Keys to Web Page Success

Information (Photo credit: heathbrandon)

There are almost as many web pages available to look at as there are stars in the sky.  Whether spotting stars and their patterns or finding useful web sites; both can be equally challenging for the viewer.

 Here are a few tips for your consideration when creating or updating your web page. 

A. Presentation

When someone visits your site, what do you think will be their first impression?

1. Neatly organized
2. Acceptable color choices (complimentary colors)
3. Easy to find information
4. Overall attractiveness. Ugly disorganized sites tell the viewer to go away.

B. Reading Level

You want people to understand and you must find a reading level appropriate for your audience.

1. Avoid lengthy sentences (I’m still learning that one)
2. Check spelling and grammar ( Microsoft Word – Open Office – Libre all offer dictionary and thesaurus support)
3. Steer clear of jargon or technical words specific to you unless you expect the reader is going to have this background.
4. Ask someone you know willing to offer an honest opinion about what you wrote. Be sure that someone isn’t in the same group as you. At this juncture you need independent and thoughtful review. We all require a sanity check.

C. Accessibility

How will your readers see this website? Accessibility is becoming the new web page gold standard.

1. Is your web site designed for inclusion? How will people with disability use your site? Is it even a consideration?
2. Display platforms are changing rapidly and with increasing use people with graphical touch pads and phones are accessing the net. Are you ready for these new technologies?
3. Part of accessibility is the ease of access to key features and options. Is your site easy to view and find information for non-technical users?

D. Useful Information

Will someone visiting your site come away with something of value even if it’s only entertaining?

1. Everyone makes a choice when they visit a website.
2. Make your content worthy of those visiting to believe they have engaged something of value.  That’s a difficult call to make for anyone but if that independent viewer thinks your site was interesting, informative or entertaining then you probably have a winner.
3. Different people will have their own opinion. Generally, l find honest opinion will help improve the value.

E. Contacts

Feedback from readers or potential clients is extremely valuable.

1. When creating a business site the most valuable item is to have an open dialogue. Engage your customer!
2. Blogs are useful as long as you are willing to take the time to update. If you offer the option for users to post, it’s best to only permit posting after approval.
3. One of the successful ways to market to your customers is to provide something for free in exchange for contact information. Let’s face it, finding customers interested in our services is an ongoing challenge. No better way to gain contact information than when it’s volunteered through your web site. That’s gold and you are the miner.
4. Stay in touch. Social media isn’t the complete answer, it’s a shared medium and not personal enough for business. Once you have a connection, let the other person know you are still interested in by routinely corresponding with them. Even if the correspondence is only one way and you never expect to obtain business, stay in touch. Let people know you care and just maybe they will too.

Here are a few recommend web sites to look at and obtain ideas. Remember, don’t copy words or images just review their appearance.

clarkhoward.com   A site that provides thousands of helpful tips, links and user interaction. Very well organized.

proaudio.com   A business site with an easy option to leave contact information.

electrosport.com   A simple layout with images. There’s balance of both text and image in this layout.

appliedelectronics.com   Well thought out organization with relevant image presentation. Hover over the menu options.

therichhaysgroup.com clients   I demonstrate my own ideas with this layout. The presentation includes easy navigation with useful links.

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I Get It – You Love DIETY Posted Here

Can we have an adult dialogue here? If you are the type of person who becomes easily upset and launches into their own Turrets moment when you read or listen to any discussion concerning religion, then I suggest you read no further.

Everywhere people cast their eyes in the science fiction thriller, ‘Minority Report’ from the casual walker, driver or runner each was beset by targeted advertising. It was overt and pervasive as the world was a blur of noise and distraction emanating from adverts seemingly everywhere.  The additional component to the targeted ads is everyone was having their retina scanned as part of the societal security. We aren’t that far from this becoming a reality in our own lives.

As annoying as that future must seem, I’m troubled by the everyday intrusion of advertisement in my life. It is difficult to look outside the home or office without seeing an endorsement or advertisement. Even in the home if you watch TV or listen to the radio you are confronted with ads and slogans. Indeed it’s big business to come up with an ad, jingle, quick quip, slogan or logo. Some people have become walking billboards proudly displaying the motorcycle, car or athletic supporter they use.

Lately however I’ve grown more annoyed by all the apparel and social media endorsements I see for religion. It seems anywhere I go I find someone insists their brand of religious preference loves me or looks out for me. Frankly, I wish they would stop it because it’s just not working for me. I’m not talking about the Deity of choice not working for me, although there’s some truth in that, I’m talking about the silly and obnoxious slogans. Clearly the poster, wearer or endorser feel they have a right to tell me about their choices but honestly between the drinks, bikes and free clothing, I just don’t have the capacity to get behind an even more ethereal, good time feeling, my life is so much better than yours product.

Yes, it’s gotten to that point. God, Jesus Christ are all given special place on the radio, television and social media sites where I supposedly stay in close contact with friends and family. Their logos and slogans are everywhere. I don’t see or hear an awful lot of Vishnu, Shiva or Allah in my little corner of the world but I’m quite sure they are amply promoted outside my limited confines.

I have to admit a certain ignorance of the effectiveness in there placement as if they are going to convert the masses to the endorsers way of thinking just as if I must rush out and get the latest shoe or dress. Dress? Did I say dress? Oh well I guess the secret’s no longer…

It doesn’t make much sense to me when you pause to think about the use of some of these symbols. Take the cross as a symbol, as it stands for the suffering and ultimate death of a much revered person. Had he been hung by a rope or beaten by club would we so proudly display a hanging rope or a large club on our buildings and transport? The cross was used to kill people in very inhumane ways. Even a death by hanging is less cruel. Yet an instrument for torture and death gets promoted as a good thing? Then we have a fish which of course is supposed to have early Christian historical significance but today how many people know these stories or even care. As people drive down the road with cars and trucks with an ovoid sticker do some people become amused by it suggesting a fish tale?

I went online to Facebook today and saw the pages I wished to look at dotted with more brand endorsement.  Don’t these people understand how annoying this gets after awhile? If they saw ads for Vishnu plastered everywhere, what would they think?

Politicians stand up and declare their strong belief and faith then turn around and are incredibly dishonest. I’ve had friends and family who proclaim their undying support but I can’t trust their honesty or judgment. C’mon people have a little respect and tone the message down. For once I would like to be inundated with people living their lives in harmony with these religious artifacts, not screaming in my face about what they believe and how I need to conform.

I apologize if this offends someone that read this blog entry but I did warn you upfront and after all isn’t my opinion of value as well?

Can We Assume We Are Alone?

The sheer number and diversity of stars indicate the possibility the universe is brimming with life in forms perhaps unimagined by us. Others believe this planet is extremely rare and fortuitous that life has developed to the levels we witness on earth. Numerous scientists have and continue to explore the observable universe through radio spectrometry, advanced telescopic digitization and various probes, some of them launched decades ago.

Science fiction authors have written tomes about aliens of all sorts with desires for conquest with technology far in advance of our own. We have also read or listened to stories by people who say they saw a UFO or alien creatures. Some have gone so far as to declare they were temporarily abducted and observed by extraterrestrials.

There have been many popular movies and television programs capitalizing on the imagination of gifted and not so gifted authors. Few stray from a formula which includes beautiful women in peril, attempted conquest by aliens, advance weaponry with required pyrotechnics and a death ray or two.

Two possibilities exist: Either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.

- Visions : How Science Will Revolutionize the Twenty-First Century (1999) by Michio Kaku, p. 295

There is one movie however that didn’t try to be humorous, melodramatic or portray evil empires conquering hapless romantics in deep space.  Its primary authorship was by someone with an honors degree in physics, mathematics and applied astronomy. This author wrote a technical paper in 1945 originating the concept of communications through satellites. He described accurately how they function, a dozen years before the first Sputnik launch and awakening our technical world with its beeps.

Arthur C. Clarke wrote a short story “The Sentinel” in 1948, later adapted by Stanley Kubrick for the film 2001: A Space Odyssey which was released 40 years ago. This movie attempts to fill in where the prevailing scientific view, that simple organisms slowly and randomly developed over billions of years to become not only ourselves but everything that’s ever lived, doesn’t really do the job. This was well researched and brought forth by a gifted film maker and presents an unflinching look at what if we do have an encounter with superior alien intelligence. Will we be able to communicate or fathom the significance of the encounter?

From this 1968 movie about human contact with other extraterrestrial intelligence, we find a renown scientist in the 21^st century suggesting contact with other intelligent life forms might not turn out as optimistic as some want to think.

Aliens almost certainly exist but humans should avoid making contact, Professor Stephen Hawking has warned. 

In a series for the Discovery Channel the renowned astrophysicist said it was “perfectly rational” to assume intelligent life exists elsewhere.

But he warned that aliens might simply raid Earth for resources, then move on.

“If aliens visit us, the outcome would be much as when Columbus landed in America, which didn’t turn out well for the Native Americans,” he said.

Prof Hawking thinks that, rather than actively trying to communicate with extra-terrestrials, humans should do everything possible to avoid contact.

He explained: “We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet.”

from kubrick.com

Fiction films are commonplace but most of them deal with impossible worlds set in far-off futures, filled with death rays and weird monsters. In MGM’s presentation of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Stanley Kubrick has tried to imagine how things are really going to be a few decades.

“The most terrifying fact about the universe is not that it is hostile but that it is indifferent, but if we can come to terms with this indifference, then our existence as a species can have genuine meaning. However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light.”

Behind every man alive stand thirty ghosts, for that is the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living. Since the dawn of time, a hundred billion human beings have walked the planet Earth

Now this is an interesting number, for by a curious coincidence there are approximately a hundred billion stars in our local universe, the Milky Way. So for every man and woman who has ever lived, in this universe there shines a star.

But every one of those stars is a sun, often far more brilliant and glorious than the small, nearby star we call the Sun. And many-perhaps most-of those alien suns have planets circling them. So almost certainly there is enough land in the sky to give every member of the human species, back to the first ape-man, his own private world-sized heaven-or hell.

How many of those potential heavens and hells are inhabited, and by what manner of creatures, we have no way of guessing; the very nearest of them is a million times further away than Mars or Venus, those still remote goals of the next generation. But the barriers of distance are crumbling – one day we shall meet our equals, or our masters, among the stars.

Men have been slow to face this prospect. Increasing numbers, however, are asking: “Why have such meetings not occurred already?”

What are the beings that inhabit these worlds? Will we be able to recognize them or will they appear so alien that if we were to see them we should hardly know them as intelligent life at all? Will they be biological life forms, machines or even disembodied creatures of pure energy? will they be hostile towards us, or will they think that we are so primitive that they will pass us by and look elsewhere for other beings more nearly equal to them?

If we get a signal from outer space, what should we do about it? Should we answer it  and invite visitors, or should we ignore it and continue to live in the Universe as if we are alone? Or have we already been visited? Has some extraterrestrial civilization left artifacts for us to find?

If we find life in the Universe-perhaps beings more intelligent than ourselves, what will we come to think of ourselves, our problems and our struggles, all of which take place on an obscure rocky planet not far from one of billions of average stars?

ADDITIONAL CREDITS

According to an argument, made by scientists Carl Sagan and Stephen Hawking, it would be improbable for life not to exist somewhere other than Earth.

If we have learned one thing from the history of invention and discovery, it is that, in the long run — and often in the short one — the most daring prophecies seem laughably conservative.
ARTHUR C. CLARKE ~ The Exploration of Space (1951), p. 111

We stand now at the turning point between two eras. Behind us is a past to which we can never return…  The coming of the rocket brought to an end a million years of isolation … The childhood of our race was over and history as we know it began.
ARTHUR C. CLARKE ~ Exploration of Space (1952)

It is not easy to see how the more extreme forms of nationalism can long survive when men have seen the Earth in its true perspective as a single small globe against the stars.
ARTHUR C. CLARKE ~ The Exploration of Space (1951), p. 187

ARTHUR C. CLARKE ~ Predicts the Internet & Personal Computer

A 1974 explanation on future computers as well as their intercommunication. Not a bad prediction of the Internet before DARPA.

Searching for life On other Planets – we are NOT alone

Why Bureaucracies Fail – TSA

TSA Passenger Screening (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

So often the best of intentions and initiatives of a new organization become entangled in the reality of their own size and lack of accountability. I’ve written about the TSA before and it’s myriad of abuses as well as it’s failure to carry on it’s mission. Of course it’s easy for me to sit back and criticize as an arm-chair quarter back. The problems though are recognizable by many within and without and in order for this organization to be successful it must assess the value of criticism and evolve into a working productive protective organization.

I think perhaps no one is better qualified to assess the strengths and weakness in carrying out its mission than former head of the Transportation Security Administration, Kip Hawley,  His article in Why Airport Security Is Broken — And How To Fix It describes the problems and possible remedies. I recommend reading it, however here are a few highlights.

You know the TSA. We’re the ones who make you take off your shoes before padding through a metal detector in your socks. We make you throw out your water bottles. We’re on the evening news when someone’s grandma gets patted down or a child’s toy gets confiscated as a security risk.

More than a decade after 9/11, it is a national embarrassment that our airport security system remains so hopelessly bureaucratic and disconnected from the people whom it is meant to protect.  If you’re a frequent traveler, you probably hate us.

The crux of the problem, is our wrongheaded approach to risk. TSA’s job is to manage risk, not to enforce regulations.

There is a way out of this mess , here are five specific ideas for reform.

1. No more banned items: Aside from obvious weapons capable of fast, multiple killings—such as guns, toxins and explosive devices—it is time to end the TSA’s use of well-trained security officers as kindergarten teachers to millions of passengers a day.

2. Allow all liquids: Simple checkpoint signage, a small software update and some traffic management are all that stand between you and bringing all your liquids on every U.S. flight.

3. Give TSA officers more flexibility and rewards for initiative, and hold them accountable: No security agency on earth has the experience and pattern-recognition skills of TSA officers. TSA’s leaders must be prepared to support initiative even when officers make mistakes. Currently, independence on the ground is more likely to lead to discipline than reward.

4. Eliminate baggage fees: Much of the pain at TSA checkpoints these days can be attributed to passengers overstuffing their carry-on luggage to avoid baggage fees. The airlines had their reasons for implementing these fees, but the result has been a checkpoint nightmare.

5. Randomize security: Predictability is deadly. Banned-item lists, rigid protocols—if terrorists know what to expect at the airport, they have a greater chance of evading our system. To be effective, airport security needs to embrace flexibility and risk management—principles that it is difficult for both the bureaucracy and the public to accept. In America, any successful attack—no matter how small—is likely to lead to a series of public recriminations and witch hunts. But security is a series of trade-offs.

If Americans are ready to embrace risk, it is time to strike a new balance.

Transportation Security Administration officers (USA) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)