Nibbler
 

“I want exactly that, but different” and other horror stories

A collection of anonymously contributed client horror stories from web designers (none of these are ours, we promise!)

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The Internet is killing your business, Part II

Taking advantage of that Internet thing

In Part I we looked at how the Internet changes everything. This is how you can take advantage of it.

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The Internet is killing your business, Part I

Luddites

We meet a lot of big, established companies who don’t ‘get’ the Internet.

“We’ve got a guy looking at that.”

“Most of our customers don’t use the Internet anyway.”

“We’ve already got a website. I haven’t really used it, but it looks really nice.”

Many businesspeople dismiss the Internet as a place for their website and email. That’s equivalent to seeing the PC as a nicer looking typewriter, and about as dangerous. History is littered with the carcasses of once great companies that failed to embrace revolutions: from the combustion engine to the microchip. Just like these, the Internet changes the whole game.

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How to lose your empire to a guy in a garage

Amazon logo

Year founded: 1995

Website launched: 1995
Revenue (2008): $19.9 billion
Number of employees: 20,500

NASDAQ: AMZN

Barnes and Noble logo

Year founded: 1917

Website launched: 1997
Revenue (2008): $5.06 billion
Number of employees: 37,000

NYSE: BKS

Which pretty much says it all.

For the full story, read this interview of Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s founder.

 

10 signs your web writing sucks

Child writing ABC

99.9% of writing on the Internet is utter crap.

We’ve known £100 million companies with content that looks like it was excreted from the rear end of an illiterate baboon.

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If only your website was a nightclub

Dancing girl

It’s the opening night of your dream nightclub. You’ve spent months picking out the right shade of pink for the carpet, the perfect umbrellas for your cocktails, the best bulldog statues for the toilets. It cost you every penny you have, but it’s perfect.

You invited everyone you know – of course – and it’s going pretty well. Word of mouth is sure to spread, and in a few weeks you’ll be packed.

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The pain-free redesign of our own website

Screaming at computer

Apparently doctors make the worst patients. As web designers, working on our own websites can be similarly life threatening.

We must be getting better at this though, because this was a cinch.

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Have you got your Christmas e-cards sorted?

Christmas 1

With more postal strikes on the way, now is the perfect time to save money, help the environment and send your Christmas cards electronically.

Silktide Studios are offering two ways you can send festive greetings this year.

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How not to spend £180,000 on a website

Man with money

Defra has been widely criticised for spending £180,000 on redesigning their website – because it looked ‘too brown’.

Now it’s easy to poke fun here, but as web designers we’re interested how that money was spent and why. I mean, the money didn’t just go on a colour change… right?

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The secret to websites that work

Magical book

The problem with most websites is they’re built for the people who are building them.

All the things which matter to the person who pays for a website are almost entirely irrelevant to their poor audience. Is it cool? Are the corners rounded? Where is the SEXY GROUNDBREAKING NEW FEATURETM?

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