Pod Presentations

There were several things that I liked tonight, but I think that creating a space, one that is somewhat unique was the overiding theme throughout all of the various presentations. I really think that in many respects, we can probably combine all of the pod's ideas, to make one simple, yet attractive online magazine. My suggestions would be having a space (i.e. a house) for which the reader/visitor can enter into. Within that house you will have the various themes suggested tonight, whether it is going down into a basement/fallout shelter, to going into a kids room where the comic book idea can be prevalent; going into a library where we have have the concept of a book and being able to turn the pages, could all mesh well in creating an interesting world of liturature and art.

In terms of being more pro active in trying to acquire submissions, I think that we as students have to take it upon ourselves to establish for example, a minimum number of submissions that we will each solicit and bring to the magazine.

Overall though, i think we now have an excellent start...the hard part now is how are we going to ultimately make the decisions as to where and how we want to proceed from here.

The Most Important Design Elements

If I was to provide advice to an online editor about the most important design elements that they could implement, here is what I would say:
First and foremost, they would have to concentrate on the attention grabbing or unique design that will serve to initially captivate the users attention and imagination. Essentially, what would you like to have your viewer see within the first three to five seconds of visiting your page.
Secondly, a web editor has to factor in the usability factor of his website. Although the initial image of a website is key to its success (especially when trying to grab one's attention), a potential user/viewer of the website must be able to navigate the site with ease, otherwise they will move on to the MILLION OF OTHER WEBSITES THAT EXISTS.
Additionally, the availability of the relevant information has to be readily available and easily accessible as well. I think that the key in keeping a user's attention (and possible return), is to avoid them getting frustrated in their search for information. Therefore, optimize what information you want to have, and decide by using an order of importance.
Listed below are a set of rules for which I found on a website (http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/01/31/10-principles-of-effective-web-design/) that discusses the 10 Principles of effective Web Design. They are as follow:

Don’t make users think
Don’t squander users’ patience
Manage to focus users’ attention
Strive for feature exposure
Make use of effective writing
Strive for simplicity
Don’t be afraid of the white space
Communicate effectively with a “visible language”
Conventions are our friends
Test early, test often