Is NDA culture hurting developers?
Ars Technica has an interesting post revealing some sordid tales from the world of iPhone development. The tales center on iPhone app developers who claim to have developed apps that they really didn't develop. And they're getting away with it because of an NDA culture that permeates much of the development world.
NDAs, or non-disclosure agreements, of course, are those pesky little agreements that you've probably asked been asked to sign a million times if you work in the world of technology. In some markets, just about everyone asks that an NDA be signed for the smallest of things. Sometimes I half expect to be asked to sign an NDA if I ask where the bathroom is when working on-site with a client.
30+ Twitter Lists and 5000+ Twitter accounts worth following
Twitter Lists are now officially available to all of Twitter's users. And there are plenty of them. While it remains to be seen whether Twitter Lists will help Twitter boost user engagement, Lists offer a no-hassle means to discovering and following people who you might find interesting.
Here are 30+ Twitter Lists that collectively follow more than 5,000 interesting Twitter accounts.
Site review: BBC Democracy Live
The BBC yesterday launched a new political website, Democracy Live, which enables the public to keep up with TV coverage of political debates.
The site offers live and on demand coverage of the Commons, the House of Lords, the European Parliament, Scottish Assembly and more, so you can keep up with debates on a variety of issues that may effect you.
The new CNN.com: the good, the bad, the ugly
CNN is one of the world's leading news organizations and it's website is arguably one of its most valuable assets today. In an effort to make it even more valuable, CNN has launched a new design for CNN.com over the weekend for both its U.S. and International versions.
According to Nick Wrenn, Vice President of Digital Services for CNN International, "We had a look on how our users use the site, and put a lot of thought and research behind it". The finding: "Breaking news is our core brand and will continue to have a prominent spot. But we wanted to showcase a lot more of the deep, rich content we have. It was falling off the main page too quickly and people couldn't find it".
Q&A: Rob Colling on why online video needs subtitles
Launched earlier this year, internetsubtitling.com is a startup that, as the name suggests, provides captions and subtitles for online video.
The captions and subtitles, as shown in this example,
provide a potentially useful way to make online video more accessible.
I've been talking to founder Rob Colling about the company and
concept...
Four steps to profiting from a decent domain name
If you're an entrepreneur, or budding entrepreneur, making money online can sometimes seem like a real challenge. In my opinion, that's often because entrepreneurs focus on the wrong thing. They want to create a 'startup' and become the next Facebook or Twitter.
That's a tall order and, for most of us, a recipe for disappointment. But if you're willing to start out small and work hard, profit on the internet isn't so elusive.
Mobile web experience letting users down: report
After years of too much hype, it's safe to say that the mobile internet is here. Sure, a lot of the activity is taking place in closed gardens (App Store, cough). But thanks to the wide availability of internet-enabled handsets, the rise of smartphones and 3G networks, more and more people are accessing websites through their mobiles.
Unfortunately, access and demand haven't yet produced the ideal mobile web experience. In fact, according to a recent study conducted by Gomez, Inc., in the past year two out of three mobile users have run into problems while trying to access websites on their mobiles.
Which auto websites are getting it right?
A study of automotive website usability has named the Audi website as the best by a manufacturer, with Volvo and Mini the runners up.
The eDigitalResearch study was commissioned by Auto Trader, and looks at various features of car websites, including selector tools and customer service options.
I've been looking at some of the winners' websites...
Eight tips for boosting lead gen conversions
The internet is arguably the most powerful tool for generating leads the business world has ever known. Using little more than HTML forms, it's possible to set up a simple mechanism for generating leads on a website and thanks to cost-effective internet advertising options, reaching an audience of potential customers has never been easier.
But even given these things, generating quality leads online isn't always as easy as it looks and a lot of leads are lost because the forms and web pages designed to generate them are poorly implemented. Here are eight tips for making sure you're maximizing your lead gen conversions.
Site review: M&S relaunch
Marks & Spencer launched a revamped version of its website yesterday, the first major update since 2007.
According to M&S, the aim is to 'dramatically improve the customer journey from browsing to basket'. I've been seeing how well the site achieves this goal...
Holiday shopping forecast 2009: a lot like 2008, with more coupons
The NLA explains why it is going after the news aggregators
Web 2.0
Graham Charlton
Strategy & Planning
