Well, it’s been four and a half months, so I suppose I had better write a new post. I have every intention of writing more often, but as it happens I get too busy and neglect this arm of the online presence. Don’t call it a comeback.

Why have I been so busy, you ask? You are too kind. There are a few projects in the air at the moment, and as I juggle photography, branding, web design, and print design, I can’t help but feel a few plates crashing to the ground. I am pretty excited about the work on the table, so I’ll be sure to update as it comes to fruition.

My intentions are also to post more commentary about the community and the business.

More to come . . .

Just because one is a designer, it doesn’t mean they are a web design. Quite often I see designs that look great on paper, but they aren’t an experience. It’s a flat piece of paper with some images, text, and flair. Great design, don’t get me wrong, but not web design.

Oftentimes there seems to be a void. Someone wants a website, goes to a print designer to lay it out, takes it to a developer to write some code, and voilá! Then people start to complain that it looks like a print ad. Well, yes, because it was designed as a print ad. Jeffrey Zeldman wrote a great article for A List Apart called Understanding Web Design. Everyone needs to read this article. Jeffrey does a great job defining web design:

Web design is not book design, it is not poster design, it is not illustration, and the highest achievements of those disciplines are not what web design aims for. Although websites can be delivery systems for games and videos, and although those delivery systems can be lovely to look at, such sites are exemplars of game design and video storytelling, not of web design. So what is web design?

Web design is the creation of digital environments that facilitate and encourage human activity; reflect or adapt to individual voices and content; and change gracefully over time while always retaining their identity.

Hence the need for front-end developers and interface designers. Even in the marketing world, perhaps especially in the marketing world, we need to remember to create experiences that make sense.

It amazes me how many “web designers” and “bloggers” there are out there. On any web or design blog you can scroll to the comments and click-through all the visitors’ personal sites or blogs. The numbers are staggering.

It also amazing how much rubbish there is out there. I googled for web design agencies in my local area and came across some absolute junk. The thing that baffles me is that people are willing to pay for this stuff. The questions that come to mind are:

1. How did that guy get that client?
2. Has the client ever been on the internet?

Honestly, if they have been online in the past 5 years they should know that the site they paid $1000 for wasn’t worth it. Gone are the days of everyone having to have a website because of this new boom called the internet. Your site should still be worthwhile, providing value to your client or the community. It seems like people are settling for a jumbled message with poor grammer when they should really be striving for a strong, attractive presence.

The blogosphere is overwhelming. Sure, there are niche blogs for family, friends, hobbies, etc., but beyone that are the blogs out there also providing value? It seems like most of the time people just need a microphone rather than trying to contribute to some greater good.

We need to be asking the question: Does this add value to the client and/or the community?

I’ve seen a lot of demands out there for knowledge in a variety of content management systems. I already have a pretty good knowledge of WordPress, but ExpressionEngine and Drupal are foreign to me. So I’ve decided to retrofit a site I just finished into EE, and build a new site from scratch in Drupal.

Right off the bat, EE seems very easy to work with. It’s pretty similar to WordPress with some custom syntax. Drupal, on the other hand, doesn’t seem very intuitive. I think I’ll need to dig a little deeper to get my footing.

I’m pretty excited that my first full-blown freelance project in quite a while has wrapped up phase one. DanielProject.net is live and the identity pieces have been finalized. Tim has been great to work with and is more than accommodating to my hectic schedule. Still to come . . .  video.

No, not that kind of modeling. I’ve had the pleasure of working on a project that is Cinema 4D overload. It’s probably been 5 years since I’ve really worked in C4D, but boy-oh-boy it’s an awesome application.

This project is going to turn out pretty dang sweet.

I’ve been so busy developing and managing a couple other blogs, plus working full-time and doing some freelance design that I forgot about this. Oops. On to some substance

So the almighty iTunes App Store launched. Wow. I’ve been enjoying my jailbroken 1st gen iPhone running the 1.1.4 firmware, and haven’t really seen a need or desire to purchase a 3G iPhone or upgrade to the 2.0 firmware. I’ve had a lot of great conversations about it, but for what I want my iPhone to do, it does it.

I browsed the available applications and I have to say, I’m not that impressed. I’ve certainly been missing the buzz of development that once existed before the great developers signed up for the developers program and lost focus on jailbroken applications. All the applications I saw that I would find useful have a non-2.0 counterpart in some form or another. Nothing new under the sun.

It amazes me how crazy people are. I saw posts of people downloading and even paying for dozens of applications before the 2.0 firmware is released, and definitely before the 3G is released. People are honestly bragging that they are so crazy about downloading new applications and how they’re spending money on apps just for the sake of purchasing apps and they really have no reason to blah, blah, blah.

I wish parent’s wouldn’t give their 14-year-olds enough money to buy an iPhone, or even the ability to access the internet for that matter.

I was at the WebDesignWorld conference in Chicago a week and a half ago and realized that all designers and developers have blogs . . . except me. Not anymore.