IceWeb 2006 notes - Andy Clarke, "FeedingYour Creativity Without Compromising User Needs"

Written April 28. 2006, at 12:52 GMT.

• Lovely English accent... ...and humour. (Andy's website)
• Design stake-holders: Brand ... Marketing ... Business needs (bottomline/politics/etc.)
• "Flash is a fantastic tool! What's wrong with Flash is what people do with it." hehe
• Shows imaginary spash-screens for Amazon, eBay and Flickr asking people to choose between "Flash v. HTML" or "Ajax v. Plain Old Javascript". Point taken. "Don't make assumptions that people know things about web-technology or even the setup of their own computer". Audience laughs.
• Mentions the King Kong website's front page as an example of a site where Business needs (sponsorship) have taken over the basic user as well as marketing needs (usability, aesthetics, etc.)
• Also the Ice Age (movie) website: "Choose your region to enter the site". Inside: good looking but confusing.
• Example of a good site: HBO's Deadwood. Good looking, well branded, but clear and simple and focused on what the user wants to know.
  • I wonder: King Kong and Ice Age are both mostly geared towards kids and youngsters - while Deadwood is for grownups. In my experience kids love to browse explore and try things out. Maybe simplicity isn't neccessarily a virtue/requirement for them. (??) So is it possible that the studios are onto something that Andy isn't? I tend to agree with Andy's point of view, but I just wonder...
• He then goes on to demonstrate how one could rebuild The Corpse Bride website using clean HTML and CSS.
  • ...It's all pretty basic stuff - but fun all the same, to watch someone else do it.

More like this: English Entries, IceWeb2006.