WordPress is smart -- really smart -- and I like that, but it requires the right input if you want to exercise its abilities. What follows are a few things I do to get the most out of WordPress's highly professional desktop-like web publishing features. Many of the tips I will offer carry over to the commenting side as well, not just article posting. Please know that I am not using the Visual Rich Editor so while most of the posting tips will apply, they may not be all shared.

The Simpsons and Linda Evangelista do haute couture in Paris in the latest edition of Harpers Bazaar. Fabulous illustrations by Julius Preite.

Via the wonderful people at NOTCOT.

To my complete and utter amazement, Jon Burgerman has agreed to create something truly, but unsurprisingly unique for this site. In doing so he has made me realise just how different a feel a new illustration can create, even when nothing else on a page changes.

I am proud to announce the recent launch of John Ferdinand, a luxury men’s lifestyle brand specializing in mens jewelry and all things nice. If you’re looking for a touch of sophistication and major wow factor these goods are definitely for you. John Ferdinand is the brainchild of Mark Armstrong and Perry Josito and i’m thrilled to be part of the Whitespace team to bring this stunning brand to fruition.

The launch collection, titled ‘Dreamer’ offers an escape from the urban jungle and sanctuary for all city dwellers. Each individual piece tells a story of its own, and is hand crafted and nurtured in Indonesia using Ebony wood from a sustainable source in Sulawesi.

Check out the site we laboriously worked on and reward yourself with some über unique bling that your conscience, friends will love you for. It’s worth it, trust me.

www.johnferdinand.com

What it is:

CircaVie, or “times of your life,” is a place to celebrate your life in an exciting new way … chronologically through an interactive timeline. Tell your life story or the story of your latest road trip, a day to remember, or a trip around the world. Any time, any picture, any video - mark it here and share it everywhere.

So all that’s nice. But what can you actually do with circaVie? Here’s one idea:

How it all started:

Back in February, my manager rang me up to talk about a new project based on a concept by AOL Developer, David McVicar. It was one of those “small team, quick turnaround” projects - one person on U/I, a project manager, four developers (off and on) an art director and a lead designer. The mission: to make a Flash-based web application that allows users to import photos and other media to create a visual timeline.

To be fair, there are other companies out there doing timeline web apps (OurStory, Xtimeline, EachDay.com and DandeLife to name a few), but David wanted to take his own approach. Of highest priority, make circaVie more “general audience” user-friendly (as opposed to being geared towards one segment) by being responsive to user input and easily integrating multimedia into the experience. Whew. Long sentence.

By the time I was brought into the fold a working prototype was already in progress - David began developing the concept in August 2006 after receiving an Innovation Grant to do social/personal timelines with photos and videos. Based on this initial test version, Jenna Marino constructed the wireframes while I created moodboards to nail down the look and feel. Here’s how the moodboards turned out:

Moodboard 01:

Moodboard 02:

Moodboard 03:

Moodboard 04:

Next up came the actual design, more UI revisions and meetings, meetings, meetings to discuss how the application would work, what the logo should look like and what we would be able to accomplish with the limited amount of time we had left. Corey Lucier (Flash Development), Jason Garber and Kelly Gifford (who both worked on the markup) took the finished design and voila! CircaVie was born.

The reception thus far as been pleasantly warm:

Mashable.com

“This is pretty neat: AOL has launched circaVie, an effortlessly simple (and well-designed) way to share timelines. The site provides a tool for creating Flash-based timelines: add photos, captions, text and links for all kinds of events.

Others can then view your timeline, scroll through it, skip to a certain date, search across all timelines, browse tags, embed timelines on other sites like MySpace (or AIMpages) and subscribe to a feed of that timeline. It is, in a word, neat. Someone needed to do timelines right, and I think they have. The next question is whether they can actually get the user base to sustain this thing.”*

*For an idea of how many users we have so far, check out the complete list of timelines already created (in less than one week!)

Other reviews:
SomewhatFrank.com
Blogowogo.com
webdev 2.0

A demo is available here (thanks demogirl!)

And a special thanks and congratulations to the circaVie team on a job well done!

David McVicar, Project Lead
Ari Kushimoto, Art Direction
Jayna Wallace, Design Lead
Jenna Marino, U/I Design
Corey Lucier, Flash Development
Kelly Gifford, Markup
Jason Garber, Markup
Dan Bradley, Operations

- Jayna

Here is the Steve-Jobs-hates-buttons (more like he has declared fatwa on buttons) story in short:

So the iPhone doesn't have buttons—buttons are the Great Satan.

Fine. Super. Dandy. That's great.

Look, when I can wave my hand over the screen to unlock the device and then call people by clinching my hand into a fist and then pointing all five fingers into the air then I'll be impressed.

And when I can mind control the person I'm talking to by waving said hand in a horizontal, left-to-right motion then I'll be even more impressed, like write-home-to-mom impressed.

Touchscreen be damned, lets not get all pat-on-the-back yet, there is still a lot of work to make this a technology miracle. Aside from the aforementioned missing features, I tried to use two iPhones as a hover-skates only to find that functionality has yet to be installed. And why am I still having to light cigars with a lighter or use a separate device to crack open lobster?

Minimalist indeed.

A friend from college visited me a few months ago and we played a few rounds of Wii tennis and he fell in love with the game and wanted one. Then I had to break it to him that it was still currently almost impossible to buy a Wii. He recently told me a story of his coworker tracking one down:

So my friend is walking through Wal-Mart on a Sunday morning and I guess it’s when the Wii shipment comes in because just as he’s walking past the video game area, he watches an employee put four Wii console boxes on the shelf. He picks up a Wii box and he’s reading the label for maybe 30 seconds. He looks back at the shelf, and the three other boxes are gone. Then someone taps him on the shoulder.

“You gonna buy that Wii you’re holding?” says the shoulder tapper.

“Yeah, I think I am.”

And he did.

Now that’s consumer demand for a successful product.