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Chrome To Drop http://

Chrome is by far my preferred browser these days. I have practically stopped using other browsers unless my job requires me to do so.  

I have many reasons for preferring Chrome. The main one being, that Chrome simply seems to be faster loading and more responsive than any others browser out there.

Today Mashable reports that the Chrome developers are about to remove the annoying "hhtp.//" from the URL-field in the browser:

When you see some text prefixed by “Http://”, you automatically assume that what follows is a web address, as defined by the Hypertext Transfer Protocol. The question is, since most web addresses are easily recognizable anyway, do you really need it? The developers of Google Chrome don’t think you do, so they simply chose to hide it in a developer version of Chrome.

It would appear that the solution is a bit tricky to carry out in real life. But I like the sentiment behind it: Namely that web browsing should be as user friendly an activity as possible. No geeks required for that ;-)

Get the full story at Mashable

Web Statistics - How Good Are The Tools?

Are you into web statistics and do you speak Danish? Then this link to a comparisson of webstat tools  might be of interest to you. 

The writer is Jacob Kildebogaard, who works for the Danish online consultancy firm Deducta.

The Nature of Good Design

Over at A List A Part Jeffrey Zeldman has some interesting thoughts on the nature of good web design.

"Although a great site design is completely individual, it is also a great deal like other site designs that perform similar functions. The same is true of great magazine and newspaper layouts, which differ from banal magazine and newspaper layouts in a hundred subtle details. Few celebrate great magazine layouts, yet millions consciously or unconsciously appreciate them, and nobody laments that they are not posters."

I think Jeffrey is spot on. Innovative web design is not characterized by fantastic fonts or groundbreaking css use. However there still seems to be an agenda (among web communicators too) to kick web design for not being as open to design creativity as print design. But web design shouldn't try to emulate print design. I agree with Jeffrey Zeldman who writes:

"The inexperienced or insufficiently thoughtful designer complains that too many websites use grids, too many sites use columns, too many sites are “boxy.” Efforts to avoid boxiness have been around since 1995; while occasionally successful, they have most often produced aesthetically wretched and needlessly unusable designs."

Amazon Down

Wow... apparently Amazon.com has been down for most of the day. Also the british Amazon site wasn't fully working when I visited it this evening.

Rare to see a giant power down for that long without any explanation.

Balmer Was Retroblogged

Microsoft CEO Steve Balmer visited the IT University in Copenhagen last week. The event was not blogger-friendly since computers and cameras weren't allowed in the auditorium (why on earth, I don't know).

But that's where retroblogging comes to the rescue. Assistent professor Lisbeth Klastrup took notes during the talk, then photographed the notes and uploaded them to the web as soon as the Microsoft boss had left the building.

"I ran up to my office [...] and took photos of my notes with my mobcamera and uploaded them to my moblog immediately. This is as close as you get to "real" blogging of a blogging-banned event, I think?!"

Very original solution. Immensely entertaining notes.

Technorati: Retroblogging | Steve Balmer

The Story Of A Scam

More and more Danes fall victim to scams on the web! That at least is the story in Danish paper Jyllands-Posten (yes, the infamous one) today.

The story focuses on a Dane who was scammed into paying 12.000 Euro for a car that he never received. The buyer allegedly thought the design of the sellers web page "looked trustworthy" and thus payed the money in advance (!!) by transferring it to an Italian bank account.

What annoys me about this story is that it portrays the web as a place where scamming has run amok. Yes of course there is scamming going on. But the case story is actually not about a web scam, is it? Making a guy pay money in advance to a seller he doesn't know for goods he hasn't received, is a scam that has probably been around a little longer than the web :-).

Yes, the web facilitated the scam. But it could probably have happened via other channels as well.

Sometimes journalists are simply a little quick to jump to the popular conclusion: The web is dangerous.

Get the full story (in Danish)

Technorati: Scam | Journalism

Regrets Of A Web Inventor

Okay this might be kinda of an old reference, but I've been out of the loop for a while. So if you're in a similar situation, here goes:

The British Computer Society (BCS) has posted an interview with the inventor of the World Wide Web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee. First question goes like this:

»Q: Looking back on 15 years or so of development of the Web is there anything you would do differently given the chance?

A: I would have skipped on the double slash - there's no need for it. Also I would have put the domain name in the reverse order - in order of size so, for example, the BCS address would read: http:uk/org/bcs/members [...]«

What a magnificent answer. It shows just how far the web has come in its development. In the beginning: primarily an instrument for scientific communication. Today: a tool for you, me and everbody else.

Exaggerated Uproar Over Cookies

American government agencies employ cookies to track visitors to their web sites. Only problem is that it is against the law.

»A 2003 government directive says that, in general, "agencies are prohibited from using" Web bugs or cookies to track Web visitors,« writes techie news site, news.com.

From a European perspective the whole discussion seems a little over the top. Could it possibly be that cookies are merely used for statistical purposes and not to spy on citizens?

Also, what sort of spying are web users supposed to fear from organizations like National Institute of Health and the Smithsonian Institution?

If agencies - it would be rational to suspect spying from - like the National Security Agency and Department of Defense - wanted to spy on their web site visitors wouldn't they use more succinct measures than cookies anybody can detect?

Technorati: Spying | Cookies

Wake-Up Call To Mainstream Media

They create, they publish and they rule the web! Who, you might ask. The newspapers? The network stations? The ad agencies? Nope, I'm talking about American teenagers half of which today create and share their own media creations online.

According to a survey from Pew Internet Studies a mind-boggling 57 percent of US-teens who use the Internet have a blog or web page or have posted original artwork, photography, stories or video online.

»Teens are often much more enthusiastic authors and readers of blogs than their adult counterparts. Teen bloggers, led by older girls, are a major part of this tech-savvy cohort,« writes Pew on its web site.

Wake-up call to Mainstream Media: Hello, you're looking at your audience of the not to distant future! They wont be satisfied by web pages that read like a book. And forget about trying to tell them what to think. They want to form and communicate their own opinion. In short: They're not taking any non-interactive cr..

So get your act together and communicate in a fashion that appeals to this web savvy audience!

...End of wake-up call :-)

Technorati: Blogs |Media

Google Suit Will Hurt Publishers

Google is being sued for it's plans to index and scan books from five major libraries. The suit is brought on by The Association of American Publishers who say that Google's Print Library Project will infringe their copyrights, reports BBC News.

The publishers and Google have tried to reach an agreement but haven't be able to do so. The Google project would enable Internet users to search throughout millions of printed books. But users wont be able to download and print an entire book or even read it on screen, They will only be able to view a few sentences from each printed work, states Google.

If that is really the case I think the suit seems sort of ridiculous and counter productive. Shouldn't the book industry be welcoming this kind of cool marketing. Wouldn't it be really good for book sales if users were allowed to find books via Google and sample them on the net?

To me there are more than one similarity between this case and the way the record labels fight file distribution. In stead of embracing the new technology and finding ways to make their product (and business) better by using it they decide to lawyer up and go to war against it.

Recently former VP of Napster Don Dodge explained how Napster originally tried to reach an agreement with the music labels (the RIAA) to sell their music but the RIIA wouldn't budge and instead Napster wound up being sued:
»The RIAA succeeded in shutting down Napster, but lost billions in potential revenue over the next several years to Gnutella, Grokster, Morpheus, Kazaa and others,« writes Dodge.

Hm... Is that what's in store for the court happy publishers?

Technorati: Law |Books |Google