that Google was serving up on Tim's entry:

Right. An entry on photo retouching (and implicit integrity) and Google is serving up Susan Lucci's "Youthful Essence."

Where I work, we're playing the SEM game, though, like the writer of this article from the NY Times, we know this is a short-term play. At some point, since we're not selling thousand dollar products, we won't be able to pay for relevant search terms. And so far, I've said no to playing in the content space (as opposed to search space), because I don't need our ads showing up in a context that is either completely irrelevant (see above) or even potentially negative.

07:14 PM | | linkme | home

Gosh, sorry for the light posts lately. I hope to get back in form shortly. In the meantime, I've been meaning to follow Kottke's lead and add a personal cat anecdote to my weblog.

I mean seriously, you try blogging like this!

Yes, I have an upside-down picture frame that sits on two other frames to keep the cats from adding unintentional text. Hint: if you see 9999977777wwwww333 in a post, that wasn't me :).

It was much easier to blog when the cicadas were around!

07:40 PM | | linkme | home

I'd blogged the September project back in the spring. The folks on the list mentioned today that the Seattle Times has published a nice story about it:

What if Americans spent the day talking about democracy? What if they had the conversation in their local libraries? What if it all happened on Sept. 11, a date that means so much in the national memory?

These are the questions David Silver asked last winter at a meeting with librarians in Seattle. Since then, 110 librarians across the country have given him an answer: great idea.

Rats...David is now on the West Coast. I'd hoped to run across him one of these days. Anyways, you can see if the project is coming to a library near you via their map or their list of participating libraries.

07:01 PM | | linkme | home

Into photography? Like stories? Then you'd probably enjoy A Picture's Worth. Here's some info:

Officially launched on the 1st of August 2003, A Picture's Worth is a personal project that aims to highlight the inspiration that can arise from a photograph and to capture it in the form of words which in turn can reveal the true beauty of a photograph. Ultimately, the project seeks to inspire and enhance captivating story writing and beautiful photography.

In line with the idea that a picture is worth a thousand words, visitors are invited to share the memories, emotions or creative stories triggered by a photograph of personal significance. It is hoped that a new photo essay will be posted on the site daily.

Some of the photos are really amazing, and ya just gotta love how the whole "word of mouth" thing works. Now to find a photo with a good story...

06:10 PM | | linkme | home

Okay, this is a slight off-topic post. Yes, it's political, but it also has interesting implications for those who like to study how blogs are affecting journalism, politics, and culture, and there's even something for info designers.

Tom Mauser has enlisted blogs to help recruit signers for his petition against assault weapons. It's a personal thing for Tom; his 15-year-old son Daniel Mauser was one of 13 people killed at Columbine High School.

For a knee-jerk, left-wing (I say that like that's a bad thing :) perspective, see Ariana Huffington's column in Salon last month:

Attention, al-Qaida sleeper cells, domestic terrorists, school shooters, David Koresh wannabes and bloodthirsty lunatics everywhere: Be sure to mark Sept. 13 in your day planners because -- thanks to President Bush and his GOP pals in Congress -- your murderous missions are about to get a whole lot easier.

You see, that's the day the 10-year-old federal ban on assault weapons is set to expire, making it perfectly legal to buy, sell and own a whole new line of domestically produced rapid-fire killing machines.

Here's the little something extra for the info design fans...a cool map showing geographic support by bloggers for Tom's petition:

I didn't figure that there would be enough IDblog readers who'd sign to get me over the tail of the power law curve, but feel free to sign on kottke's page if you want to sign with the head of the curve :).

06:00 PM | | linkme | home

How sad...I just received an email that let me know that John Rheinfrank (who I mentioned in an entry just last Saturday) passed away a day later, on the 4th of July.

I didn't know the man, but I'd become interested in his work after viewing content on his site and the outline of a talk he and wife Shelley did on a rationale for user-centered design.

For more, see this personal reflection and the official announcement.

06:39 PM | | linkme | home

It's been quite a while, but I finally got around to reviewing the search logs to see what folks were searching for. Over the years, I've actually found some interesting stuff by doing a Google search for some of these.

But I found a couple of, umm, interesting queries this go-round. Here are some highlights:

• last tornado in ohio
• do my bit for information age
• picture of Florence Nightingale's lamp
• psychology of reality television

Okay, it's an information design weblog (with a few political off-topic posts thrown in). Reality TV? Tornado? I don't think so. And while I have blogged some of these (like Florence Nightingale -- an early info designer), the above search queries are clearly doomed to failure.

Maybe people think it's a Google search? There, returns 250 pages.

That said, these still don't match my favorite search query (from work):

I paid my dues now where's my card?

Which, alas, does not return any results on our site either.

Searching for people is common. Recent searches have been for Mary Yeo, Joyce Yee, and John Rheinfrank. John has quite the impressive pedigree (Scient, Doblin Group, and Fitch). I gotta find out how he wound up in daBurgh!

07:15 PM | | linkme | home

Alrighty then...one last off-topic post before the holiday weekend and I'll be caught up.

While Nader's legacy as a consumer advocate is unparalleled, it is worth noting that the onetime national hero wasn't celebrating his landmark birthday surrounded by the hundreds of people he has worked with and influenced over four decades. Indeed, virtually no one who worked with him since the heady days of Nader's Raiders is supporting him politically or personally today.

Unlike 2000, it seems that there are more folks that are vocal about Nader's role as a potential spoiler. This time, the Green Party says "no thanks" to Nader as their candidate, and there are groups like United Progressives for Victory (who generated the funny graphic above), Don't Vote Ralph, and the Nader Factor who are getting some press. (Salon claims there is a Nader's Raiders for Kerry group, but I couldn't turn up anything about them on Google).

Now if only I lived in a swing state:

07:21 PM | | linkme | home

Another list goodie: All you wanted to know about Web type but were afraid to ask. If you like this, be sure to browse the full topic list for more.

06:45 PM | | linkme | home

Here are some links related to the publishing of research and other academic works that I've culled off some lists recently:

• Nature: Access to the Literature
  This ongoing web focus will explore current trends and future possibilities. Each week, the website will publish specially commissioned insights and analysis from leading scientists, librarians, publishers and other stakeholders, as well as key links, and articles from our archive.
• NY Times: A Quiet Revolt Puts Costly Journals on Web
  The high subscription cost of prestigious peer-reviewed journals has been a running sore point with scholars, whose tenure and prominence depend on publishing in them. But since the Public Library of Science, which was started by a group of prominent scientists, began publishing last year, this new model has been gaining attention and currency within academia
• Acid-Free Bits: The document is a plea for writers to work proactively in archiving their own creations, and to bear these issues in mind even in the act of composition.

06:31 PM | | linkme | home