The Print Biz Lives On

Publishing is being democratized, print is becoming personal, users are demanding choice in the content they consume and the manner in which they consume it, and production is being fulfilled on demand. This is especially true in the magazine publishing industry. In the US alone, consumers spend more than $10B a year on magazines, across 18,000 titles.

MagCloud, the revolutionary new self-publishing web service from HP, is changing the way ideas, stories, and images find their way into peoples’ hands in a printed magazine format. Whether you are a novice or experienced publisher, MagCloud offers you a way to create commercial quality magazines, printed on demand with no upfront costs or minimum print runs. MagCloud is creating new ways to bring consumers and publishers together in a web-based marketplace where choice, flexibility and print on demand are the cornerstones of the community.

Libya’s Pathway to Peace

I.H.T. OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR

By BARACK OBAMA, DAVID CAMERON, and NICOLAS SARKOZY
Published: April 15, 2011

Together with our NATO allies and coalition partners, the United States, France and Britain have been united from the start in responding to the crisis in Libya, and we are united on what needs to happen in order to end it.

Even as we continue our military operations today to protect civilians in Libya, we are determined to look to the future. We are convinced that better times lie ahead for the people of Libya, and a pathway can be forged to achieve just that.

We must never forget the reasons why the international community was obliged to act in the first place. As Libya descended into chaos with Colonel Muammar el-Qaddafi attacking his own people, the Arab League called for action. The Libyan opposition called for help. And the people of Libya looked to the world in their hour of need. In an historic resolution, the United Nations Security Council authorized all necessary measures to protect the people of Libya from the attacks upon them. By responding immediately, our countries, together with an international coalition, halted the advance of Qaddafi’s forces and prevented the bloodbath that he had promised to inflict upon the citizens of the besieged city of Benghazi. (more…)

I Can’t Stop Playing This Album!

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Creating Album Artwork

Working with a certain theme is really important when it comes to dealing with clients. No matter who you work for (family, friend, client) or what kind of theme do you get, it always needs a solid execution to look professional. Even when the concept seems simple.

For this project we came up with an “Occupation: Human” concept, as most of the songs tell story about people and their lives. I had many different visions of human feelings trying to hit the best fitting one. Most of those concepts didn’t work out – either I couldn’t find the right photo or it looked pretty bad when I tried to experiment.

Finally I came up with an “in between” conclusion, I found something that wasn’t a feeling, but pointed to being a human. And it was the incompletion of life. That even though everything can be great, we suddenly lack something. Like we miss a piece. A missing puzzle. Read more

Make Your Content Make a Difference

Content, content, content. It’s an obvious part of any interactive experience. In fact, you’ve probably heard content is king, or queen, or some sort of royalty. Yet, content is elusive. Often, you don’t realize your content isn’t cutting it until it’s too late. Does any of this sound familiar? Delayer projects, broken designs, uneven voice or low-performing landing pages.

Read more…

The Elements of Responsive Web Design

Responsive web design is undoubtedly a hot topic in web design right now. To some degree, the popularity of the concept of responsive web design is well deserved because site users are increasingly diversifying their methods of accessing a website.iPad, iPhone, Android mobile devices, desktops, netbooks — we’re in a time where our web designs must function in a multitude number of ways. Read more

10 Excellent SEO Tips That Will Improve Your Web Design

A great website design is important to any business trying to find success online, but if a website doesn’t have a chance at good search rankings, very few people may ever get to see it. To avoid having a website that is not search engine friendly, you simply need to take into consideration some basic SEO principles and good content development practices. Read more

10 Techniques for Customizing the WordPress Admin Panel

A while back, I wrote a guide on how to improve the WordPress Admin Panel as an exploration of how we can customize the user interface of WordPress for end-users. In this post, I’ll take you even further with some awesome tricks, techniques and snippets from my website, WP-Snippets.

In the previous post, we removed a lot of clutter and things that we didn’t need. Now we’ll focus on things that happen behind the scene that can enhance the user experience. Read more

How to Design Browser Themes

The web browser is probably one of the most frequently used applications on a person’s computer. For designers and developers, a browser theme can be canvas that provides hours of exposure to the artist or brand willing to create a theme for their fan base.

But with such an extreme landscape orientation and a range of functional obstructions, designing browser themes is a creative endeavor with plenty of pitfalls and gotchas.

There are many things to consider when approaching a new theme — from avoiding copyrighted images to achieving designs that work within the confines of a particular browser. Read more

Wizards vs. Celtics

Glad to have a chance to see the Celtics play before the Wizards wrap-up the season..BUT I can’t help but wish Kevin, Ray, Rondo and gang were playing ) ;

At least Jermaine played: