Perry

Hewitt

Tag: cms

Friday 5 — 7.15.2016
1. Pokémon fever struck this week with the release of Pokémon Go, an augmented reality app that allows players to catch virtual characters populating physical spaces. Here’s how it works. Om Malik points out that the app has heightened expectations for how we can access information, acting as a kind of gateway drug for broader applications of AR.
2. Deane Barker points out the need for rationality when planning a content management system implementation. As someone who has been through the process more times than I’d care to admit, her observation about “irrational uniformity,” the tendency to slavishly shoehorn everything into the CMS, is apt.
3. Anyone who posts regularly to social media recognizes the power of a strong image to grab attention. Here are some practical tips for ways non-designers can create images for social media.
4. It’s easy to get bogged down in the visual look and feel of a brand, but these days a digital product’s performance is just as likely to shape users’ impressions. The Vox Media performance team talks about their approach, and their push to design fast experiences for the slowest networks. Learn more in this Responsive Web Design podcast (full transcript also available).
5. Just over two months since its release, Facebook Live has become a powerful, popular broadcast mechanism. As a result, the social network must now address a host unintended consequences, most significantly increased scrutiny, as unedited, visceral human experiences — the mundane, the sublime, and the tragic — are broadcast to news feeds everywhere.
Weekend fun: Disturbed by the smartphone zombie culture? A social experiment app is trying to change that. For pure offline joy this summer, a pop up Museum of Ice Cream here in NYC will soon open with a pool full of sprinkles (that’s jimmies, to the civilized among you) that you can swim in. Brought to you by Tinder.

Every Friday, find five, highly subjective pointers to compelling technologies, emerging trends, and interesting ideas that affect how we live and work digitally. Try out the Friday 5 archive, or sign up for a weekly email.
July 15, 2016
Friday 5 — 11.27.2015
It’s been an odd, three-day work week on the interwebs. We had the #SlackDown maelstrom with an impressive social media save, fake Don DeLillo joined Twitter to announce a fake death, and then a real Jeff Bezos joined Twitter to announce a real disposable rocket launch. Go figure. In more substantive news:
1. WordPress has disrupted itself, according to founder Matt Mullenweg. The WordPress.com product has been revamped to be faster, slicker, and open source — and to adopt some of the follow and recommend features of platisher Medium.
2. A report on searching for work in the digital era reveals trends consistent with overall mobile and social behaviors. 53% of young adults have used a smartphone as part of the search, and 13% of social media users say information that they have posted on social media has helped them get a job.
3. Messaging apps continue to surge, and according to Stephanie Newman, the real growth has only just begun. This article includes some helpful context setting, and a mindblowing average revenue per user number for WeChat.
4. The tag #longread gets thrown around a lot, but it should definitely be applied to this monograph on the selfie. It’s a worthwhile deep dive into the history and culture of self portraits.
5. Still thankful? It’s not too late to give to #ThanksgivingforSyria. This web app provides a clean interface to calculate the cost of your meal, and to donate half of that amount to a charity helping refugees.
Weekend fun: Enjoy the exploits of one of the internet’s most prolific trolls. Or let this Google Easter Egg take you back a long time ago to a galaxy far far away.

Every Friday, find five, highly subjective pointers to compelling technologies, emerging trends, and interesting ideas that affect how we live and work digitally. Try out the Friday 5 archive, or sign up for a weekly email.
November 27, 2015
Friday 5 — 6.20.2014
1. Email subscriptions can be pernicious — almost every online interaction bullies you into adding another. Try Unrollme to clean up your inbox by unsubscribing from the mail you never quite get around to reading.
2. What will wearables mean for the workplace? Salesforce releases code libraries to inspire app development, with potential impact on both in-office productivity and lifestyle/fitness.
3. Content management systems and their admin interfaces aren’t usually the sexiest of web topics. But this comes close: the Nieman Lab’s look under the hood at the New York Times’ CMS.
4. Amazon this week launched its long-rumored Amazon Fire Phone. Of note: multiple front-facing cameras to offer 3D perspective and Firefly, which enables you to scan products for additional information. The phones ship next month on AT&T at $199 (32GB) and $299 (64GB) price points.
5. A step-by-step look at Twitter’s cumbersome signup process shows why the company is struggling to grow. But on the bright side, Twitter finally supports GIFs to add a little fun to your timeline.
Weekend fun: OK, Jon Stewart! The Daily Show takes down Google Glass in inimitable style. Fear not: no Glassholes were harmed in the filming of the segment.

Heads up: Friday 5 is taking a break next week to celebrate the World Cup, and resumes on the 4th of July.

Every Friday, find five, highly subjective pointers to compelling technologies, emerging trends, and interesting ideas that affect how we live and work digitally.
June 19, 2014
Friday 5 — 5.9.2014
1. You likely don’t need a set of graphics and stark statistics to remind you how much work email has encroached on our personal lives. Also: thoughtful essay on how excessive corporate email promotes burnout rather than productivity.
2. Email marketing is a staple of corporate and nonprofit outreach, but how do you get those overloaded recipients to open it? See these five tips for email subject line that attract readers.
3. Here’s a comprehensive rundown on LinkedIn strategy for evolving from a resumé parking lot to an online newspaper. Growth plans include investments in mobile, international expansion, and “delivering massively personalized experiences.”
4. WordPress.com parent Automattic closed $160M in funding on a $1.16B valuation. Known for its robust developer community and emphasis on clean user interface, WordPress now powers an astonishing 22% of 10 million websites today. The investment’s a strong bet on WordPress to continue its growth beyond niche blogging to become the best publishing platform in the world.
5. Smartphones, smart watches, smart toothbrushes are now all available to contribute to our families’ personal data exhaust streams. These data streams are loyalty cards on steroids, providing a live feed of behaviors which when aggregated are a potential goldmine for retailers. Prediction: myriad law suits to emerge over parents’ use of their children’s personal data in return for discounting.
Weekend fun: Perhaps amusing only for soccer fans, Arsenal players respond to mean tweets. Extra credit for gratuitous Vorsprung door Technik joke.

Every Friday, find five, highly subjective links about compelling technologies, emerging trends, and interesting ideas that affect how we live and work digitally.
May 9, 2014
5 ways to make your admin interface shine
Your design meeting for the new website was standing room only. People who routinely wear mismatched socks showed up to express strong opinions on color hue, saturation, and value, and to weigh in on flat vs. skeuomorphic design. A public website for the enterprise is important — it’s a brand statement seen millions of times each month. So while it’s not surprising that these meetings garner internal attention, it’s unfortunate how little mindshare is paid to its less sexy alter ego, the admin interface.

Chicago Tribune taken over by kittens – was the admin interface to blame?

The admin interface is the dashboard view for the internal users managing your site through a content management system (CMS). A fair amount of your website may be automated through feeds or ad servers, but odds are you still have a team to edit/add content or choose what to feature on the homepage. Spending the time to make this dashboard a user-friendly control center instead of a jargon-filled, out-of-the box system can improve productivity and reduce errors.
1. Start by giving your developers a clear idea of how site admins will manage site content. Who writes/curates the content? What’s the process for inputting the content, and for any proofing and approval? How often does existing content get updated, and how much new content comes in each day? How many site admins need different levels of access? The bottom line is that the technology must support human users, and not the other way around. An out-of-the-box system can adequately handle 90% of the use cases. But considering the amount of time your site managers spend each day inside the admin interface, small improvements can add up to big value.
2. Volume matters. Make sure to test each aspect of the interface with the right amount of content. For each entry, make sure heads, subheads, and copy lengths approximate or are real ones. (For fun: read a good attack and defense of Lorem ipsum) Once you’ve populated the system with hundreds or even thousands of content items, is it still possible to quickly find a specific article or multimedia asset for an edit?
3. Disable unnecessary features. Most CMS systems serve general audiences, and offer features and links you may never use. Developers are often loath to remove features because they may someday be useful. It’s important to push for showing only what is needed. Removing unnecessary options will make daily functions easier to find, and accelerate task completion.
4. Enable workflow, but also workarounds. Enforce data validation, but be careful not to create processes so cumbersome that they slow down content entry. The workflow needs to be painless enough to ensure its adoption, and anticipate common use cases. But recognize that you can’t design for every content and staffing scenario, so leave some flexibility in the system. Examples might include a “nuke” button for a social media feed, or a way to override approvals for certain content types.
5. Add your brand to the admin interface. This interface is the home screen of the people who work in it. As much as is practical, make sure your organizational and site identities are reflected. The latter is particularly useful in seeing at a glance one site’s admin interface from another in organizations where admins may manage multiple sites.
Internal, task-oriented admin interfaces will never be the rockstars that public website designs are, but an infrequently updated site can often be tied directly to how damn hard it is to add or change content. Investing time in thinking through and designing a usable admin interface does more than make your internal users happy — it’s a strong predictor of a well-maintained public website.
August 7, 2013
Friday 5 — 08.02.2013
Every Friday, find five quick links about compelling technologies, emerging trends, and interesting ideas. Source: the internet.
1. Starbucks reported solid earnings, and pointed to the “demonstrable impact” of digital innovation. More than 10% of Starbucks transactions in the U.S. are made via mobile, and they’re installing wireless charging mats in more locations (which seems like the smartest loss leader ever).
2. LinkedIn brought in a strong second quarter, and now boasts 238 million users worldwide. CEO attributed the results to accelerated member growth and strong engagement—and LinkedIn will likely continue to grow into new geographies and demographic profiles.
3. WordPress continues its user-friendly march toward world domination, now powering 18.9% of the web according to Matt Mullenweg. I’ve seen how WordPress has weathered the transitions Mullenweg mentions: from pure blog to blog/CMS, to app platform. It’s remarkable how the community has retained a strong commitment to user experience rare among open source projects.
4. Business Insider released a summary of its new paid report on video growth. Social is an explosive driver of both production and distribution, and brands want in on the action.
5. What does it look like when a brand jumps on the viral video bandwagon effectively? Watch The Camp Gyno to find out how clever startup Hello, Flo makes it look easy.
August 2, 2013
Friday 5 – 05.31.2013
Every Friday, find five quick links about compelling technologies, emerging trends, and interesting ideas. Source: the internet.
1. If you click one link this week, let it be the Mary Meeker’s Internet Trends slides. It’s a terrific state of the internet summary, with insights into mobile upside (still!), wearables, and the hockeystick rise of digital, tagged content like photos, video, sound, and data.
2. Security’s not sexy, but it’s essential as we store more and more info online. Kudos to Evernote for their recent adds of two-step verification, authorized apps, and access history.
3. Speaking of verification, Facebook finally offers verified pages for brands so users know the pages are legitimate. It’s a gradual rollout — more info here.
4. If you manage a content management system as an admin, work as a content strategist, or just post information to the internet, check out Karen McGrane’s terrific DrupalCon keynote. It’s a great balance of evangelism and understanding the messy content world we live in.
5. Do women and men use social media differently? RWW reports on some Microsoft-sponsored research with some interesting observations about gender. Women report more social media use for collaboration on work products, and men report more use for professional networking.
May 31, 2013
When lines blur: medium and content in online publishing

We all like clarity — bright dividing lines that indicate what we’re accountable for and where we should fear to tread. Back in the old days of newspaper publishing, roles were clear: the journalists wrote the copy, the photographers snapped the images (but not too many of them for a Serious Publication), and the business side handled the unseemly aspects of the work, like advertising and circulation management. For the most part, people knew how to swim in their own lane to achieve a clear result.

But along came the internet, and all the intricacies of online publishing emerged once people realized the new world wasn’t just a Quark-to-HTML export function. Along with disrupting who could capture and report the news (with highly variable quality), the internet has also made murky the clear dividing lines dictating where the content drives use of the medium, and where new opportunities in the medium drive the content.

Two recent articles highlight different aspects of this complexity:

Om Malik weighs in with a terrific piece on the opportunities for journalism in a post-Snow Fall world. Lauding The New York Times for its innovation, he points out:

There is a failure in the media business to understand that the medium and the content are intertwined much like those lovers on the walls of Ajanta and Ellora caves. … Now take all of that as context and then understand why I keep harping on the point that Snow Fall-type products are a brand new media, a whole new style of storytelling and a model for 21st-century journalism

There is a remarkable opportunity here for online publishers ready to adopt a forward-thinking digital strategy. The winners will be those willing to blur the content type lines — and they will get there only by embracing innovative techniques for delivering shareable content made possible by the rapidly shifting digital medium.

Next, Karen McGrane surfaces important issues with how we think about and design the content management systems that underpin how we actually do online publishing. We need to separate content from presentations to preserve meaning and structure for an orderly and semantic web. It’s hard, though, as she writes:

And yet, we know that medium and message are intertwined so tightly, they can’t be easily split apart. Graphic designers rail against the notion that “look and feel” can be painted on at the end of the process, because design influences meaning. The more skilled we are as communicators, the more we realize that the separation of content from presentation is an industrial-age feint, an attempt to standardize and segment tasks that are deeply connected.

The very tactical way we create, edit, and publish the content has implications for how we both structure and perceive it. Without continuous investment in these systems (unlike the one-off printing press capital cost), content creation will struggle to meet the shifting of the digital medium. Beyond the system itself, there’s a new need for people who have an outward-facing awareness of all the mobile and social places the content will live, and the rendering an sharing opportunities inherent to each.

Bottom line: As the bright lines previously dividing the medium and the content blur, there’s a need to re-think the capabilities and approaches supporting each. How does this new murkiness change what the content is, how it’s created, and how it gets pushed it out into the world through a lens of realtime context? Successful organizations will innovate often and measure fast, and operationalize the kind of nimble experimentation required to succeed.

May 14, 2013