Just use your brain. I’m not sure our industry says this often enough. You’re smart, you make the internet, and you can make good decisions. Pay attention to your craft, weigh the good against the bad, and check your assumptions as you go.
Helvetica looks great in many contexts. This is not one of them.
Surprisingly, there was no press release with a rationalization for the name or any explanations of how the logo represents cutting edge technology and XFINITY’s commitment to its customers. Or whatever. The new name feels at the same time pompous and clichéd — as if there is no brighter horizon than the infinity of XFINITY but, really, nothing is as depressing as a badly placed “X,” a gesture better reserved for extreme games and products, for bad dot‐com era start‐ups and for strip‐club dancers not named Destiny. It might sound more fun than “Comcast” but at least Comcast sounds like a real company with almost fifty years of experience.
Here’s a lovely pagination control I looked at on PSDTUTS today. Actually, first I used it; when it took me to a page I was not expecting, I hit the Back button and looked at it. It’s a testament to both my arrogance and my compulsiveness that I found five…
CSS Advanced Layout Module. I suppose this is a good spec, even though the syntax is a bit weird. But — Christ — can they please stop overloading the display property? It’s hard enough to use as it is.
I’m going to have to compile a list of all the tiny UI touches Apple got right with the iPhone. I’ve been playing with this thing for a couple hours and I keep discovering new stuff.
Hixie: The CSS working group is irrelevant. I agree with everything he says — someone needs to light a fire under the CSSWG’s ass, but I don’t know who has the necessary time, inclination, and expertise.
Relying on software to pick colors for you is like letting your mother pick your clothes.
Web design is 95% typography. So what if we have only a handful of fonts to work with? Creativity thrives under constraints. Look at Daring Fireball or Coudal Partners and observe how typography can fully define a site’s identity.
I know I am probably preaching to the choir here, but maybe, just maybe, if we sing loud enough, the branding firms that make these decisions will hear our song of reason and make the right decision. If we are going to redesign a classic logo (or design a new one for that matter), let’s stand up for good design and actually do something innovative instead of relying on bevels and drop shadows applied to someone else’s genius.