Archive for October, 2008

Microsoft Chooses Tricks over Treats

Thursday, October 30th, 2008

A new Microsoft development has occurred for me this week – I can no longer access my free Hotmail account through Entourage 2004. I realize this is not a new thing for most. According to an Entourage help site:

“If you have a free Hotmail account, Entourage may or may not work for you. People who have had free accounts for a long time were grandfathered access with Entourage. Newer subscribers do not have access with Entourage. A Hotmail Plus account would guarantee you access with Entourage 2004.”

I guess they decided to un-grandfather me in this week. I was hoping the free Hotmail access would continue to work as long as I didn’t upgrade to Entourage 2008, since I knew if I decide to spend the money to upgrade my software, I’d definitely not have access.

What really perturbs me about this event is that both Hotmail and Entourage are Microsoft products. So not only do I have to purchase their software, but if I want to use their email with this software, I have to pay for that, too. Yet, I can set up a Gmail or other Pop/IMAP accounts in Entourage just fine. Does that make any sense?

I realize I’m probably one of the last to experience this particular shortcoming from Microsoft, so its like they did me a favor, right?. Guess its time to switch to Gmail…

Posted in Miscellaneous | 3 Comments »

Wired Infographics

Tuesday, October 28th, 2008

The November 2008 issue of Wired magazine is a packed issue containing, among other things, a very nice infographic-y section on world food production and trends. Here’s just a taste of the graphic coolness.

Have a look at all of the graphics in this article here.

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Posted in Design | No Comments »

Project Launch: y|Factorial

Tuesday, October 21st, 2008

y|FactorialWe’re excited to announce the relaunch of yfactorial.com this week. This is the second time we’ve worked with Ryan Daigle in designing for his company. This time we redesigned the y|Factorial logo and website to better reflect the company’s expanding service offering, particularly with regard to iPhone app development services.

Unit Interactive accomplished the logo redesign, website redesign, front-end development and scripting, and the ExpressionEngine CMS integration. Working with y|Factorial was a treat, again, and it’s nice to see a friend’s enterprise expand and grow. If you’re in need of iPhone app development or Ruby/Rails Web development, get in touch with y|Factorial .

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Posted in Launch | No Comments »

Ugly Websites = User Flight?

Thursday, October 16th, 2008

People are seemingly programmed to flee ugliness. Moheb Costandi’s article in the October issue of Seed magazine takes a look at how human perceptions and concepts of beauty are being investigated in the field of neuroaesthetics. There may be relevant links to website aesthetics in all of this, too.

Ugliness in \

By the way, if you’ve not seen it, Seed is a winner of a magazine (the print version!); with as much attention paid to design as to the quality of the content. This one is a true gem.

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Posted in Design | 1 Comment »

One for the Idealists

Monday, October 13th, 2008

This past weekend, I had the opportunity to watch Gary Cooper in “The Fountainhead” ? (1949). This clip sums up the main protagonist’s struggle, and I think it is indicative of every designer’s effort to keep integrity in their work.

The book by Ayn Rand, adapted for film here (Ayn actually wrote the screenplay herself, so there can be no confusion as to the message of the film), is often criticized for being idealistic; creating characters and results that could not possibly exist in the “real world”. As designers, though, we have dedicated our lives to idealism. We know we can never achieve perfection, but aspire to it every day in our work, and therefore we should take the example of Mr. Roark here as inspiration for how we can hope to be, though we may not always be able to achieve his level of absolutism.

The movie (and book, for you literate types) is a thorough exploration of such absolutes, almost specifically dealing with creativity and ideas. Check it out when you get a chance.

BTW – The director, King Vidor, also gets a special nod in the “Director with the Most Intimidating Name” category.

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Posted in Culture | 4 Comments »

Publish2 in the NY Times

Monday, October 13th, 2008

Publish2 in the NY TimesThe New York Times today features a story on how our client, Publish2, and it’s CEO Scott Karp are teaching news organizations how to remain relevant and do their jobs better in the Web era. Scott coined the term “link journalism” to describe how best to organize and present news on the Web to the benefit of readers, newsrooms, and news publications.

We worked with Publish2 to design their corporate identity and website, and continue to work with Scott and his team to design their online newswire application. Publish2 is redefining how news organizations work and organize content, and Scott and his team have devised the right sort of tool to make this happen: Publish2. Congrats to everyone at Publish2 on the nice article!

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Posted in Business | No Comments »

Design in the Sociopolitical Arena

Friday, October 10th, 2008

Heather Mantovani is a design student who sent us her ideas for helping folks in this politically charged season to better understand fundamental differences in sociopolitical ideals. The first is called “Fish or Fishing Pole?” (.pdf) Heather suggests you fold the card in half and stand it on the TV while watching political debates. After each candidate offers a plan or idea or response, the card reminds you to evaluate whether the candidate is offering you a fish (something to help you only briefly) or offering you a fishing pole (to help you to sustain yourself better from now on). Great idea!

The second is a pro-Conservative postcard (.pdf) that clearly and plainly explains one of the fundamental pillars of Liberal ideology, which could help people quickly determine whether or not they hold with being treated in this regard ? or ? if they prefer the Conservative alternative.

Please note that these projects are not officially sanctioned by the organizations or websites referred to on the cards, as this is just a student exercise and design proposal.

I thought Heather’s work was very nice and that these were interesting examples of using design to communicate in the social arena. Thanks for sharing, Heather!

Click on either to download the printable PDF.

Fish or Fishing Pole?
Liberal or Conservative?

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Posted in Design | 26 Comments »

Is the Pricing Right?

Friday, October 3rd, 2008

This week our own Nathan Ford published a cutting essay on website design pricing approach, and how some agencies’ pricing amounts to little more than looting. Among other things, Nathan notes that some agencies and individuals rely on the fog of understanding surrounding Web technology production to artificially and unscrupulously inflate project pricing in order to find the maximum a client will agree to pay.

“?A price that is based on anything other than an honest appraisal of efforts, though, and extorted from the uninformed by means of shady, smoke-and-mirrors tactics, should not be misconstrued as mere capitalistic gains. By all definitions, that’s thievery.”

These issues are worthy of examination and reexamination in the interest of individual professionalism and industry health. Whether you’re a freelancer or an agency designer or owner, I highly recommend reading Nathan’s essay and then devoting some time to reflection.

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Posted in Business | No Comments »

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