Archive for ‘Social Media’

What happens when an article about logging using Facebook Connect achieves a high ranking in Google? You get an extremely interesting and humorous insight into the way many people use the internet.

Rather than typing Facebook into the address bar, many Facebook users get to their beloved social media by searching Google for “Facebook login”. Unfortunately earlier this month Read Write Web published a post about Facebook Connect which appeared above the actual Facebook login in Google results. Believing Facebook had changed it’s design and unable to login, hundreds of disgruntled Facebook users began venting their frustration via the comments on Read Write Web.

Check out the first couple of pages of comments on ReadWriteWeb for a laugh.

From a UX perspective it’s particularly disturbing that so many people missed so many cues that they were on the wrong website. Even when other uses pointed out the mistake they still didn’t understand the mix up and kept commenting.

Late last week we rolled out a significant update to Citysearch.com.au. The first thing you’ll notice is the revised header which now sports a much cleaner, lighter design with a prominent search box. Once you start a search you’ll really begin to notice the changes. The search results page has been completely redesigned for better scanability. You can also clearly see what other users are voting for and commenting on.

When you click on a result for more information you’ll find the details page has also been redesigned. The new, cleaner, lighter design makes it easy to find the information you need. You can read what other users are saying and leave your own comments. We’ve hooked up Citysearch with Facebook Connect so you can now sign in to Citysearch using your Facebook account. This makes leaving comments on Citysearch much easier and it also gives you the option of publishing the stuff you’ve found on Citysearch to your Facebook wall for your friends to see.

We hope you’ll enjoy using the new features as much as we do.

About a week ago it seemed as though the Interweb was going into meltdown. I think I first noticed something was amiss when my iPhone denied my my morning serve of email, tweets and analytics on the way to work. The disconnectedness continued at work when it became apparent that a major Telstra connection was down. This was soon followed by Gmail going offline and Twitter went into another tailspin (probably due to everyone tweeting complaints about Gmail being down). Finally there were the reported attacks on WordPress blogs. Luckily my blog is akin to a Mac – it’s small and insignificant so who would want to waste their time with malicious intentions?

While the folio and resume are for public consumption, the blog is really for myself anyway. If someone else finds it useful or interesting then it’s just a bonus. But really it’s just a scrap book of random thoughts and links about design that I want to save for later. It wasn’t always like that though. Back when I started my blog in 2004 there were only a handful of design blogs. I on the other hand was too busy writing about my travels around Europe. Then there was a long period of neglect before I imported my old Blogger database into WordPress. At first I was sceptical of the cookie cutter approach to applying pre-made themes, but now I am continually surprised by the ease with which you can make endless changes and additions. There really is no excuse for tardiness anymore.

It’s still early days in this new format and I’m still finding my feet, or more to the point my voice. Anyway, below is a collection of articles that will hopefully help me to get where I’m going. Where ever that may be.

100 Ways To Improve Your Blog
16 Excellent WordPress Security Plugins To Secure Your Blog
Must See SEO Guide for All WordPress Bloggers
Key Elements to Blog Visibility
The Anatomy of a Blog
Top 7 Crimes Best Bloggers Commit!
9 Things to Do To Make Sure Your Next Blog Post is Read by More than Your Mom
Writing Blog Post Titles That Grab Attention
Designers Discuss the Benefits of Running a Blog
The Benefits of Running a Blog as a Freelancer (Tips Included)

I’ll admit that I’m a fairly recent convert to Twitter. Before hand I could never figure out the attraction. How and why would I want to constantly post updates on my most mundane of activities? Even worse, why would I want to know about those of other people? Given I was already on Facebook I thought I may as well be on Twitter. At least then I could have an informed opinion. Two months on and I am pleasantly surprised. I guess it comes down to what you want to make of it, or more to the point, who you follow.

Sure there’s cross-over with Facebook with the odd mundane update and the whole “look at who and how many I’ve connected with”, but it’s the ear to the ground aspect I really like. I  love the fact that I can finely tune my drip feed of industry gossip and news and get it relatively fresh. I know that sounds cheesy but it’s also the most startling aspect – those 140 characters convey things that often pop-up a week later via a channel I would have ordinarily discovered them on.

So Facebook rarely gets a look in these days. I find it’s really just a catalogue of past friendships and misplaced marketing opportunities. That said, it still seems to be going from strength to strength.

1. YouTube – Are You F*cking Kidding Me? (Facebook Song) LIVE – Kate Miller-Heidke is brilliant.
2. What the F**k Is Social Media? Here’s an Answer – a great eye-opener for businesses.
3. STUDY: Two-Thirds of Marketers Now Use Social Media
4. The Rise of Conversation Media
5. Seeking -How the brain hard-wires us to love Google, Twitter, and texting. And why that’s dangerous.
6. Spacelocker, A Social Network You’ll Want To Avoid Like The Plague – a disaster in every way.
7. Social Media: Fad or Revolution? – a great collection of facts and figures (ie Social Media has overtaken porn on the internet, who knew?!)
8. Social Media Training – Five Must Read Reports for Big Business
9. Social Media Map
10. The Conversation Prism
11.  Facebook Grew Twice As Fast As Twitter In July
12.  Facebook’s Click-Through Rates Flourish … for Wall Posts
13.  Twitter Job Description by Date Joined – for me this is particularly embarrassing!
14.  I Want My Tweets Back – this is a bit of a worry.
15. Happn.in shows you what people are twittering about in your city – Melbourne
16. Portrait of a Twitter user
17.  Tweet City – What type of twitterer are you? – apparently I’m a broadcaster. This post is proof enough!

1. The Do’s and Don’ts of Modern Web Design
2. iPhone GUI PSD 3.0
3. HOW TO MAKE THE MOST OF YOUR META TAGS
4. Dealing with Client Logo Design Quotes – Ask for a Budget
5. Mind the Web Gap, Please: Challenges in Bridging the Interactive Agency Divide
6. Twitter 101 for Business – A Special Guide
7. The Evolution of Blogging