DESIGNER, producer, and radio host Jeremy Fuksa and I discuss advertising’s view of the web, the web’s view of advertising, and new design processes for our multi-device web overlords. Enjoy.
Author, lecturer, studio co-founder, UX wiz, and web design pioneer Dan Brown is my guest in Episode ? 100 of The Big Web Show (“Everything Web That Matters”). Listen in as Dan and I discuss collaboration strategies, the path from HTML to UX, growing a design studio business, Brian Eno and more.
And then…
IN EPISODE ? 99 of The Big Web Show (“Everything Web That Matters”), Foursquare co-founder Naveen Selvadurai and I discuss mobile apps and the quantified self; the genesis of bookmarking places; creating mobile UIs in the bad old days before smartphones; how Delicious’s bookmarking helped inspire Foursquare; what was really innovative about the iPhone from a mobile developer’s perspective (it’s not what you think!); when to quit your job and start a product or service; where ideas come from; and what’s after Foursquare for him. Enjoy Naveen on The Big Web Show.
For more fun:
I CHAT with internet radio pioneer, design author, and brand maven Debbie Millman about broadcasting, writing, teaching, publishing, learning to be happy in your own skin, and the importance of early failure to long-term success and happiness. Enjoy Debbie Millman on The Big Web Show.
(Want more Debbie? Check Observer Media–Debbie’s legendary audio interviews with the likes of Jessica Walsh, Milton Glaser, Massimo Vignelli, Maria Popova, Stefan Sagmeister, Dave Eggers, Jen Bekman, Gary Hustwit, Tina Roth Eisenberg, Erik Spierkermann, Jessica Hische, and many more.)
IN EPISODE ? 97 of The Big Web Show?, Erika Hall? (Just Enough Research, Mule Design Studio?) and I chat about why funding startups nobody needs is killing innovation; how designers can use research to stop bad ideas and find great ones; Russell Brand; and the secret history of Unsuck It.
IN EPISODE No. 96 of The Big Web Show (“everything web that matters”), I chat with my friend Mike Monteiro, author of Design Is A Job, and co-founder of Mule Radio, about the joy of client services; how to sell great work; the relaunch of the show on the Mule Radio Network; and the one weird secret that all the best-loved applications, services, and content sites have in common. Enjoy the show.
Photo of Mike and Jeffrey at Marciland, Seattle, 2013 © Daniel Mall.
LEA VEROU and I discuss the creative process behind her “CSS Secrets” series and the book of the same name she is writing for O’Reilly; loving JavaScript and math; her professional path, beginning with coding Visual Basic at age twelve; using CSS to lay out a print book about CSS; creating Open Source projects like Dabblet, Prism, and CSS3 Test; the case for progressive enhancement; earning a living doing your own thing; and leaving her job at the W3C (announced today).
All that and much more is now available for your listening pleasure in today’s Big Web Show Episode No. 94.
AMERICAN DESIGNER Tash Wong and British designer Tom Harman are the co-founders of Coastermatic and my guests in Episode No. 92 of The Big Web Show (“everything web that matters”).
Tash and Tom recently resided in Brooklyn, NY and completed their MFAs in Interaction Design at New York’s School of Visual Arts, where I was one of their admiring teachers; they are now bound for Hawaii, where they will expand their web-based product empire. Coastermatic, their first joint product, converts your Instagram photos into stone coasters, and was conceived during their time at SVA. (More in the August 2, 2012 issue of Dwell.)
In a fast-paced hour-long podcast, we discuss design, product, and business strategy; finding the right manufacturing and fulfillment partners; the division of labor in a small startup; and other juicy UX and entrepreneurial topics.
Enjoy Episode No. 92 of The Big Web Show.
RYAN AND TINA Essmaker are my guests for Episode No. 91 of The Big Web Show (“everything web that matters”).
Ryan is a designer and the co-founder of The Great Discontent. By day he works with Crush + Lovely as head of products, and manages No Little Plans, The Great Discontent’s parent company.
Tina is an illustrator, essayist, photographer, blogger, and the co-founder of The Great Discontent, an online journal of interviews focusing on creativity and risk, and No Little Plans, The Great Discontent’s parent company. By day she manages community for Crush + Lovely and works as a freelance writer.
This episode of The Big Web Show is sponsored by A List Apart, the design magazine for people who make websites.
Enjoy Episode No. 91 of The Big Web Show.
THE AMAZING PAUL FORD is my guest in Episode No. 90 of The Big Web Show (“everything web that matters”). In a fast-moving hour, we discuss computer system emulators on the web, designing web archives, the value of context in software and literature, the new tribalism, the fallacy of history, buying records when you are 16, why getting to magic is more important than attaining perfection, the interconnectedness of software design and storytelling, how parenting twins facilitates A/B testing, and loads more. Give it a listen!
Paul is a freelance writer and computer programmer. He was an editor at Harper’s Magazine from 2005–2010, and brought Harper’s 159-year, 250,000-page archive to the web in 2007; the system now supports tens of thousands of registered subscribers. More recently he helped the media strategy firm Activate with the launch of Gourmet Live, a re-imagining of Gourmet Magazine for iPad, and co-founded Popsicle Weasel, a small company totally focused on microsites.
He has written for NPR, TheMorningNews.org, XML.com, and the National Information Standards Organization’s Information Standards Quarterly, and is the author of the novel Gary Benchley, Rock Star (Penguin/Plume). Paul programs in PHP, Java, and XSLT2.0, but lately is all about Python and Django. His writing has been anthologized in Best Software Writing I (2005) and Best Music Writing 2009. He enjoys both software and music.
He teaches Content Strategy at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. His personal website, started in 1997, is Ftrain.com. He lives in Brooklyn, New York with his wife Mo and the obligatory cats.
AVI FLOMBAUM, dean of The Flatiron School, is my guest in Big Web Show Episode No. 89. A 28-year-old Rubyist, Skillsharer, storyteller and entrepreneur, Avi founded Designer Pages and NYC on Rails before creating The Flatiron School—a 12 week, full-time program designed to turn you into a web developer.
Listen to Episode No. 89 of The Big Web Show.
GREG STOREY of Happy Cog is my guest in Episode No. 88 of The Big Web Show (“everything web that matters”). We discuss the Austin tech and design scene; real and virtual office models; Greg’s upcoming book (with Carl Smith) for people transitioning to web design; new methods of publishing on multiple platforms; and the inspiration behind the Digital PM Summit.
Listen to Episode No. 88 of The Big Web Show.
In eighteen years leading interactive creative and development teams, Greg Storey has launched projects for industries ranging from education to retail, gaming to medicine, media to politics. His amazing roster of clients includes Sundance Film Festival, The Nation, W3C, MSNBC, Today Show, AOL, New York Magazine, DiVX, and SpeedTV.
Greg’s ideas, and his work as a creative director and designer, have been profiled in Communication Arts, The Wall Street Journal, MSNBC-TV, Salon Magazine, The Associated Press, and beyond. He serves as a resource for journalists, researching new media stories for a number of well-known publications.
As a writer, he has become a voice in the web design and development community through his personal site, Airbag Industries, and publications like A List Apart. Greg serves on the Board of Advisors for South by Southwest Interactive and has been a presenter as well.
In 2005, Greg started his own studio, which grew to eight employees and a number of strategic partners in less than four years. In 2009, Jeffrey Zeldman and Greg Hoy approached Greg Storey with a plan to merge his company with Happy Cog. Today, Greg oversees the operations and expansion of Happy Cog’s newest base of operations in Austin, TX.
This episode of The Big Web Show is sponsored by An Event Apart.
SQUARESPACE CEO and founder Anthony Casalena is my guest in Episode 87 of The Big Web Show (“everything web that matters”).
We discuss the platform’s capabilities and the three markets it serves (consumer, designer, developer); the journey from one-person start-up to 120-person company; the launch of Squarespace’s ecommerce platform; how to design a start-up that makes money the day it launches; ways to build community around a non-open-source platform; the effectiveness of good old-fashioned traditional advertising in marketing an internet company like Squarespace; staffing up and laying people off; and much more.
Anthony is the founder and CEO of Squarespace, which he started from his dorm room in 2003. During the company’s early years, Anthony acted as the sole engineer, designer and support representative for the entire Squarespace platform, allowing for it to be a stable and profitable business from the outset.
In addition to his main responsibilities in running the company and setting overall product strategy, he remains actively involved in the engineering, design, and product teams within the organization. Anthony holds a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from the University of Maryland.
This episode of The Big Web Show is sponsored by Shutterstock.com. Use offer code “BIGWEBSHOW3” to save 30% off any Shutterstock photo package.
IN EPISODE No. 86 of The Big Web Show, I interview Monkey Do studio’s Michael Pick and Tim Murtaugh.
Mike, Tim, and I discuss the A List Apart redesign, responsive images and type, CSS Zen Garden, organic design processes, the future of CMS systems, designing a food truck app, and more.
TIM MURTAUGH has been building web sites since 1997 and specializes in delivering standards-based HTML5/CSS templates. His eye for design and serious affinity for clean code allow him to painlessly integrate his templates into larger systems without sacrificing user experience or aesthetics. Tim started in the non-profit world, moved on to start-ups, shifted to an agency, upgraded to publishing, and from thence: Monkey Do. Tim can be found on Twitter at @murtaugh.
MICHAEL PICK approaches web design from the perspective of both art director and front-end developer. He primarily creates clean and concise design systems for websites, but is also known to get his hands dirty with Flash, HTML/CSS, and JavaScript development. Over the years he has worked as a cog in a large agency, an in-house art director, and a humble freelancer, and has picked up a few awards along the way. He holds a BD in Communication Design from NSCAD in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Mike tweets as @mikepick.
This episode of The Big Web Show is sponsored by Shutterstock.com. Get 30% off any package with discount code “BIGWEBSHOW3.”
DAN CEDERHOLM is my guest on Big Web Show No. 85, sponsored by Lynda.com.
Dan is co-founder and designer of Dribbble, a vibrant community for sharing screenshots of your work, and the founder and principal of SimpleBits, a tiny web design studio. A recognized expert in the field of standards-based web design, he has worked with YouTube, Microsoft, Google, MTV, ESPN, Electronic Arts, Blogger, Fast Company, Inc. Magazine, and others. He also received a TechFellow award for Product Design & Marketing in early 2012.
Dan is the author of four books: CSS3 For Web Designers (A Book Apart), Handcrafted CSS (New Riders), Bulletproof Web Design (New Riders), and Web Standards Solutions (Friends of ED). He’s currently an aspiring clawhammer banjoist and occasionally wears a baseball cap.