The AIGA I/O Conference wrapped up yesterday. Overall, it was an excellent 2-day conference with a nice range of topics covered. I stuck around in Miami for an extra day just to relax a little. Over the last couple days, I snapped a lot of digital shots in attempt to capture some of the beauty I saw here. As I was taking the night shots, I quickly realized my simple digital camera couldn’t handle low light pictures without a flash. But when I turned the flash off, I discovered I could get some really nice time-lapse effects. I’ll let some of my favorites from the weekend speak for themselves… continued

After listening to Hillman Curtis speak twice today, (once for the opening keynote, and another for a session on design process) I now have nothing but respect for him, and gratitude for the inspiration he provided through what he had to say and how he said it. A complete reversal in my opinion of the man and his work. His recently released book, MTIV: Process, Inspiration and Practice for the New Media Designer, is one I’ll have to acquire soon. continued

I just arrived in Miami for the AIGA‘s Interaction Only Conference. A balmy 85 degrees with lots of humidity took my breath away as I stepped out of the airport. I’m excited be here, and am looking forward to hearing some of the speakers lined up (Hillman Curtis, Brian Collins, Paula Thornton …) who will be speaking about the design process, business approaches, and usability techniques. Also looking forward to meeting some others in the field of experience design.

I’ve never been to Miami before, so I also can’t wait to explore the city a little. I’m intoxicated by the total surrounding of Art Deco and post-modern architecture here. Even the run-down apartment buildings I saw in the cab ride from the airport over to Miami Beach have lovely symmetrical flourishes and decorations adorning their facades. And the neon is more prevalent here than a row of Victorians in San Francisco.

It’s late, and I still need to get out and find something to eat. South Beach is just a few blocks away, and there’s bound to be some good Cuban food to sample somewhere.

Last night, I received an email message from a gentleman named Mark. The subject was: appreciate your blog and designs. I’ve received quite a few messages like this recently. But there was something about Mark’s message that had a different gravity to it. The last words of his message read: By the way, I am blind … continued

I’ve been thinking a lot about type on the Web lately. Not type that a designer sets in Photoshop and turns into an image. But type which can be selected, searched, indexed, and resized by the browser. Type marked up with tags like <p>, <h2>, or <cite>, etc. continued

The issue can’t escape mention, even though it’s a few days late. Robert Gumson and Access Now recently launched a suit against Southwest Airlines, claiming that Southwest’s website was inaccessible to the blind, thus was in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Last Friday, a U.S. District Judge in Florida dismissed the accessibility suit, [.pdf, 1.0 MB] stating the ADA is only applicable to physical spaces like office buildings and restaurants, and does not apply to the Web. continued

I just returned home from Meet The Makers, a one-day gig here in San Francisco for (in the words of the organizers) creative people in a technical world. The small crowd included creative/design directors, web/interaction designers, IAs, founders, CTOs, Principals, and CEOs. Lots of people who make the Web happen. continued

Last week’s redesign of Wired News included significant visual changes to the interface. The push toward XHMTL and CSS is certainly a big deal. But as a designer, I also love delving into visual details, especially as they impact the user experience. In addition to the usability testing we conducted on WN prototypes a month or two ago, there’s another excellent mechanism for measuring and determining the experience our users have with the site. It’s called user feedback, and we get a ton of it for free via a multi-use Contact Form on the site. continued

The high profile Wired News redesign has attracted a lot of attention, primarily because of the Web standards we’re using, and the effort we’re making at keeping our code compliant and error-free. However, daily editorial additions continue to allow XHTML validation errors to sneak into the Wired News markup. The most frequent culprits are the ampersands (&) which separate name/value pairs in URL query strings, or which commonly appear in our English language in company names like AT&T or slang acronyms like R&D. Section C.12. of the XHTML 1.0 specification effectively explains why these symbols need special treatment. continued

In reading some of the feedback pouring in since the Wired News redesign, some of my confidence that we did the right thing initially began to erode away. The launch was somewhat anti-climactic. The press release looked like a misfire because we didn’t get the site launched as scheduled on Wednesday night. Within just an hour of pushing the site live on Thursday evening, (around 10pm pacific time) we had 4 messages from users who were irate and frustrated with the new changes, promising never to return. continued