For years we've said "content is king". The promise of the web was that we'd have so much more data that we'd be able to make truly informed decisions. But it appears now that we are generating too much data, and we have no good way to understand or integrate all of the data that we have collected. We are literally drowning in data, as individuals, as businesses, as a culture. The amount of media that is available to the average citizen is vastly greater than at any time in history. With Google now indexing 'Tweets' we are on the verge of an internet with trillions of pages of information that are all indexed and available... but only useful if we can figure out the right search query. We desperately need to structure all this data; we need to find the relationships. The Semantic Web promises to automatically discover the relationships for us. On the Semantic Web content may not be all there is, rather, CONTEXT may be "king".

Web 3.0 by Kate Ray - This 15-minute film is a pretty good general overview of the semantic web. That is, turning all of the data on the web into structured data so as to define relationships between it and derive meaning... The video includes interviews with Dixon, Tim Berners-Lee, Clay Shirky, David Weinberger, Nova Spivack, Jason Shellen, Lee Feigenbaum, John Hebeler, Alon Halevy, David Karger, and Abraham Bernstein.

Watch Kate Ray's film - Web 3.0

Are embedded tweets the social media equivalent of "pull quotes"? Once again Twitter has co-opted one of the ways that users are working with their product and incorporated it directly into their service. It's a little clunky right now, but the idea is pretty interesting. In the example below you can see that this is a live 'tweet' with all the attributes of a tweet:

Twitter's "Blackbird-Pie" tool for creating embedded tweets is here.

Twitter not only gets media attention, it drives media attention for world events by making it faster and easier for every day Joes to share information through its micro-blogging service. Now, Twitter is taking it one step further with embeddable tweets. The embeddable tweets are essentially a micro-blogging version of newspaper-era pull quotes, intriguing statements that aim to get attention of readers and entice them to read the entire article. Twitter is calling the embedded tweets the "new quotes."

Read the whole article at Yahoo

This does not surprise me. I think women are generally more 'socially communicative' than men. According to Brian Solis, women 'get' social communication 10% better than men. I believe it. Some say that, since the late 90's, the socially most communicative people on earth have been adolescent Japanese girls using next generation mobile devices in Tokyo. Read more on new media practices in Japan
...I think this is because women are simply more inclined to engage and share using language. I think they gain more personal satisfaction from the exchange process. It may be that women are genetically are more inclined to listen and learn, as well as to speak. What this means for social media and internet development is going to be the focus of a great deal of attention going forward. Clearly the development side of the social sphere will not be dominated by males. This is a very good thing for our historically male dominated technical culture, in my opinion.

Based on data collected and analyzed using Google Ad Planner, I recently discovered that in Social Media, women rule. Across almost every major social network, the balance was revealing and in some cases, profound....According to new reports, it appears that mobile counterparts paint a similar picture. Nielsen recently released data that shows that in mobile, women also dominate social networking.

Read all of Brian's article at BrianSolis.com

This does not surprise me. I think women are generally more 'socially communicative' than men. According to Brian Solis, women 'get' social communication 10% better than men. I believe it. Some say that, since the late 90's, the socially most communicative people on earth have been adolescent Japanese girls using next generation mobile devices in Tokyo. Read more on new media practices in Japan
...I think this is because women are simply more inclined to engage and share using language. I think they gain more personal satisfaction from the exchange process. It may be that women are genetically are more inclined to listen and learn, as well as to speak. What this means for social media and internet development is going to be the focus of a great deal of attention going forward. Clearly the development side of the social sphere will not be dominated by males. This is a very good thing for our historically male dominated technical culture, in my opinion.

Based on data collected and analyzed using Google Ad Planner, I recently discovered that in Social Media, women rule. Across almost every major social network, the balance was revealing and in some cases, profound....According to new reports, it appears that mobile counterparts paint a similar picture. Nielsen recently released data that shows that in mobile, women also dominate social networking.

Read all of Brian's article at BrianSolis.com

This does not surprise me. I think women are generally more 'socially communicative' than men. According to Brian Solis, women 'get' social communication 10% better than men. I believe it. Some say that, since the late 90's, the socially most communicative people on earth have been adolescent Japanese girls using next generation mobile devices in Tokyo. Read more on new media practices in Japan
...I think this is because women are simply more inclined to engage and share using language. I think they gain more personal satisfaction from the exchange process. It may be that women are genetically are more inclined to listen and learn, as well as to speak. What this means for social media and internet development is going to be the focus of a great deal of attention going forward. Clearly the development side of the social sphere will not be dominated by males. This is a very good thing for our historically male dominated technical culture, in my opinion.

Based on data collected and analyzed using Google Ad Planner, I recently discovered that in Social Media, women rule. Across almost every major social network, the balance was revealing and in some cases, profound....According to new reports, it appears that mobile counterparts paint a similar picture. Nielsen recently released data that shows that in mobile, women also dominate social networking.

Read all of Brian's article at BrianSolis.com

This does not surprise me. I think women are generally more 'socially communicative' than men. According to Brian Solis, women 'get' social communication 10% better than men. I believe it. Some say that, since the late 90's, the socially most communicative people on earth have been adolescent Japanese girls using next generation mobile devices in Tokyo. Read more on new media practices in Japan
...I think this is because women are simply more inclined to engage and share using language. I think they gain more personal satisfaction from the exchange process. It may be that women are genetically are more inclined to listen and learn, as well as to speak. What this means for social media and internet development is going to be the focus of a great deal of attention going forward. Clearly the development side of the social sphere will not be dominated by males. This is a very good thing for our historically male dominated technical culture, in my opinion.

Based on data collected and analyzed using Google Ad Planner, I recently discovered that in Social Media, women rule. Across almost every major social network, the balance was revealing and in some cases, profound....According to new reports, it appears that mobile counterparts paint a similar picture. Nielsen recently released data that shows that in mobile, women also dominate social networking.

Read all of Brian's article at BrianSolis.com

This does not surprise me. I think women are generally more 'socially communicative' than men. According to Brian Solis, women 'get' social communication 10% better than men. I believe it. Some say that, since the late 90's, the socially most communicative people on earth have been adolescent Japanese girls using next generation mobile devices in Tokyo. Read more on new media practices in Japan
...I think this is because women are simply more inclined to engage and share using language. I think they gain more personal satisfaction from the exchange process. It may be that women are genetically are more inclined to listen and learn, as well as to speak. What this means for social media and internet development is going to be the focus of a great deal of attention going forward. Clearly the development side of the social sphere will not be dominated by males. This is a very good thing for our historically male dominated technical culture, in my opinion.

Based on data collected and analyzed using Google Ad Planner, I recently discovered that in Social Media, women rule. Across almost every major social network, the balance was revealing and in some cases, profound....According to new reports, it appears that mobile counterparts paint a similar picture. Nielsen recently released data that shows that in mobile, women also dominate social networking.

Read all of Brian's article at BrianSolis.com

This does not surprise me. I think women are generally more 'socially communicative' than men. According to Brian Solis, women 'get' social communication 10% better than men. I believe it. Some say that, since the late 90's, the socially most communicative people on earth have been adolescent Japanese girls using next generation mobile devices in Tokyo. Read more on new media practices in Japan
...I think this is because women are simply more inclined to engage and share using language. I think they gain more personal satisfaction from the exchange process. It may be that women are genetically are more inclined to listen and learn, as well as to speak. What this means for social media and internet development is going to be the focus of a great deal of attention going forward. Clearly the development side of the social sphere will not be dominated by males. This is a very good thing for our historically male dominated technical culture, in my opinion.

Based on data collected and analyzed using Google Ad Planner, I recently discovered that in Social Media, women rule. Across almost every major social network, the balance was revealing and in some cases, profound....According to new reports, it appears that mobile counterparts paint a similar picture. Nielsen recently released data that shows that in mobile, women also dominate social networking.

Read all of Brian's article at BrianSolis.com

This does not surprise me. I think women are generally more 'socially communicative' than men. According to Brian Solis, women 'get' social communication 10% better than men. I believe it. Some say that, since the late 90's, the socially most communicative people on earth have been adolescent Japanese girls using next generation mobile devices in Tokyo. Read more on new media practices in Japan
...I think this is because women are simply more inclined to engage and share using language. I think they gain more personal satisfaction from the exchange process. It may be that women are genetically are more inclined to listen and learn, as well as to speak. What this means for social media and internet development is going to be the focus of a great deal of attention going forward. Clearly the development side of the social sphere will not be dominated by males. This is a very good thing for our historically male dominated technical culture, in my opinion.

Based on data collected and analyzed using Google Ad Planner, I recently discovered that in Social Media, women rule. Across almost every major social network, the balance was revealing and in some cases, profound....According to new reports, it appears that mobile counterparts paint a similar picture. Nielsen recently released data that shows that in mobile, women also dominate social networking.

Read all of Brian's article at BrianSolis.com

There has been a great deal of complaining and hand wringing about the fact that the Apple iPhone does not support Adobe's Flash. Apple has said repeatedly that, for significant technical reasons, it doesn't think that Flash is the right solution for mobile devices. Adobe has accused Apple of blocking Flash for narrow business reasons. This might seem like a silly squabble between business rivals, but it actually has huge significance for web designers, web developers, and any one trying to deploy video on the web. Who's right? Here's what Steve Jobs has to say:

I wanted to jot down some of our thoughts on Adobe's Flash products so that customers and critics may better understand why we do not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. Adobe has characterized our decision as being primarily business driven - they say we want to protect our App Store - but in reality it is based on technology issues. Adobe claims that we are a closed system, and that Flash is open, but in fact the opposite is true. Let me explain. First, there's "Open".

Read the rest of Steve Jobs's article at Apple .com

Wi-Fi on the go is a promise that we've been teased with for quite a while, but the reality is that mobile Wi-Fi is often a hassle, and generally overpriced. Whether you are in an airport, a hotel, or a coffee shop, there is a wide spectrum of possible payment structures, some of which are just plain highway robbery, and others that are refreshingly free... it all depends on the enterprise that it offering it. It's like a road system with out any standards, a variety of toll roads, mixed with occasional free roads, and no interoperability. For the mobil user it's a nightmare. For web designers and internet marketers it is a growing aggravation.

The promise of anywhere access when on the go is old hat, promised but not delivered by all sorts of providers for more than a decade. How long have you heard about Wi-Fi on airplanes, Wi-Fi hotspots wherever you travel for business, municipal Wi-Fi, and so on?...

Where we are today is that there's more mobile Wi-Fi available, but the fractured fiefdoms add hassle and cost. The providers need to figure out how to stitch their services together and stop trying to carve out all these separate silos -- they inhibit usage that way. I figure in another five years, this mobile Wi-Fi thing may finally work right.

Read Galen Gruman's story at InfoWorld

Wi-Fi on the go is a promise that we've been teased with for quite a while, but the reality is that mobile Wi-Fi is often a hassle, and generally overpriced. Whether you are in an airport, a hotel, or a coffee shop, there is a wide spectrum of possible payment structures, some of which are just plain highway robbery, and others that are refreshingly free... it all depends on the enterprise that it offering it. It's like a road system with out any standards, a variety of toll roads, mixed with occasional free roads, and no interoperability. For the mobil user it's a nightmare. For web designers and internet marketers it is a growing aggravation.

The promise of anywhere access when on the go is old hat, promised but not delivered by all sorts of providers for more than a decade. How long have you heard about Wi-Fi on airplanes, Wi-Fi hotspots wherever you travel for business, municipal Wi-Fi, and so on?...

Where we are today is that there's more mobile Wi-Fi available, but the fractured fiefdoms add hassle and cost. The providers need to figure out how to stitch their services together and stop trying to carve out all these separate silos -- they inhibit usage that way. I figure in another five years, this mobile Wi-Fi thing may finally work right.

Read Galen Gruman's story at InfoWorld

Wi-Fi on the go is a promise that we've been teased with for quite a while, but the reality is that mobile Wi-Fi is often a hassle, and generally overpriced. Whether you are in an airport, a hotel, or a coffee shop, there is a wide spectrum of possible payment structures, some of which are just plain highway robbery, and others that are refreshingly free... it all depends on the enterprise that it offering it. It's like a road system with out any standards, a variety of toll roads, mixed with occasional free roads, and no interoperability. For the mobil user it's a nightmare. For web designers and internet marketers it is a growing aggravation.

The promise of anywhere access when on the go is old hat, promised but not delivered by all sorts of providers for more than a decade. How long have you heard about Wi-Fi on airplanes, Wi-Fi hotspots wherever you travel for business, municipal Wi-Fi, and so on?...

Where we are today is that there's more mobile Wi-Fi available, but the fractured fiefdoms add hassle and cost. The providers need to figure out how to stitch their services together and stop trying to carve out all these separate silos -- they inhibit usage that way. I figure in another five years, this mobile Wi-Fi thing may finally work right.

Read Galen Gruman's story at InfoWorld

Things are chainging fast. Last week it was Ford now it's Coke - Coke has announced that it is abandoning plans for campaign web sites and investing in social media. They say that the their Facebook and social media presence is "a better homepage than Coke.com." Prinz Pinakatt, Coke's interactive marketing manager for Europe explains:

"We would like to place our activities and brands where people are, rather than dragging them to our platform."

Read more at Hubspot.com

While it might seem hard to believe, the 'mobil revolution' promises to be faster and more wide spread than the general internet explosion of the last decade. As cell phones morph into "smart" phones and ultimately into hand held computers in the next few years, more and more people will be logging on to the internet with mobile data devices. The trend lines predict that by 2015j more people will access the web via mobile devices than from desktops.

"We believe Facebook has the potential to serve as a communications platform/engine of one-to-one, one-to-some and one-to-many (and visa versa) for the mobile Internet," Morgan Stanley says. "Facebook has already become a primary way for millions of people to stay connected and Facebook's lead is likely to be extended as more consumers use increasingly powerful mobile devices (with photo/video + high-speed access) and the communications options on Facebook (like voice/video chat and other services) continue to rise."

Read the whole story at FierceMobile

Clients generally have an abysmal understanding of what constitutes "usable art" for their various graphic design projects (like web sites and printed brochures). Most people tend to think of digital versions of logos, photos, drawings, and illustrations as an undifferentiated category of 'visual stuff' without a great deal of thought about how different kinds of digital images can be functionally different from each other, or how those differences apply to their particular graphic design projects.

"Why can't we use a logo from my web site on my business card? How can a single graphic look great on the web, and look completely terrible on a printed page? What's going on here? Clients are understandably mystified by things like this.

Designers, on the other hand, know full well that their success in bringing a project to completion will depend critically on their ability to sort through the various image type and quality issues and secure the right digital image type, with sufficient digital resolution, for each application. The catch is that clients are often the gatekeepers to the required image assets, so, for designers, educating clients about fundamental image quality issues will often be a prerequisite to acquiring the 'best' art for the job.

Here's a great little video that explores, in layman's terms, the difference between Pixels and Vectors. You've probably heard of pixels, but what are vectors? This is a major area of public misunderstanding about digital graphics. The bottom line: understanding the difference between Pixels and Vectors will make conversations with your designer a lot easier, and it could easily save you time and money on your next graphic design project.

See the video at MacMerc.com

Signal has been working with BCBSVT for some time and we are proud to have helped them push through a complete redesign of their site. Not only have we helped with a fresh new look and a new CMS but we help guild them through a complete content overhaul. Using Google Analytics to determine visitor interest and the cooperation of their vendors, BCBSVT organized a completely new content architecture. With the launch of their new site, we've increased their page views and decreased their bounce rate significantly. Health insurance just got a little easier to understand for Vermonters. This is a success for everybody in our book.

Visit the BCBSVT.com web site

Who are your site visitors likely to be, and what are they likely to be coming to your web site for? They're coming on a 'quest'; what is it? If you can figure this out, and create site content that fulfills your site visitor's quest, you have a chance of keeping them on the site long enough to realize what a great product you have. If you fail to figure this out you are probably wasting your time with your web site. It's all about 'relevance' these days. We're way beyond the idea that people "surf" the web looking for interesting and beautiful web sites. Today we know that most web traffic is mediated by 'search', and most search driven traffic is driven by an information 'quest'. Match the quest with the content of the site they land on after a Google search, and you have relevance... bingo!

As a part of a larger communications plan, an effective site has a specific job. (Notice here that I didn't say simple. Simple and specific are different things. Simple isn't always good for a site -- specific is.) The more specific the job, the more effective the site can be. On top of that, there's a bonus. The more specific the job for the site, the more creative your creatives can get with it. Specificity has always been a critical component of great traditional creative. Not only is that also true on the Web, it's magnified. Specific goals lead to better creative. Better creative leads to deeper engagement, which further boosts effectiveness.

Read more at Adotas.com

For about 10 years Jakob Nielsen has been telling the web development community to focus on the basics, and on the customer. One of his favorite admonishments, to site owners and designers, is "you are not the user."

Clear content, simple navigation, and answers to customer questions have the biggest impact on business value. Advanced technology matters much less.