Miracle World Media Blog

Web Designer Rap: Now this is Passion for Web Standards

Media Marc — Fri, 08 May 2009 15:06:02 +0000

While looking for web standards coding tutorials on YouTube for a friend, I came across this hilariously interesting rap video by a guy named Poetic. The rap is entirely about the benefits of following proper web standards. His flow is really average but listen to the lyrics, I think all front-end web designers/developers will identify with this one.

Majority of Twitter Users Eventually Quit?

jeffersj — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 03:21:22 +0000

I came across a report tonight from ChannelWeb.com, based on Nielson Web analysis, that 60 percent of Twitter users quit the site after one month. After the recent hype from Ashton Kutcher and Oprah Winfrey, it remains to be seen if Twitter will have the long-term benefit from the recent surge of new users.

In the next few months, it will be interesting to see if the site retention for Twitter improves.

YouTube App: Windows Mobile Users Get another Great Time Wasting Tool

Media Marc — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 20:19:38 +0000

Earlier this week I was stuck on the Metro rail due to a train malfunction one stop away from my destination. After ten minutes of just sitting there looking at the ground trying not to make eye contract with strangers, I decided to pull out the “old spare time killer”, my cell phone. Currently I am caring around the HTC mogul my provider is Sprint and I go with the unlimited data plan, it doesn’t make much since to me to have a smart phone and have to worry about data charges. But anyway the mobile version of the online video site, YouTube has never worked on my phone; however I hadn’t tried for awhile so I returned to the site via my Windows Mobile phone to check to see if YouTube mobile had been updated. I had no luck viewing YouTube videos from its mobile website, but I was pleasantly surprised with a download link for a YouTube application for Windows Mobile users.

I really enjoyed my first experience with the Windows Mobile YouTube app. The home screen is very basic giving you the following options, search videos, view top rated, most viewed, and/or most recent. If your Windows Mobile phone has a slider QWERTY keyboard with vertical and horizontal screen views, the YouTube mobile app automatically changes the screen to horizontal view when the desired video is clicked. Watching videos on a delayed train never got so good, the streaming is clear with a little buffering. Navigation for the app is nice and simple, a horizontal slider is provided to browse the videos with your touch screen or directional pad. The app is stripped now allowing you to view related videos or more videos from a specific user, but on the plus side there are no advertisements either. The only major concern I have with the YouTube Windows Mobile app is, if you do not close the applications close button and just open another program or return to Windows home screen, it makes the vertical to horizontal screen display switching volatile. Sometimes I could be looking at the phone keypad and the screen would just turn from vertical to horizontal all over sudden. Closing the YouTube app using its menu seems to solve this problem. All in all this is a nice application to add in addition to your games and other time wasting tools. Enjoy!

YouTube and Facebook’s Popularity Doesn’t Pay The Bills

jeffersj — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 23:11:29 +0000

Over the past couple of weeks, I have come across a number of articles suggesting that YouTube and Facebook are not making as much money as people would expect.

First, Credit Suisse reported that YouTube will lose an estimated $470 million in 2009. Half of YouTube’s expenses ($711 million) are towards the high bandwidth costs. Google is hoping that online advertising will eventually turn the site into a profit, but one has to wonder if they will ever reach that goal.

On a similar topic, last month Business Week reported that Facebook was looking for an estimated $100 million in credit financing to help pay for the rising server costs. Currently, Facebook has an estimated 275 million users and is registering close to 1 million users per day. Last year, Facebook was estimated to be worth $15 billion, but with the company looking for credit financing, the estimate is probably slightly inflated.

It appears that some of the popular web 2.0 sites are having some issues with the high IT operations costs. In the late 90’s, the popular business model for upstart websites was online advertising, but after 10 years, is it still an effective business model as the main source of revenue? Evidence seems to suggest no.

New Epidemic: Teens Acting Up Online

jeffersj — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 23:35:24 +0000

Last week, it was reported that a 14-year-old girl who posted nude pictures on MySpace was charged with Child Pornography, even though she is a minor.

Last Year, a 17-year-old boy posted nude pictures of his 16-year-old ex-girlfriend.

Because of the increased popularity of social networks (e.g. Facebook, MySpace), a small number of teens are using this medium for posting inappropriate content, mainly nude pictures.

Local authorities are having some difficulty with such cases because laws that deal with the possession and exchange of nude pictures of minors assume that the person who broke the law is an adult. As of now, laws have not been adjusted to account for minors who technically break the law. Some local authorities have been threatening to charge minors with possession and distribution of child pornography in the hope that minors will stop this behavior.

I believe that the problem is that teens do not have the concept that passing around or posting nude pictures is illegal and is a very serious offense. Another related phenomenon is “sexting”, which is text messaging that is sexually motivated and that can contain nude pictures. In January 2009, the National Campaign to Support Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy reported that 20 percent of all teens admit to “sexting”. At this rate, local authorities will not be able to keep up with prosecuting every case.

The main punishment for distribution of child pornography is registering as a sexual offender. Once being labeled as a sexual offender, the stigma that goes with it will make it hard for the person to go on with their life as a normal person, such as in finding employment.

Local governments nationwide should seriously consider enacting mandatory training that would educate high school students about the dangers of social networks and texting. As Web 2.0 technologies (e.g. YouTube, Digg, Facebook) become more intertwined with our daily lives, it will become more difficult to stay within the sometimes vague “outdated” 20th century laws that do not confront the realities of the 21st century. Nevertheless, parents are completely responsible for what their children do as minors.

A Real Cruel April Fools Joke: The Conficker Worm

Media Marc — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 13:27:12 +0000

The Conficker Worm is back and scheduled to attack Windows based computer systems on tomorrow April 1st! Microsoft is so desperate that they are offering $250,000 to anyone who can stop the spread of this virus. If the worm infects your computer it creates a “zombie computer” which can be controlled by the virus’s creator. Once the virus is on your computer it supposedly will prevent your computer from being able to access websites that provide security updates such as Windows Update. Rick Ferguson, Senior advisor at Trend Micro, when asked if this computer virus might be a prank said, “The people behind this worm are very skilled programmers and very well informed, these are very skilled cyber criminals.”

Reach Out and Text Someone: The Millennial Generation

Media Marc — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 00:26:36 +0000

About two months ago a co-worker and friend of mine told me about a news article I’m sure most of you have read by now, about a 13 year old girl who sent over 14,000 text messages in one month. I will admit at first I brushed it off and thought, “big deal that’s what kids do these days”. But recently I began dwelling on it, thinking how out of control it was. 14,000 text messages? Wow can you say carpal tunnel syndrome in the making? She must have even texted people that were right next to her or in the same room. Just thinking about this story made me wonder about the generation that it is right after mine, the “millennials”.

I’m a 30 year old member of generation X, computers where around most of my life which eventually lead to me entering a career in the information technology field. However members of the millennial generation have been around computers their ENTIRE lives. The instant messaging, social networking, emailing, and texting became a part of their lives as soon as they gained the ability to use them. With that being said I really have to ask myself, are we headed toward a more anti-social society when it comes to actually physical conversing?

One Saturday during a youth meeting at my church, I asked two teens who where texting during the presentation, “why young people text so much?” One of them responded, “because you can chat with people that you might not feel like talking to”. I laughed and thought to myself, “this person is communicating with someone he really doesn’t want to talk to”, very interesting. Back in the day the telephone service AT&T encouraged us to reach out and touch someone, however now all we want to do is reach out and text someone. Today there are four major texting days for most people in our society, your birthday, Christmas, Thanksgiving, and New Years. I might sound a little sensitive but if we are supposedly close friends or family you need to call me on my birthday. I’m serious are we headed for a physically anti-social society?

I can just imagine future generations having trouble with traditional interpersonal conversations. My younger cousin once told me that texting or instant messaging allows her to say what she really wants to say to somebody, because she didn’t have to see the physical reaction of that person after she expressed herself. I always said that it’s so ironic how a cell phone is the most social and anti-social device all rolled it to one. Its a tool that can allow you to connect to friends and family all over the country, and it can also allow you to avoid conversations with strangers (girls can ignore guys trying to hit on them if they pretend to be concentrating on a cell phone conversation), as well as people you might know.

I am a tech geek and really enjoy the emerging technologies, like social media, smart phones, and video conferencing, they can be convenient and cost effective, but I also like being around and engaging the people. Sometimes I just wonder will things go too far? Its scary to think that children of the future may start having their birthday parties online. What do you think?? LOL

Majority of Facebook Users Do Not Like the New Layout

jeffersj — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 23:14:22 +0000

Today, I came across an article from TechCrunch reporting that 94% of
Facebook users do not like the Twitter-like interface. Personally, I
find that the new interface is too focused on status messages, which
sometimes can be very interesting and insightful but other times can be
annoying.

I will occasionally come across status messages such as “I’m sick this
morning. I must have eaten the wrong burrito! ” They are funny the first
time around but become stale very quickly.

It will be interesting to see if Facebook keeps the new layout or gives
users the option to use the previous layout if preferred (best option).

Apple announces iPhone 3.0 Update, Ups the Ante on Sprint’s Palm Pre

jeffersj — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 23:59:49 +0000

Apple Insider reported on today’s announcement from Apple Computer Inc. on the upcoming iPhone 3.0 update that is scheduled to be released later this summer. The iPhone update includes the long awaited MMS and copy & paste features. The update will be free for iPhone users, while iPod Touch users will have to pay a $9.95 fee to download.

Apple has posted the complete presentation online in Quicktime format.

Soon to be iPhone competitor, Sprint Palm Pre is scheduled to be released this spring.

Please Stop the Dreamweaver Hatin’

Media Marc — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 23:43:10 +0000

Recently I was having a discussion with a fellow web developer on what is becoming a classic argument, as a web designer/coder is it taboo to use Adobe Dreamweaver? The guy that I was discussing this with is one of those, “I’m a web designer who codes from scratch with amazing standards and breaths awesomeness from my nostrils, blah blah” type person. You know the type of person who was hit with some magic wand and now knows everything about web design, past, present, and future. My biggest concern came when a family friend who is still in college (studying information systems) sat with us listening to our whole debate.

This post is for all those new to the web design world or those who are planning on entering it. Please do not let the “know it all” code monkeys, web standard cops, and the like deter you from learning a program that could help jump start your web design or even web development careers. With that being said I’m not saying that you should totally rely on Dreamweaver or discontinue using any other WYSIWYG tool (I’ve used Visual Studio, Aptana, Expression Web, Coda, and more. So don’t get it twisted.) What I am saying is that Dreamweaver with its large user scope is still a valuable tool for both web newbies and seasoned front-end developers.

Dreamweaver can Help New Webbies Learn the Basics

If used correctly Dreamweaver can not only allow someone who wants a new hobby and could care less what the acronym HTML stands for build a halfway decent website, but It can also help the aspiring web design/developer get comfortable with coding by hand. If you are new to Dreamweaver switching in and out of the “Code View” can help a great deal when learning exactly what it takes to complete some simple html tasks. If you are trying to get familiar with HTML, use the common tool bar in Dreamweaver add an image, table, or hyperlink, highlight it in design view and then switch to code view so that you can see exactly what has changed in your code. This is a great hands-on resource to go along with sites like w3schools.com and webmonkey.com. Many seasoned web developers will say that Dreamweaver produces too much unnecessary code and can affect the web standards compliancy. If a person is new to web design they shouldn’t be worried about this quite yet. Getting a good working knowledge of HTML tags and attributes should be first on a new comer’s list, and there is nothing wrong with a little Dreamweaving to help them do so. But I dare to say Dreamweaver can help some of us intermediate to advanced designers as well.

Dreamweaver Great Tool for Advance Developers

Currently Dreamweaver is in its 10th installment with version CS4 but I have to admit back in the MX 2004 days when Dreamweaver added better support for CSS is when I really learned to use pure CSS to develop web page layouts. Using Dreamweaver’s CSS style panel to visually insert styles into a style sheet and then checking the code the styles panel created was a great orientation when it comes to CSS layouts, now I say, “Look Ma no tables!” I’m just giving a brief example on how Dreamweaver is an excellent tool not only for performing web task quickly but can be used as a teaching resource. Knowing Dreamweaver is still valuable to an aspiring web developer’s career.

Now if you are a freelance developer creating layouts, that’s fine, however there are many mid to large scale businesses in both the private and public sectors who rely on Dreamweaver’s tools to do huge web updates, and quick solutions to massive company sites. I have heard many users say that the use of Dreamweaver is dying off or will die off due to the emergence of content management systems, well just go over to Monster.com or Career Builder and type in Dreamweaver in the keyword field, and see thousands of job listings cover your screen. If you are a computer information systems major with plans to have a career in web design or development it won’t hurt to have a working knowledge of Dreamweaver.

Dreamweaver has an extensive amount of features not only for the novice web developer but for more seasoned web devs as well, supporting backend programing languages such as .NET and PHP which can be used for rapid “simple” application development. I didn’t even mention the new Adobe Air Runtime that allows web developers use their existing skill set to produce rich desktop applications using web technologies, and yes Adobe has a free Dreamweaver extention that allows developers to take good advantage of this feature. Adobe is constantly expanding on Dreamweaver and it would be a shame to miss out because you think using it is not the trendy thing to do amongst the web design community.

To be honest I really don’t have the time to go over Dreamweaver’s many features during this post. But if you can afford it Dreamweaver is an excellent tool for both new comers to the web and seasoned vets. So please stop listening to the so called coding kings, download CS4, take a look around and atleast get familiar with the application and tell’em Media Marc sent cha