I'm (as I expected) really digging my new iPad at the moment (many thanks to Jess for that surprise birthday present!). And the app I was most looking forward to did *not* let me down. That app is Flipboard.

Flipboard

For those who don't know Flipboard (and its like) are part of a new breed of apps which are trying to help us make sense of the ever increasing rush of information which we are expected to consume on a day by day basis; it can be overwhleming so these new apps need to be our intelligent agents; sifting on our behalf.

Flipboard's main take on this is to try and present your (say) Twitter stream in a much more magazine like manner - and boy does it do a good job of it! Pages flip (hence the name) in a pleasing, tactile manner and the content is laid out in different sized sections depending on how *important* Flipboard thinks that particular blob of content is. Images and click-to-play videos flow beautifully with this type of approach. 

(Note: perhaps I'm being thick but I can't yet figure out on Flipboard how to see an aggregated feed of *all* of my stuff - I seem to have to select the 'channel', such as Twitter or Facebook, and then can only see that silo?)

Zite

The other app I'm playing with is Zite which, Flipboard, does a grand job of displaying content in a lovely, non-twitter-feed like way. Zite seems to come at the whole problem from a slightly different angle to that of Flipboard in the sense that, when you configure your Zite account, you select topics that you are generally interested in and, via voting topics up or down as you read them, you can influence the content you see over time; i.e. it tries to learn & adapt from your reading behaviour.

Voting Irregularties

My question, though, is this: how accurate is the Zite voting mechanism in representing and adjusting the overall content flow to my individual tastes? I mean, if I vote "yes" on an article about near field communication (NFC) & foursquare posted on the tech news site Techcrunch, what does that vote actually mean? Does it mean I seem more articles about NFC? Or more location based topics such as foursquare? Or (shudder!) simply more Techcrunch posts? There's a difference.

Be My Outer Perimeter

I do love these content aggregation services such as Flipboard & Zite and I'm all for any methods which can influence it & make my information feed more relevant to me. Anything which helps reduce noise & gives me more signal has got to be a step forward. Funnilly enough, RSS readers never did it for me - I need more intelligence than simply scanning my eye down a list of blogs in Google Reader  - I want the smart people I follow on (typically) Twitter to be my outer perimeter for news: sifting through the firehouse of updates and digging out the nuggets of gold. All for me!

But this whole thing of sorting signal from the noise is not an easy task - making sense of all the faves/retweets etc and turning that in a weighted stream of information? Not a trivial task. How can you programmatically work out what a (say) blog post is actually *about*? What it actually relates to? If (say) Flipboard can take a good stab at working out topics then we've got almost our own personalised newspaper with news, tech, sports sections tailored to our tastes.

I'd like that.

Joel

(note: please shout out if there are any other apps like Zite/Flipboard I should look at)

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Ok, the wait is over, my first bash at writing iPhone apps has been released into the app store - hurray!

The 'purpose' of my app is pretty simple; it's to answer the question which a lot of us (who produce websites) get asked: "So, how much does a website cost?" - this seemingly simple question poses problems for us web folk - it's like when Spock get's asked "how do you feel?" - it's not always an easy question to answer - it's like "how much does a house cost?" - it depends - and it's a topic which I've blogged about before on the Jojet company blog.

Anyway, the purpose of this post is not to get into a lecture about anwering that quesiton but to give us web folks a simple, fun way of answering it:

..in steps my app "How much does a website cost?"

Simply shake the app (or press the button) and, hey nonny nonny, a random price appears - saves you the trouble of asking all those pesky questions about what the website really should do etc :)

For (ahem!) advanced users you can also change the settings to set your own maximum and minimium values. See, this app is for big agencies as well.

Why did I create this?

The app is just a simple bit of fun really and was done just as a test for app development and getting used to the whole appstore release procedure. It paves the way for (hopefully) more sensible and useful apps.

Why does the app look a little crap?

Hey! That's a little rude! But, in fairness, I've not done a great job on styling - I'll put that on the radar for phase 2 ;) Or perhaps I'll get Russ Britton to open up his paint pots.

Why only Apple IOS?

Pure laziniess. The app was developed in the Appcelerator which should mean I can get it onto Android etc without too much fuss. Let's see how many people clammer at my door before I role up my sleaves there though...

What other apps am I doing?

Well, there's no Angry Birds in the pipeline but I am looking into useful utilities - stuff that scratches an itch I've got as I'm guessing that's an itch others will share. And, as I'm now a proud own of an iPad, I'll be looking there too. Oh, I'm also looking to write some apps to go alongside my pet love Instagram.

How much money do I think my app will make?

Zero. It's free.

Why are you not tough enough to write in Objective-C?!

Again, a little harsh there! Currently I'm more interested in the general landscape of developing for mobiles - Appcelerator allows that. I am looking into IOS dev to gain more knoweldge but I doubt very much that i"ll be dreaming in Objective-C anytime soon. I'm more interested in knowing what I can and cannot acheive for my clients; whether I develop that myself or get someone else to do it.

If you've any other questions or suggestions for the app, please let me know. You can normally find me on Twitter, slumped at the bar, near the pinball machine.

Joel

p.s. oh! If you're wondering why the app has so many disclaimers it's because Apple rejected it the first time round - Jeez, it seems pretty obvious it's not a *real* website quote machine! But hey, they've got to cover their arses I suppose...

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As you may or may not know, I'm an avid Instagrammer (my wife Jess would use a different word), so much so that I'll be prattling on about Instagram at an upcoming event (pity those poor fools in advance I say ;)

I'm fascinated about how Instagram (IG)  has blitzed what was an already crowded marketplace for photo apps - they had just the right balance of functionality & simplicity: an intoxicating mixture which has fueled their amazing growth.

I'm equally fascinated about the culture of IG: what properties are unique to it? What does the platform do well? What does it lend itself to? How can it help business? How does it fit in the broader social media spectrum? etc.

Your Help Required (please!)

To help make my presentation more interesting I'd like to get you to do all the work find out your insights into IG:

• What do you like/dislike about IG?
• What do you think about the culture?
• What interesting ways have you seen it used by people and brands?
• Where do you think IG is going? Video?
• What is the #1 feature you'd like to see on IG?
• What is your all time fave IG photo? (I'd like to show case a few in the presentation)

I can't promise to use all the material in the presentation but I'll certainly be sure to mention it somewhere; I'm guessing in a follow on blog post about your feedback & the presentation etc.

Please give feedback in whatever way you want, here in comments, on Twitter or keep it real in Instagram. The choice is yours.

Many, many thanks in advance for any input you can give on this. You rule :)

Joel

p.s. Here are some of my other posts on Instagram 

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With two young kids it was hardly surprisingly that Christmas generated a lot of material for the recycling. Torfaen (where I live) have only just recently begun cardboard collection so that's a step in the right direction but I'm still uneasy about the shear amount of all of this rubbish. This got me thinking...

 Kids packaging (or breakfast cereal boxes for that matter) have typically been through some heavy duty printing: with numerous inks & finishes etc. I doubt that there is much that can be recycled from the energy spent on the printing aspect (but please shout out if you have any thoughts).

That being the case, what if there were a much more Draconian legislation on the recyclability of packaging? What if the cardboard/material had to be ultra-recyclable? What if only a tiny % of the packaging surface area could be printed on and, even then, only an ultra-low impact, monotone ink were used?

You're probably thinking that this would lead to some pretty uninspiring packaging - brown text on brown cardboard. And I'd have to agree with you.

But what I was thinking was this.…

What if you viewed that boring packaging through your smart phone (or, better still, some sort of wearable "shopping glasses") then the packaging could spring into life; your smart phone would recognise the packaging and would, in realtime, superimpose hires (environmentally friendly!) artwork onto it. Pick the box up and rotate it in your hands, and you'll see the artwork.

How would the smartphone/glasses recognise the product? Could be via bar code, QR code, snap tags. It would then consult an online database and retrieve the associated digital artwork to superimpose.

How would it position the artwork? Well, this is one for the image people but I'd say there are markers/symbols on the packaging so that the software "knows" how that package is oriented & what to render where (this reminded me of the "Space Vision System" on the Internation Space Station).

Print is Dead

 But of course we mustn't just think of static 2D artwork - let not the old print world constrain us - the superimposed packaging could be multimedia of course: product slideshows; video, latest reviews of the product etc. Perhaps the retail outlet itself might control some aspects of the packaging which can help with up sell/cross sell (e.g. "Want the GI Joe with the rubber hand grip as well? Go to aisle 4").

Personalised Packaging

 Furthermore there is a fantastic opportunity to weave in identity; what if the packaging presented you was personalised to your needs/tastes? E.g. a child might want to see the toy being played with but a parent my prefer more emphasis on safety features/recommendations?

Shopping Glasses

Shopping at toys-r-us would be a completely different experience! Without your smartphone (or "shopping glasses") you'll see rows of bland, environmentally friendly packaging. With your glasses on, you'll have a shopping data layer. Want to see all the toys which are suitable for under 8's and which your friends rate? Sure! Highlight those but leave everything else dimmed.

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Instagram, Apple iPhone App of 2011, is supposedly coming to the Android platform in the very near future. It therefore seems a good time to post some IG pro tips I've accumulated over the year (and by "pro" I mean someone-who-spends-far-too-much-time-fiddling-with-Instagram than anything to do with my level of photography!).

The basic usage of the Instagram (IG) app is actually pretty straight forward: you take your piccy, optionally apply a filter and then optionally share it to multiple social networks of your choice (and it's this simplicity which has been the rocket fuel of its amazing success this year). Interestingly though, you don't have to share to Twitter/Facebook etc as IG is a social network in its own right (it shares the same concept of following/followers as Twitter). 

So, without further ado, let's take a look at some of my tips:

1) Username?

If you're a twittererer then I'd say it makes good sense to keep your usernames the same (mine, on both, is joel_hughes). If you can't, you can't but it's worth bearing in mind.

2) Follow Policy

I treat IG differently to Twitter in that I am very strict on viewing all the photos of the folks I follow. This means that the more you follow, the more work there is for you to review: I can stay on top of the 130 I follow but it can be a struggle. (Note: if somone follows you and they are following hundreds or thousands of people then, in my opinion, it's a bit of an empty compliment - they ain't paying attention).

This tip is particularly important because, when some folks first join IG they mistakenly use the "follow all from Twitter" approach. Don't! Just because you follow someone's tweets doesn't mean you'll like their photos of rusty sheds ;)

3) Follow Back?

I don't feel the need to follow everyone back as this would impact on point (2). Also, you'll find snappers who excel in the same area: e.g. there's quite a few who take pictures of old signs but, for my attention span, I'll just follow @recapturist.

Note: it took me a while to get used to the asyemtric nature on IG but, when I embraced it, things made a lot more sense. And it even impacted how I think about Twitter; i'm now less worried about who follows me back on Twitter (not that I stayed up all night crying before though!). If you create interesting content and people are interested in it then things will happen of their own accord.

4) What should I take photos of?

Obviously you can take & post photos of whatever you damn well please (within reason!) but, for me, I tend to like photos of rusty sheds, texture etc etc; I won't put loads of photos of the kids/family up as I've got Facebook & Path for that.

I tend to take photos of a range of subjects but some folks are a lot more focussed. We've already mentioned @recapturist but take a look at @liljeberg - he has a fantastic eye for urban typography and doesn't it look great when viewed as a single feed?! I'll touch on this point again later...

5) How often should I post?

Like Twitter there is no easy answer to this but it is important to try respect other people's streams. I tend to post max 5 a day. If I post more then I'd only do so if I was sure that the shot was worth sharing and I'd try to space the time out. No-one likes an attention hog.

6) Don't post your test shots...
This follows on from point 5 really. Don't post 10 shots of your feet in the sand when 1 or 2 will do. Be a harsh critic of your own stuff. Self editting is your friend.

7) Tags/Hashtags
Tags work pretty much exactly the same as hashtags on Twitter. They allow you to group your photos into different segments - this can give much greater visibility to your snaps as people do a lot of searching of tags on IG.

For instance, i'm a big fan of rust, decay etc and, no surprise, there are tags which help group those shots together (us weirdos like to group :) - and that groups people across the whole of the IG community - not just me & my following/followers. It's one big old melting pot of photography love :)

To add a hashtag (sorry, I always say hashtag even though IG just say tag, old habits die hard) just add it in the comment of your photo (they start with a # just like on Twitter).

Note: And this is a big gotcha, you cannot add tags to other people's photos! Well, IG allows you to add them but the tagging has has no effect; if you then search on the hashtag, the tagged photo is not there. Remember,: only the author can successfully tag a photo.

8) But which tags should I use?
Well, obviously this does depend to a large degree on your photo but as a general rule you can spot tags on other peoples posts and use this as a starting point - click on the tag to see what the stream looks like (and if contains lots of photos then you know it is a popular one).

Another good way is to use the IG search facility right there in the app:

- click on profile
- click on search Instagram
- click on tags

If you search on (say) "door" it will list out matching searches and, more importantly, how many pictures they contain - this tells you which are the popular ones. Use this method for tag research.

9) Getting Followed

We're all a little vain; hey, isn't that the purpose of social networking? To show off a bit? And our vanity is pampered when we get some people interested in what we do.

A simple receipe for getting more followers on Instagram is:

• post great content: think about what you want your subject(s) to be, edit well.
• Interact with the community; like and be liked. Don't like TO be liked though.
• Use (don't overuse) hashtags

Easy huh?

10) Apps

Im not going to go into detail about the full range of apps I use (that'll be a good post on it's own) but I will say that you don't have to do all/any of your editting on the IG app itself; there are plenty of other options. Here are some:

• Camera+, wonderful features and some great filters (try 'clarity')
• Picgrunger, magic at aging an image
• Gyrocropper, great for straightening those lines
• Magichour, loads of great effects
• 6x6, a lovely, medium format looking retro camera app. Shoots in IG dimensions.

11) Competitions

Some folks have a lot of followers on IG and they've taken it on themselves to launch competitions to help keep everyone interested. A great example of this is JoshJohnson, Josh is very active in the community and regular runs competiions where, for example, the the topic is black and white. It usually works where there is a specific hashtag for the competition and people submit an entry to a competiton by tagging the photo with that hashtag etc.

Why do this? Again, it helps meet like minded people - find great people to follow and, perhaps, find peope to follow you.

12) Personal Hashtags

This is another subtle use of the tags facility and works well if you post pictures across a broad spectrum of topics. E.g. I sometimes post pictures of door knockers (with the usual hilarity about the word knockers); now, if someone is interested in one of my pictures of knockers (watch it!) then they probably will be interested in seeing ALL of my knockers (ahem!).

Therefore, I tag such pictures of mine with the #jh_knockers hashtag, this tag is for me & me alone. And if you click on the tag you will see my knockers in all their glory. 

I've posted about personal hashtags before.

13) DSLRs

This is a quite an emotive one. A lot of folks think that IG is for photos taken on the iPhone only. this is kinda fair enough but I'm a little less puritanical about it. My take is that IF you do post photos you took on your lovely Canon 550 then let people know via the comments, add a #dslr tag or something. Make it obvious.

I'll spot a DSLR photo straightaway primarily because, 9 times out 10, the editting for IG's square format will be poor/non-existant with black bands to the top or sides of the photos - looks awful. Golden rule? It's hip to be square. Don't be lazy with the editting.

14) Links

This, again, is a bit of a gotcha. If you add a link to a comment on a picture then IG will NOT turn it in to a clickable hyperlink - so it's pretty useless. A workaround which I've seen some people use is to reappropriate their main profile URL for this need; they'll say something like "click on my profile link to read the blog post". Clever.

15) Sharing

Don't forget that you can really go to town on your sharing settings. Yes you can share to Facebook but you can also share to a Facebook Page (ideal for businesses). You can share to Foursquare, Tumblr and, obviously, Twitter. Now I'm selective about what goes where though - I don't put everything on Twitter as I don't think it's fair on my community there; however, if I were a photograper (like @hjphoto) then perhaps it would make sense to share all between the to. It all depends. 

So, hopefully you found that interesting. Please pity me as I lost half of this fricking post when Posterous played up (a Wordpress move is closer & closer). 

Plase shout out if you have any more and I'll try to add them in.

Joel

Updates

 21st Dec 2011 - Oh, and people who watermark their photos? Good grief, this isnt The Tate?!

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My social network is spread out over an increasingly large set of websites and services: Twitter (and company account), blogging (x2, this one and my company blog), Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, Instagram etc. And I can only see this net widening.

Now one "cop out" approach to dealing with multiple networks is to simply join them up so that everything that appears of Facebook is auto-tweeted to Twitter or LinkedIn etc. Personally I find this a bit crazy though...they're different platforms with different characteristics & constraints.

My preference is to selectively flag which messages (if any) should flow from one network to another (and I'd only do this when it is relevant and maked sense).

However, this still presents issues, consider this tweet I posted recently:

"let's have some public sympathy for @huwphoto - he stuck £50 worth of unleaded into his diesel motor. ("oh bugger!")"

As familiar Twitterereers will know, when a word starts with a @ then it's a Twitter username and the referenced Twitter account holder (in this case @huwphoto) will be informed that you have said something about them. Furthermore Twitter is clever enough to spot the username in the tweet and make it a link it to the relevant profile page - this makes it much easier for people reading the tweet to discover more about Huw. So far, so cool.

So, if I allowed this update to flow from its native Twitter to (say) Facebook, then the message would still pretty much make sense in FacebookLand...apart from this:

@huwphoto means absolutely nothing in the world of Facebook - it is a valueless currency. People reading this Facebook status update (which is what it now is) would not be able to click on @huwphoto and be taken to a relevant profile page; no, that's been broken by taking it out of the context of Twitter. Facebookers would have to recognise that it was originally a tweet and that @huwphoto was actually a Twitter username.

In short we've experienced a disconnect here.

You say tomato, I say tomato...

Not that Facebook cannot do person/business tagging; it certainly can, and it's very slick. It has it's own system for doing it. E.g. whilst you are creating a Facebook status update, type an '@' and it'll start trying to autocomplete usernames. These usernames then serve as links to relevant Facebook profile pages. Cool!

So both services have their tagging approaches but they are pretty much incompatible.  

Say Cheese!

The same type of disconnect happens if I allow photos posted in Instagram to feed through to (say) Twitter.

To give you some background, on instagram (IG) I entertain my particular penchant for taking photos of old sheds, rusty items, doors etc - not everyone's cup of tea I admit but there is a community of crazy horses there who like that kinda stuff.

So, let's imagine that if I've taken a photo of a particularly beautiful shed, I might include this title:

"Another sexy shed for my #jh_sheds collection. And one for @elinlia to take a look at. #shed #sheds #shedporn"

In the above: @elina references a IG user and, on IG, this will work in a similar way to Twitter: the IG user will be informed that I've mentioned them so that they can intereact etc.

Hashtags (or simply "tags" as IG calls them) are as important on Instagram as they are on Twitter as it gives your photos much greater visibility. In the case above, I'm adding it to the #shed, #sheds & #shedporn searches.

(Note: the #jh_sheds is an Instagram concept I stumbled across to group your own photos)

Insta-sharing

A killer feature of Instgram is that it makes it dead easy to share to other networks. So, if I wanted this photo to flow out of the IG community and into (say) Twitter then I could easily do so but note the following complications:

1) @elinlia also MEANS something in the syntax of the Twitter language: in this instance I'm accidently mentioning a Twitter user. Now there happens to be no Twitter user called that so I'm sure you can see how confusing that might appear in Twitter. To avoid this, If folks do have an IG and a twitter account then many (like me) will try to keep the usernames the same.

2) the hashtags also share the same syntax as Twitter and will work (although, probably not as the original IG poster intended!). In Instagram, it is quite common (if a little risqué) for IG tags around a certain subject to contain "porn" in the title (eg #doorporn, #woodporn, #rustporn, #skyporn etc). Now, IG users are familiar with seeing the "porn" word but Twitter users may well be confused or concerned.

It's ok, don't worry, it don't meta...

An answer, obviously, is to be careful about what potentially proprietary "meta" elements you allow to flow from network to network (as they will more than probably not work as intended - if at all). In the case of IG, I tend to provide a simplified title if I know that I will be flowing it into Twitter: I can always add in IG tags or mentions as another comment to achieve the desired IG results (these subsequent comments do NOT flow to twitter and therefore avoid the issues).

The End

As social networks evolve I think we'll become smarter about not only which message goes where but what meta accompanies it. Also, social networks probably need to evolve to allow better marshalling and mapping of meta information like usernames & hashtags between systems (where it makes sense).

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A friend on Twitter just asked me how things were going at Jojet (my company) and this sparked a post that I've been meaning to do for a while...

Jojet has been running 10 years this year, I should have made more of this milestone but hey ho, when your nose is to the grindstone, you can easily miss "bigger picture" things. The company started off simply as a contracting shell (typical in my IT industry) but about 5 years ago I steared it into more of a small business proper; and, that's where the fun began!

Me, Myself & I

Jojet is mainly just me but, as I'm from a freelance background, I am able to bring on board other freelancers when the project dictates (typically for extra design or programming work). On top of this I work with some great associates when required (such as the uber talented Russell Britton of Brandnatter - exceptional branding brain).

I've considered expanding into full time staff but this seems such a big leap. I'm comfortable with the structure at the moment as it can certainly flex to cope with quite big projects. However, in a few years, a team might well be a route forward...

The first couple of years

In hindisght I can now see that the first couple of years were very much "jeez! can this baby actually fly?" - discovering all the elements of running a business (things are pretty shletered in the IT contracting world) and seeing if you could make them work.

In this period I was completely clueless as to:

- who my customers were

- what my offerings truely were

- what I was good at (and and what I was bad at)

- ...and more

The Midde Ages

The recession hit like a mutha a few years ago and I won't pretend that Jojet escaped without any scars. But survive it did, and along the way I got a little bit more knoweldage and wiser about all the other non-geeky things it takes to run a business.

Which leads rather neatly to where we are now...

Brave New World

This year has been good; enjoyable work and quite a lot of it. I won't pretend that I've discovered a fantastic marketing approach (probably more luck than judgement) but I do know that getting myself out there more (blogging, twitter, workshops, seminars) has really increased my visibility & referrability. This approach tends to fit neatly with my more "content marketing" view of things - create good stuff, tell people about it and things will happen - *not overly greasy infomerical products - just plain old good content. 

I'm happier in my role as the overseeing, project managing Internet strategy chap; working out what's what for clients, assembling the right team for the job & then delivering. As someone who can design & build websites (inc nerdy database stuff) etc, I've found it tricky to let go of certain aspects but let go you must if you are to concentrate on what you are good at - you can't spin too many plates or something will hit the floor (or, more to the point, the fan).

The next steps for me/Jojet include:

Taking another look at the brand/identity - the name Jojet was born out of a flippant 5 minutes, 10 years ago. I'll be getting Russ to take a good hard look at that aspect - at the end of the day people buy from me so maybe that needs to be raised a bit, we'll see.

Better structure on products/services - Russ has done a great job of thinking through what he does and this translates well to the web and, more importantly, to initial conversations with potential clients.

Further definition on target audience and hone in the marketing on that. I like writing blogs posts, videos, podcasts, speaking, teaching etc - just need to make sure that is tuned to who I need to reach.

My good friend Phil Cheesman will also be of invaluable help when it comes to asking the hard questions about the business and getting to the bottom of products/services etc. Phil is a star.

To End

So, to answer the question "how are things at Jojet?" - pretty good - I see moving into 2012 very much about stepping up - putting the business house in order and moving things up a few notches. Onwards & upwards and all that...

Joel

*What do I mean by this? You know, when you get to a website and there's a popup to download a free e-book or sign up for a newsletter etc. I've got nothing against those particular routes it just how you want to present them to people: when someone answers the door to you, do you talk to them politely or do you wedge the door open with your foot whilst you rattle off the patter? Me no likey hard sell.

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His career & track record of products is pretty bloody impressive: iMac, iPod, iPhone and more recently the iPad. Something you had to admire about him was his certainty of his being right; of him knowing the right way (and not worrying about focus groups) - not giving too much credence to what others say (which, in fairness, must have made him pretty tough to work for). 

His ability to bounce back after being booted out of Apple, to see the value in Pixar and then to come back to Apple and turn things around is a testament to persistence and vision. 

The recent iPad is a great example, he launched it in his typical charismatic fashion at a keynote with many industry experts braying that Jobs & Apple had got it wrong; after all, surely other companies had tried tablet computers before?!

However, it was the industry experts who were wrong...

Jobs knew (and has instilled in many of the top quality  people at Apple - such as Jony Ive) that the products which set the public's imagination alight are the ones that magically craft technology with design; you've got to get the balance just right - too much in either direction and you have a turkey on your hands (and in fairness, Apple had a few of those - but not recently). This appreciation of technology and design (and design with the end user in mind) is what set Apple apart - this and a willingness to do what they think is right - not simply to do what the rest of the industry is doing.

I hope that Jobs instilled the confidence to make such bold decision in Tim Cook and the rest of the senior management - they'll need it.

RIP Steve Jobs - would have been good to see what you would have got up to in the next 15 years but it wasn't to be. Damn shame

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The Rugby World cup has kicked off and, as an avid fan, my twitter stream will be full of witty insights (ahem!) and cross chat on the popular #rwc #rwc11 & #rwc2011 hashtags.

However, I want to be sensitive to my regular followers (sweet aren't I?) - some of whom may not give two figs about rugby (it's crazy but true) - surely there is a way to protect them from the barrage of tweets I shall emit when Wales destroy South Africa tomorrow (ahem again!)?

...luckily there is

I've created a new Twitter account called "@chSport" (short for "Channel Sport").

However, this account will NOT tweet; so what is its purpose?

Well, its beauty relies on a quirk of twitter where if I begin a tweet with @chSport then only my followers who *additionally* follow @chSport will see the tweet - so it's sort of like an opt in.

You might ask: "but hey, it's a tall ask to get all folks interested in rugby/sport to follow this?", the answer (& the beauty) is that they don't really have to, you'll see.

So, this is what i'll do (and so can you):

1) prior to the match announce that I'll be using the @chSport channel & my followers can follow the account if they want to see my tweets (follow @chSport sort of "unlocks" those tweets). Obviously my @chSport tweets will still be visible on profile and the searches.

2) I'll prefix the majority of my rugby tweets with @chSport but I'll also add the #rwc, #rwc11 & #rwc2011 hashtags to get the tweet into the correct searches (where all the fun is to be had!)

...and that's it!

The folks who are not interested in rugby (and, therefore have elected NOT to follow @chSport) will be spared my tweets as Shane Williams dazzled with 5 tries against the springboks ;)

If some of my rugby loving followers get the message and follow @chSport they'll see all of my rugby tweets in their timelines - if they don't then they'll see my tweets in the previously mentioned hashtag searches.

Shout out if you any questions...

Ps yes I've tweeted about this concept before but as I'm actually going to use it from tomorrow then I may as well blog again now.

Pps I previously referred to this concept as "shush" accounts; but I think 'channels' makes more sense :)

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Nowadays I tend to describe myself as an Internet Strategist...that's not because I got bored of the term "web designer" and decided for something more poncey sounding - I do this for a very good reason: I tend not to design websites any more. I am  more of the person who works out what is appropriate for a person or business to do online and then gets all of that done. I may do the design, the build, the blog setting up, the training etc etc...or I may not. I may set up a team to do it. It all depends. 

Either way I often find myself in a situation where I have to describe what "Internet Strategy" is and, before to long, I tend to find myself talking through an example Internet Strategy structure which can work for a lot of businesses (obviously it's not a perfect fit but you get the idea).

1) A Website

Ok, perhaps this is blindlingly obvious but we're not talking about any old website here. We're talking about a highly polished shop front (or eCommerce site etc - depends on your business) which is geared up to appeal to your target audience (or audiences). It'll be based on your brand (you do have one, whether it is formalised or not) and will perfectly show case what it is you do. It'll succinctly answer the key questions your audience have and will clearly signpost them as to what you want them to do next. Fine. I think most of us can agree on that.

2) A Blog

A lot of businesses and professional folks I do websites etc for know their industry inside out. They have an enormous depth & breadth of knowledge on the peculiarities of their sector. Now the beauty of blogs is that they give voice to this easily overlooked (and killer) aspect - blogs are great outlets for building up your reputation and more. This blog post for example, you may disagree with some of my points (or all of them!) but most people will walk away from it thinking that "fair enough, he seems to know what he is talking about when it comes to websites and all that guff" - in which case, job done. Further more this blog post will be indexed (and findable) on Google in a matter of minutes; instant SEO.

Blogs are also great if you are a photographer or some other image heavy content creator. For example, I went to see a superb artist in Cardiff a few weeks ago; the sketches he fires off each morning are perfect blog post material; instead they lay dormant in sketch books; why not put great content to work?

3) Twitter

I say Twitter because I'm more of a Twitter person but this could well be any old mix of the current social media channels doing the rounds (Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+ etc). You need to be on folks radar - there's not much point being a hidden treasure hoping that Indiana Jones will find you. You need to be where the party is at if you are to be easily  recommended for work; ever tried to recommend someone on Twitter who is NOT on Twitter? It is painful. Why make life hard for youself?  Again, Twitter and social media are a cracking way for your bottled up knowledge, experience and personality to be out there in the big wide world (and if they are out there they are findable).

Joining up the dots

So, what I've described above is hardly rocket science but there is a killer element which also has to be included: cohesiveness. By which I mean that ALL of the elements of your Internet Strategy have to be working together well; they need to cogs in a well oiled machine - not independant & disconnected islands; a jigsaw only works when you put the pieces together correctly.

Some examples of 'joining the dots' include:

• Your website show cases your blog. Giving voice to it and allowing folks to jump off to it if they so desire.
• Your website showcases your Twitter feed. Giving voice to it and allowing folks to jump off to it if they so desire.
• Your blog points back to everything else as well (as above); we have to sign post where we are online! - elimiate the guess work.
• Your email signature & business cards & other collateral also mention your blog, Twitter, LinkedIn.
• Your offline marketing is aware and makes reference to all the above (very rarely happens!)
• You have some idea of how you wish to manage & measure all of the above.
• You spend time in the social networks you have time to spend time in (hmm...get your head around that one!). Put another way, you do NOT create a blog, a twitter account, a myspace page etc and then completely forget about them (I call this the "disused matress left out to rot in your front garden for all to see syndrome").

By drawing the elements of your Internet Strategy together in a cohesive way you are bringing order to your troops - you are getting them all singing from the same song sheet (is there an award for mixing metaphors?). By treating them as independent islands you are missing a trick; and that trick is Internet Strategy.

Obviously all of the above is not right for every business but hopefully it is a good starting point for discussing Internet Strategy in the context of your business.

If you are looking to better promote and market your business online - especially in the area of Internet Strategy then why not contact me (I don't bite!) or take a looksie around my main website. I typically work with companies or self employed professionals in the South Wales and South West region of the UK but I am flexible. 

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Recently we bought a tent...no, hang on, let me say that again, my wife bought the tent...and I was instructed to get the bloody thing working.

The tent is an Vango Athena 600 - it's meant to be a great tent so I'm sure we've made a good choice. Obviously I had a Frank Spenceresque nightmare trying to put the damn thing up the first time BUT, in my defence, I'd say this:

Grizzle 1 - The instructions are gibberish. 

The instructions are printed on the tent packaging and, for the life of me, I struggled with the detangling the sentences; they just don't make sense! Perhaps I'm thick? Or perhaps I'm typical of a standard newbie to tents...but isn't that exactly whom the instructions should be targeting?

I found a copy on the instructions online here - I had no idea when I was meant to try get the tent arches in there air - admittedly I'm a bit of a plank with tents but hey!, that's not my fault! Have Vango ever given this tent to a newbie family and just observed? To see how they struggle with it and thought - "ah! ok, let's do a better job with the instructions!" - the quicker & easier to get the tent up - the happier campers we'll all be; the more likely we'll be to say "yeah, Vango...those tents rule! I recommend them".

Grizzle 2 - The Invisible Tent?

So my first portal of call with the rather sleek looking Vango website. I dutifully did a product search on "Athena" and it came up blank. That's odd I thought. Why is my tent not there? (A Google search did finally throw up the product page on their website - it's funny how often Google search is often waaaaaaaaaaaay better than search built in to a website).

Further Internet investigation reveled that the Athena 600 is actually a rebadged version of the Samara 600 when it is sold through Go Outdoors - how is the average punter meant to know this? And if support on the Vango website doesn't mention this name then this is double trouble!

Grizzle 3 - No website help

After my first erection attempt (yes, ha ha! that's what I thought it was called) I scolded myself saying "of course the instructions would be cack! Why don't I go on-line and see what real people are saying about this thing?" 

So, my pulse quickened when, on visiting the Vango website, I saw a support link for "Pitching videos" ("Ah!" I thought, "it's called 'pitching' eh? thank the Lord I don't have to say 'erection' any more...")

Sadly, my joy was short lived as there was no video for my model (or the other model name of 'Samara').

Now I'm not being funny but exactly how long would it take Vango to produce a video for each new tent they launch? 30 mins? Come one!

Grizzle 4 - the videos

So I thought I'd take a look at any of their videos (where the tent looked a little similar) just to see what I could glean.

Here's an example:

The video kicks off with a slick intro graphic and that you're hit with the musak. No, no no...that's not what I wanted. I was looking for a simple video (could be rough and ready, shakey camera work, I don't care - this aint A Room With A View) with a voice over. Yes, I want to hear some geezer (or lady) talking a newbie through all the bits and bobs. I don't want to see two experts at work - I want to see a layman do it. Experts can get this baby up with out a video.

Grizzle 5 - Social Media

As an avid Twitterer I thought "aha! let's tweet em!" so I tweeted this:

"@vango guys, I haven't had much joy with my first attempt with pitching my Athena 600. is there a video I can see? Ta"

https://twitter.com/#!/Joel_Hughes/status/99829446223216640

I tweeted on a Saturday morning so I wasn't expecting a response immediately (even though that would have been cool, I mean, most folks will be struggling with these things on the weekend right? So that would be a good time to staff the customer service front lines?). So, no, I wasn't massively surprised to have no response on the weekend. But I was surprised to have nothing on Monday. And on and on. Where did my tweet go? I can see from their Twitter stream that they do respond to folks.

I'll nudge them again and see what happens (11:00 am 9th Aug 2011). (update 18th of Aug - no response).

To End

In fairness I'm sure I'll get this tent 'pitched' but I just feel that something has gone awry here. I mean Vango have a good reputation for tents, they have a nice branding etc. So why was I left flailing. To me the brand had not been carried through to all aspects of the business, namely:

- the cack instructions on the packaging, these really are a joke to a newbie

- the missing product from the website

- the lack of video per product

- the lack usefulness of the videos

- the (lack of) social media response (don't they track their brand keywords?!)

If some/all of the above had been addressed better than I would be walking away beaming about the experience and the biggest advocate for the brand. As it is, I'm not. This is a massive wasted opportunity for them.

If they have competition out there (and I'm sure they do), there are massive areas here where they can capitalise. 

Joel

p.s. this afternoon we're about to head off for our first camping jaunt with the tent. Wish us luck - we need it ;)

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I'm a big Instagram user and, now that I've been using it for a while, I'm getting a hang of some of the more subtle and advanced ways of using it. I've found a cool techniqe for using tags but first I'd better set the stage...

Hashtags

Instgram (IG) has hashtags very much like Twitter (but IG just calls them "tags"). And these tags work in a very similar way. For example, I like to take pictures of doors (don't laugh!), here's an example...

However, if I use tags then I can be a bit cleverer. E.g. if I add the tag "#door" to my picture (via the original photo title when I uploaded or by a subsequent comment I add to it) then I add my picture to the (as of today) 14,458 other photos tagged as #door.

Why do this?

Well, apart from the fact that it's a 'cool thing(tm)' to be able to cut a swathe through the IG pictures and to see just "doors" there are some other reasons:

- if people are tagging photos then people are searching on them

- if people are searching on tags then your photos are more findable

- if your photos are more findable then your photos are more likeable and you're more followable

If you're not sure what tags to use then you can always use the search facility on the app as this helps (or keep an eye on what other folks are using). But the cool thing is that you can add tags to your photos at any time (I'm constantly going back to add relevant tags).

Personal Hashtags

Ok, now we've covered the basics of tags I want to move onto the main thrust of this post...personal tags. What are these?

Well, it struck me the other day that there are a few themes which run through my IG stream:

• doors
• ships, boats
• letterboxes
• texture
• walls
• sheds (I kid you not!)

Now obviously I'm already using the techniques mentioned earlier to tag these photos. This allows my snaps to be more findable and, just as importantly, it gives me a way to find people interested in the same odd stuff as I am.

However, I got to thinking that it would be cool if I could group my own work. E.g. I would like people to be able to see just my doors, my sheds. 

So, I started creating a set of my own tags:

• #jh_doors 
• #jh_maritime
• #jh_cars
• #jh_sheds
• #jh_walls
• etc

(Where the JH_ prefix is referring to my own name, obviously I checked they weren't in use already).

This means that I'm now organising my IG feed and making it easier for folks to find the stuff they want.

A clever bit

A final clever bit is to do this though...

IF I upload a new photo of a door, a shed etc then I make sure I include the relevant tag in the comment, e.g.

"A new shed for my #jh_sheds collection"

So, if someone likes the shed (again, don't laugh!) then they've got easy access to all my other ones. From my "likes" notifications I've seen this to be very worthwhile. We all want to be liked after all :)

Notes:

1. The programmer in me knows that this is a little bit of a fudge. I mean, the IG photo database is clever enough already to show people all the photos in the (say) #door tag which are just by @joel_hughes BUT the search facility in the app doesn't allow it (and it probably would be a bit clunky anyway). So, for the time beiong, we're stuck with inventing out own personal ones.
2. There's nothing to stop other folks posting on my hashtags so I suppose you want to make it as obvious as possible that this is a personal hashtag. Perhaps the personal tag names should actually be something more like "joel_hughes_doors" or perhaps "_joel_hughes_doors" where personal tags always start with a "_", followed by the full username and the tag name; you don't want to make it too complex though. Most folks on IG are pretty nice and if they mistakenly post on a personal tag you could always ask them to remove it.
3. This is a side note really: remember that only the photo author can add tags. I sometimes see other people commenting on photos and adding tags; these tags have no effect on search.

Update:

1. oops! I meant to add that I'm not saying I've invented this or anything! Yes, it's not rocket science and I'm sure many folks are doing this already but I've only just stumbled across it and I wanted to share the idea :) 5th Aug 2011

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One of the difficult concepts which folks new to Twitter run up against is this:

"You do NOT have to read EVERY tweet"

Like all simple statements this needs clarification. What I'm talking about here are the tweets of the people you are following; this is typically the default view you'll dip into when you fire up your Twitter app of choice (for me thats TweetList..more on that later). This public timeline of your following (as opposed to replies and direct messages) is NOT an inbox where everything should be read, think of it as a roaring stream of data which you can dip in and out of as and when you choose.

How loudly your following stream "roars" by kinda depends on the number of people you are following. If you're only following 100 folks then, depending on their volume, you can pretty much stay on top of all the tweets.

However, if you follow more than that (I currently follow 572) then this may not be an option; you need a better strategy for staying on top of things...

A Two Tier System

To address this problem I came up with a system and it works as follows:

1) I created a private Twitter list called "newspaper". This is a list of folks who's tweets I really don't want to miss. If I've been off Twitter for a length of time (which is easy now that Instagram is grabbing all of my attention!) then I'll read this list first.

2) I then use the magic of formlists.com to create another automagically populated list which I'll call (say) "magazine". Now I'm not giving step by step instructions in this post but, to summarise, using formlists means I can have an automatically created list comprising of people who i) I follow and ii) who are NOT on the newspaper list. Formulists then recreate this list each day (bless them!).

It's then up to you to keep adding important people to your "newspaper" list.

The method of reading tweets (and this is why I mentioned TweetList earlier, as it rocks at Lists) is then:

- fire up your Twitter app and look at the "Newspaper" list first (rather than the main feed)

- Once/if you have exhausted the tweets on the newspaper list (and you've got time to read some more), shift across to the "magazine" list. The beauty here is that the magazine list will NOT show  tweets you've already read in the newspaper one.

Funky eh?

Joel

p.s. I've actually gone one step further here. Formlists have a magic, out of the box list called "people-i-interact-with" which, surprisingly, lists people who you speak to regularly. I have formulists set up to automatically include these people (who I'm following) into the "newspaper" list.

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I've been on Twitter since the 11th of June 2007 and since that time I've generated over 31K tweets (and I'm not saying for one minute that's an achivement!). Like most folks I scratched my head when entering the world of Twitter for the first year or so and then, gradually, things started to fall into place (I read a great article about this only earlier today actually). 

So, during that time I've learnt a lot about Twitter and accumulated a lot of experience. And today, I finally changed my mind on a fundamental issue: the 140 character limit will need to vanish at some point.

What led me to this? Well, don't get me wrong, if you'd have asked me this a year ago I'd have said "No way!" and "the day they do that it'll instantly morph into MySpace and I'll close my account!". So, why the change of heart?

Well, for one thing I've been using the new Google Plus, and using it reminded me of the flexibility of moving beyond 140 chars (yeah, you could could say that Facebook itself should have reminded me of that but, as I can't stand Facebook, that's a moot point ;)

Why the 140 char constraint in the first place?

Well I dunno for sure but I'm guessing that this is something to do with SMS/TEXT system which is restricted to approx 160 chars(1). Either way, it seems daft that the sound barrier of 140 chars cannot be broken at some point.

Why are 140 chars not enough?

My argument is that 99 times out of a 100, 140 IS enough. Well, it's enough for those who are already versed in the mystical ways of Twitter - who have learnt the suble art of boiling information down to the bare essentials.

However, there are edge cases when we start ro run into trouble, when we get into debates and points and counter point are raised; the Twitter experience just starts to creak a bit. You could say "yeah, but then you change over to email/Skype etc" but no! I don't want to! I want Twitter to handle this for me. Hell, I had to change gears over into a blog post because of this very reason(2) but that's not the way it should be.

The Arguments Against

So I tweeted earlier that I thought that perhaps there was life beyond the 140 limit and I was met with some pretty stern responses - that's cool - I think I'd have thought the same not so long ago. So, why do I think that moving beyond 140 won't destroy the Twitter experience?

Well, for starters, we need to be open enough to admit that there could be a future beyond 140 chars. That (shock horror!), perhaps, Twitter didn't have it all figured out when they put that constraint in; perhaps the the 140 char limit is NOT the be all and end all of spcial media?

Secondly, I'd say this: perhaps Twitter has already taught us a very valuable lesson: to be brief. We already know that, in the maelstrom of social media, you have to be succint if you are ever to tempt the attention deficit audience to listen to you - waste characters at your peril! If you impinge on people's bandwidth then they aint gonna listen, it's as simple as that. Tweet too often (or too long)...and you'll get ignored or unfollowed. 

So, yes, I honestly believe that just because you can go beyond 140 chars does not mean that we all will. Not only that I'd say this, Twitter clients apps will always be pretty restrictive on the amount of summary text to show for each tweet in our feeds (and 140 chars seems a good default to use); anything beyond that and you'll need to click "read more" to get to the below the fold bit.

But why use it?

As I say, 99 time out of 100 we can tweet (and field replies and counter replies) whilst not worrying about the limit. However, sometimes we get into debates and want to dig into the finer points. Indeed, this post is a classic example, I reallly couldn't get into the detail I wanted to on Twitter and needed the breathing space of less restrictions (but that's not to say that I'd need this amount of space per tweet though!).

To End

Your could say that TwitLonger or Deck.ly already handle this but my argument is that all of these third party solutions are not worth much until they are native to the core of Twitter (and with Twitter now owning Tweetdeck, who knows ;)

So, will we move beyond 140?

Joel

1) I say approx as, when I went travelling a few years ago, I could send texts back to the UK but, on occasion, I had to make sure that I didn't go much above 140 chars. Perhaps the carriers needed to use a bit of the payload for their own needs?

2)  Actually, that's not quite true. I tend to assume that tweets are pretty ephemeral in nature and I felt I wanted to get these points down into a more permanent medium (and one where the replies weren't limited to 140 chars either).

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I initially loved the amazing hipstamatic camera app (and still use it) but nothing beats Instagram (IG for short) for quickly capturing an image and (just as importantly) quickly sharing it to the social networks of your choice (or none if you like as IG is a network in its own right).

I see some derogatory comments about IG sometimes which sort of say that people think that adding a filter to any old photo will improve it; i can see where the detractors are coming from but that's not my experience...allow me to explain.

I'm a long term (very) amateur photographert with a long term passion for images; time has taught me that no amount of expensive DSLR equipment (or even more expensive lenses) can make up for a person's inability to compose and "see" a good image; the camera is just a tool and so it is with IG.

I use IG as a completely separate social network to my main stomping ground of Twitter. Yes I do share images to Twitter occasionally but this will be for a rare circumstance (and it will also act as a "hello! I'm on IG as well" flag).

My use of IG is mainly this: if i see abstract things and textures/moments i like in everyday like, i will share them on IG. Further more I follow people on IG who share that passion - it's great to interact with people who, for example, might see the beauty in a crumpled crisp packet and want to share it - it's not for everyone i'm sure :)

The funny thing is that not only is IG the app i first check in the morning but my relationship with the network has encouraged me to take more of such photos; i mean, a few months ago i might have passed something in the street and thought "that'll make a nice photo" but *not* took it - now i'll stop and take it because i know there are folks on IG who will like it - and i'm glad those folks *also* take the time to stop & take their snaps because good images put a smile on my face. IG has altered my behaviour - not bad for a free app!

I don't use IG for family shots/work stuff - i've got other social networks & tools for that; it's a specfic tool, a specific network & a specific audience.

On IG i typically follow folks whose images are mainly taken on their iphone camera - i don't mind the odd dslr shot but, to me, that's not what IG is about. I want 'on the hoof' everyday moments/objects - i want to see how they see.

People who i've met on IG and love their photos include (IG usernames):
- @gypsycaravan (based in Ohio; lovely american photos/textures)

- @westatom (great shots, many streets & buildings. Interesting image techniques)

- @twheat (an amazing mix of photos; he's got a wonderful eye)

- @elinlia (wonderful textures & colours; my fave Instagrammer)

- @mortenbk (a recent find; based in Oslo; great urban/abstract stuff)

...and i'm sure i've forgotten loads! (which makes me think i'll do a proper IG roll call in a separate post - as an appreciation seeing as i'm coming up to my 1000th photo!).

Oh yeah, on IG (as on Twitter), i am @joel_hughes

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Recently I kicked off a web app project for a client; something I've done countless times before on projects of varying scale & complexity. This got me thinking that it might make a good post to talk about the tools, techniques I use and the hopes/fears I have at the start of such projects. So here goes!

We've all got our own processes for coming up with a proposal so I won't go into that now; instead I'm interested in the bit where the wheel meets the road; you've agreed to work on a project and at some point your sat down thinking "errr...ok...where do I start?!".

The Client's Spec

9 times out of 10 there is some form of client spec floating around (after all, you quoted for the project?!) so my first task is to see if it holds water, specifically I'm looking for:

- bits I don't understand

- areas where my spider sense tingles and I know there will be issues (cans of worms)

- areas they've forgot to go into 

- opportunities they've missed

...in short the detail.

This typically means then I've got to create my own set of documentation (that's always an awkward conversation, client: "but we've done the spec already?", me: "....errrr...yeah...about that"). What I create depends on the project but can consist of:

- my own spec which details the project, the phases it will go through, the general overview of what we're achieving etc

- sitemaps

- wireframes

- web doc (puts a bit more flesh on the bones on the above, perhaps a bit more techy)

- data docs (some times I like to map out all the areas where data is needed and which forms use them etc)

- narrative(s)

- misc stuff

Now which docs are useful to the client is a moot point - it sort of depends. I mean, some of the documentation I might start (but not finish) simply because I find the process of writing stuff down is a good way to clear my thoughts - I can then go back over the docs and and additional layers of information. Either way the information created will flow into the project in some form

Obviously I agree with the client some documentation as I want that signed off (ever tried to build without a spec? Nailing jelly to a wall spring to mind?). This is kinda where my tech spec comes into play - it's an amalgam of documentation I've done, pulled together as a collaborative, communication exercise with the client.

I always try to write my stuff is pretty clear English (unless the audience will defo be techy and then I can let loose a bit). 

My Tech Spec

Sitemaps

These normally get thrown into the mix. I like to have a model of the "pages" on the site (even if, in the final version, some pages are actually consolidated into one screen). It can help as a communication device as long as you can explain to folks what they're looking at. Sitemaps/pages are all coded  to help cross-reference to other docs. On sitemaps I may even colour code or use different symbols to indicate SEO work, CMS, database driven etc.

Wireframes

I find these handy. Again it helps get that light bulb to come on for clients (many people just cannot read things - they have to see - we're all different). These maybe lofi mockups or I might even get a designer to get more slick ones. EIther way they'll be crossed referenced to all other docs. The wireframes will form the basis of the actual design 

Web Doc

This doc sometimes comes into play. Basically there willl be a section for each page on the sitemap. For each page I'll give a narrative of what's going on, what functionality is on it. I might exactly list out all the fields etc. 

The web doc could be part of the tech spec but I sometimes keep it separate because the section numbering can get confusing (the section numbering in the web doc needs to match the codes used on the sitemaps/wireframes)

Data Docs

Sometimes I like to keep a track of what data is being displayed in various forms on the site. This helps iron out wrinkles like "oooh! so the customer number on the the order form is the relationship code in the management console?!" etc. Unlike the other docs these'll usually be spreadsheets and probably not shared with client.

Narratives

Sometimes none of the above documentation makes a lot of sense to the client and their stakeholders; in which case a narrative may help. I like to do this anyway; it's a plain Enligsh, non-techy walk through of how the system works. All stakeholders should be able to easily understand it. I'll use it to generate feedback and to help elicit scenarios which are not convered (I'm always looking to throw light into the dark areas of the project - I'm scared what might be lurking there!)

Wow! That's a lot of documentation

Yeah BUT only a portion of this will be signed off by the client and many projects will not have this much. 

Also, I may not complete all the documentation; I'll start off with the best intentions to create a set of documentation that will be 100% water tight. However, life isn't like that. I've learned when you need to be happy that you've done enough and be happy that you've thrown enough brain power at the problem landscape; looking at it from as many angles as you can to find the killer, gotcha issues. Yes you'll probably hit a few bumps in the road later on in development but as long as there are no more show stoppers then documentation has done it's role.

But what about AGILE etc?

Most people will spot that I'm trying to do documentation up front here - this is pretty classical approach. Perhaps that's because it works best on the size of projects I'm involved in (many are just me and a designer, some involve other techies) or perhaps it works best from a billing and client point of view.

I'm very interested in what tools and techniques you ladies & gentlemen find useful.

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I've been using Twitter on my iphone for a while now and have done the rounds with all the major (and minor) Twitter apps (see here http://www.joelhughes.com/iphone-twitter-apps)

My current fave is Tweetlist (with an honourary mention for Smatr) as it's stable, feature rich, actively developed and has got great support.

However, as feature rich as it is, i want more! These are some of the things that would go in my ultimate app:

1) filters
Ability to quickly & easily filter out tweets based on a hashtag/keyword for certain time (i think Tweetings has this: not easy though).

2) a multitude of shortcuts
I really do *not* want to go 3+ nested menus deep to achieve anything - especially on iphone. Eg tweetlist has "read it later" integration buried away.

3) cursor
It goes without saying that the app *must* load more tweets without losing my position but sometimes i've read a batch of tweets and i just want to 'mark' the position with some sort of visual cursor; makes it easy to come back later.

4) /via support
A key stumbling block between Twitter apps is the format they take with old school retweets: the official twitter app uses the ugly "quote" approach; tweetlist uses the more common RT (bizarelly adding a space at the front of the tweet though). However my personal pref is /via and /by - needs to be catered for.

5) custom commands
...this might be a way to achieve the above actually. Custom commands might be where you can enter your own tweet reprocessing command(perhaps with regex like syntax plus some other facilities). People could even download custom commands. Example (downloadable) custom commands: "RT as via", "show klout for user", "show engagement with user"...whatever you can dream up.

6) Reading Experience
Smartr has a great reading experience - it seems to preload articles and format them nicely. This is in contrast to many apps where the 'in app' tweet link reading experience is pretty poor - forcing you to read in Safari - i don't like that jump.

There's plenty of scope for improvement in Twitter apps and i think they'll get much more customisable & personalised - perhaps even with plugins?

What would you add?

Joel

Ps i hear that Tweetdeck have a completely new iphone app brewing - i'll look forward to that!

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As an avid iPhoner and app lover it's no suprise that I'm currently bedazzled by the latest darling bud iPhone photo app - Instagram.

Instagram is under going phenomenal growth and has quickly developed a very active and passionate audience. This means there are plenty of opportunities so show off your great content.

I'm an amatuer snapper (here's some of my Instagrams) so I just use the service for fun; actually, saying that I *do* occassionaly post a photo of a website i'm working on or some relevant documentation - sounds dull but it does help "ping" people that "hey, remember, this is what I do!". 

However, I got to thinking that photographers should defo be using this app. Why?

1) It gets their great content under more eyes. Instragram allows likes/comments etc - this all adds to your social media footprint

2) Google etc are increasingly taking notice of what happens on social networking sites such as these. By uncovering our great content we make ourselves more discoverable.

3) Photographers (hopefully!) should be completely awash with things to post about (work in progress, latest kit, things that have caught their eye etc)

4) Agencies/buyers who are looking to use photography services should be pretty much visually aware and may already be using the service; track em down, follow em, hunt em out - get on their radar; engage with them where they want to be engaged. It's easy to find your "friend"/Twitter followers on Instagram.

Why not do this on Twitter?

Why not indeed! Many photographers I see rarely post a picture to Twitter - what a missed opportunity! However, Instagram is sort of like Twitter BUT for people who really like taking photos, looking at photos etc - you've already got a more defined audience.

Instagram allows you to share to Twitter (and a zillion other social networking sites) so you can easily combine the two and get more bang for your buck.

Those instagram filters are yucky!
Simple answer - don't use them then. Use your own - or use different apps - or tart up your photos in Photoshop and then upload. This is a no brainer.

Give it a shot.

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A question folks consider when signing up to Twitter is whether to use their real name or something else (such as a nickname) when selecting their Twitter username (my personal account is @joel_hughes).

Putting aside privacy fears, name availability, corporate policy etc for the moment, I'd say this:

Many Twitter apps increasingly use auto complete for usernames: you start typing a few characters of one of your followers/ing and it automagically suggests some likely, matching usernames for you.

Now autocomplete is very handy as it saves you having to remember the *exact* username. Normally (hopefully!?) we can remember someone's firstname - certainly easier to recall that a purely abstract username they chose (save household brands like Kodak, Nike etc).

This may sound obvious to you but i've found myself more & more struggling to quickly tecall someone's Twitter name (certainly as following increases).

My recommendation is, where possible, to try to stay true to your actual name.

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It shows some sign of wear and tear - but nothing more than you would expect from a well used object - indeed they are the stamp of authenticity.

This got me wondering: what was the actual history of the object? Who had owned it? Where had it been? (we know the previous couple via ebay - not sure if it was owned before).

Pehaps objects could have unique numbers, QR codes, rfid tags etv then we could track/annotate such items via (say) social media.

Need to think more of use cases here (aside from the "out of interest" one) . I wasn't thinking of some sort of anti-theft/insurance tracking service (although there is an angle there); more of recording the "story".

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