How to manage your website browsing more effectively with RSS

As an Internet Consultant  (rough translation, GEEK) I read a lot about this wonderful place we call the interweb. A lot of which is delivered over the web. Everything from current affairs to gadget news fills my reading material and I am both better and worse off because of it.

Clients and friends often ask me how I wade through all the content that is out there and I commonly tell them that although I read the latest content from hundreds of websites each week I very rarely actually visit the sites...

Content is king, they say, but what happens when you have information overload? Browsing the web can be a great way of finding new information. However we normally browse a very constrained number of websites that fall in our areas of interest and we trust. We find ourselves revisiting the same sites to find out what has been updated. Often there is nothing new and on we go to the next site.

To use an analogy we are channel surfing without a TV guide when we visit sites to see if anything has changed.

You could be searching for a long time before you find something interesting, new and above all relevant in your bookmarks via your browser. Information overload with nothing new learnt. TV with only ads and reruns...

Context has to become King!

RSS or Really Simple Syndication has been around for years (1995 in it earliest form) - almost as long as the commercially accessible web. However the benefits to us common folk has only really been jumped upon in more recent history due to the amount of content available and the accessibility of RSS. Now most browsers, email software and productivity suites (Office for example) manage RSS feeds in some way, shape or form.

But what is it and how does it help me I hear you say.

Well put simply RSS allows you to subscribe to feeds from websites that have the option, and pull down fresh content as it is delivered by the sites. This fresh content is sorted in an RSS listing view that allows you to glance over your feeds and see what is new without visiting the websites directly. Depending on the application you use to manage your RSS (I use Google reader, free and lots of mobile clients can sync to it so you can read on the move) unread updates will be highlighted so you can tell what is new.

How do you get started?

Well first, get an RSS application. You most likely already have this but do not know it. As I stated earlier most browsers nowadays deal with RSS directly. For example here is how Firefox does it.

If a website has an RSS feed it will show in the address bar with the RSS icon (orange and white icon which has been widely adopted to denote RSS)  

Clicking on it will bring up the RSS bookmark subscribe option allowing you to save it to you bookmarks like you would any other site.

The real difference of course is now as the site content is updated so will the RSS feeds! Titles are shown for each new article so you can read only the stories that are of interest to you and avoid wading through those that are not.

So avoid information overload, browse your sites smarter not harder and sign up to RSS feeds!

While you are at it sign up to Type B feeds from Bullseye, we will keep you posted.

-Paul Judge

 

                                                                                                                                               

 

Last time I hit the keyboard I was upset with myself and the UX industry as a whole for taking a bit of a narcissistic turn. I still am and I doubt that's going to change anytime soon despite all of the really great excuses we have for acting as we have. But I'll save that for another time since I'm the one advocating for less self reference.

In my previous blog I was trying to make a point about really paying attention to what's going on for clients before we say anything or start working on a solution. So the next question obviously becomes - what exactly are we looking for? Aren't the clients telling us exactly what they want from us? Shouldn't we just focus on the requirements they specify and keep things inside scope, budget, and timeline?

Simply put ... #$%&#! that.

Our industry has allowed the current environment of economic challenge to make us cowardly. The worst part is that it’s the last thing our clients need from us right now. They’re under tremendous pressure to get their budgets in line and justify every dime they spend. They’re trying to make more happen with less and that's a pretty scary place to be. It gets even scarier when you pile on the current market's rapidly changing factors. Most clients are still getting their heads around the idea of providing mobile access to their products or services, and now tablets are nipping on their heels too.

They're looking to us for a whole new way of thinking, for innovation, and for the kinds of solutions that cut through complex issues with Samurai-like skill. They know they can't get there on their own, it's why they’re talking to us in the first place. That RFQ sitting in front of us may look like a list of requirements, but it's really a cry for help from someone whose realised they can't do this alone. Behind that thick sheaf of papers or string of emails, is a human being feeling that pressure to do more with less. In the heart of every one of those human beings is a quiet, secret hope that you will know something, or uncover something, or have a way of approaching the problem that they can't get to alone.

That's the key to great work. We have to be willing to pay attention to everything, ignore "the experts", assume nothing, and be challenging at every turn.

That first critical step of paying attention means truly listening to what the client is saying and pouring through the research (or conducting our own) over and over until we can see past it all to the real core issues. The client needs that because they are too close to the problem to see past it themselves. Once those core issues are revealed the possibilities for amazing solutions, based on innovation instead of budget, open up. No amount of funding can create something as cool as a few days of truly great thinking.

Of course, there are those who will ask if I'm advocating that we ignore what the client is telling us to do. Please see the above sentence starting with "Simply put" for my answer to that. Clients must always stay in the driver’s seat, and be firmly in control of their destiny. But we're the co-pilot next to them with the map, GPS, and 3G tablet. It's our responsibility in these challenging times to pay attention to the needs of the driver, the road ahead, the weather, the music playing, and a myriad of other elements they can't deal with. They’re counting on us to give more than turn-by-turn instructions and to instead provide strategic thinking, rich choices and - most of all - counsel they can trust.

All we have to do is shut up, and pay attention.

-Joseph Borne

Here’s what the Bullseye team are getting excited about. Huge variety of all things digital going on around the digital world … enjoy… 

Social drawing and guessing game: ‘Draw Something’

http://itunes.apple.com/au/app/draw-something-free/id488628250?mt=8

We’re loving this top-selling game as much as everybody else is! Play with people you know on Facebook or ‘randoms’ … it’s all good.

 

Weather Spark: Beautiful weather maps and graphs

http://weatherspark.com/

If you love talking about the weather, don’t miss this. Visually beautiful information about your weather. Wish the actual weather could always be this impressive.

 

Visual thesaurus: when stuck for words

http://www.visualthesaurus.com

Watch words unfold visually – great for copy inspiration! (or ‘Words With Friends’?)

 

Voyage: RSS reader with a difference

http://rssvoyage.com/

Voyage has been carefully designed around content. Add RSS feeds from your favourite sites and Voyage pulls them together to making reading easier.

 

Online shopping: Two amazing projects via YouTube

The Window Shop by Net-A-Porter:

http://www.digitalbuzzblog.com/net-a-porter-augmented-reality-shopping-windows/

 

Let the store come to the people! Virtual supermarket in South Korean – scan the products you wish to have delivered with an iPhone:

 

The world’s handmade marketplace: Etsy

http://www.etsy.com

Buy and sell handmade and vintage goods. Helping make the world a smaller place and supporting small business through online shopping.

 

Scoop.it: Online magazine tool

http://www.scoop.it/

Scoop.it is essentially an online magazine-style tool like Flipboard which allows businesses to aggregate content into a magazine-style format, brand it and make it SEO friendly before integrating it to their own website and efficiently feeding it out to their social networks by sharing or embedding.

One of the interesting things about this service is the analytics engine which sits behind and enables companies to grow and measure their audience. http://www.scoop.it/pricing/guided-tour#Business Scoop.it is currently a freemium service. Businesses can sign up for domain hosting and analytics for a monthly charge.

 

Chrono Zoom: The history of everything

http://www.chronozoomproject.org/

ChronoZoom is an open-source community project dedicated to visualising the history of everything to bridge the gap between the humanities and sciences. Browse through history on ChronoZoom to find data in the form of articles, images, video, sound, and other multimedia.

And while you’re in the mood, have a look at this resource all about the Sun:

http://nineplanets.org/sol.html

 

Here’s one from the Bali team:

http://www.republika.co.id/

This is a great online digital newspaper - Republika online

 

Postano: Aggregate social channels

http://www.postano.com

This tool lets you aggregate Facebook channels, Twitter feeds (specific users, hashtags or mentions), YouTube channels, RSS feeds, Flickr accounts, Blogs, Vimeo channels and Google alerts (through keyword streams). After you’ve pulled content together, you can style it and get the embed code to integrate it onto your own website, or embed Postano to your Facebook page.

 

The land of the long white cloud has long punched above its weight on the world’s stage.

Time and again Kiwis display ingenuity and innovation that belie its meagre population.

In the late 1800s, William Atack, become the first referee to use a whistle to umpire a game. It caught on.

In the early 1900s the two Ernests were at it. Godward, inventing the hairpin and egg-beater before becoming recognised as the world’s leading authority on the internal combustible engine. Rutherford, managing to split the atom and helping to shape modern science.

Arthur Lydiard, a proud Kiwi, is even credited with inventing jogging.

Tourism is no exception with Bungy Jumping, Jet-Boating, Zorbing and The Schweep all New Zealand gifts to the world.

As we move forward, this small pioneering nation continues to push the traditional boundaries and innovate in the sectors of wine, agriculture, dairy and technology. Not bad for a bunch of Sheep Shaggers.

There are things lagging, such as internet speeds, but that is all about to change.

The new ultrafast broadband network will be a turning point in New Zealand’s technology history. It has the potential to change how we do business, and how we connect with each other and the world.

It's an exciting time that should reap a number of social and economic benefits.

Our own agency is no stranger to working with Kiwis and we share an innovative and passionate approach to work.

With an office now set up in the heart of bustling Auckland, Bullseye is perfectly positioned to work with local businesses looking for digital transformation.

Watch this space for more exciting projects we have on the go in New Zealand -

-Claire Stewart, Business Director NZ

Welcome to the land of zero’s. Think of a statistic and then add anywhere from three to six zeros and you are starting to get a sense of what Asia is about. It is EPIC, not a little bit EPIC, but a whole great big titanic boatload EPPPIIIICCC.

Universities across India, China and Indonesia produce 10 million graduates a year, the work force is in around 1 billion people. The population is more than half of planet earth and growing. Take any percentage, no matter how small, and it equals a big damn number.

So what does this mean in a digital landscape? In terms of web and web activity we are seeing growth yet much of it is archaic and pretty ordinary. However, there is a shift. I heard a quote once and I liked it: “The Web is dead, long live the internet.” In this land of zeros we are seeing a massive rise in internet activity.

Reality is that there is poor accessibility to the web – ISPs are few, bandwidths are small and prices are high compared to the average salary. However, in this conflict of massive numbers of people and relatively poor accessibility to the web we are finding the internet is on the rise.

Mobile is a huge and rapidly growing space. Mobile phones are affordable and, via mobile, people are able to hit the internet in a large way. The growth in digital subscriptions in mobile is about 15% – that is a massive number when applied to audience size that measures in the hundreds of millions. China, reportedly, will contribute to 80% of that growth.

I wanna chuck a bamboozling number at cha: If Asia has a population of 3.8 billion, and more than half of those can work, how many mobile phones do you think they want to buy?

What this means is that we have something like a gazillion mobile phones in Asia that are able to access internet digital media. It's an absolute must for brands. If you want to talk to your audience get to them via mobile.

Anecdotally, and it is pretty close to true, if you go to dinner in Jakarta you can expect the whole table to bring out their mobile phones and spend more time on the Blackberry network free-talking to other blackberry users than talking to you.

Bottom line, in the land of zeros, getting mobile is a critical step.

– Mike McKerlie

Does It Have To Be Hard?

In 1987 a software engineer and computer scientist by the name of Fred Brooks wrote a great article called: ‘No Silver Bullet — Essence and Accidents of Software Engineering’. Brookes argued that "There is no single development, in either technology or management technique, that by itself promises even one order of magnitude improvement in productivity, in reliability, in simplicity." Essentially, he was saying that there is no single solution to the problems we face when trying to deliver on time, on budget, and to the exact specification of a client’s set of requirements.

Help! We’re having a crisis!

Back in the late 60’s, early 70’s there was a period in software engineering known as the ‘software crisis’, a term first coined by some attendees at the first NATO Software Engineering Conference in 1968.  This was the name given to the period when projects ran over budget, over time, didn’t meet requirements, were low quality and difficult to maintain. This was over 40 years ago. Does it sound familiar? Various processes and methodologies have been developed over the last few decades to try and tame the software crisis but what’s been generally agreed, as mentioned in Brooks’ paper, is there’s no silver bullet.  Even today, well-planned projects can go off the rails.

Brooks Revisited

Brooks makes a distinction between ‘Accidental’ and ‘Essential’ Complexity: Accidental Complexity relates to issues that we create and therefore are able to resolve; for example the creation of high-level development languages, such as .NET, Java, PHP etc help developers be far more productive in the development process, more so than the ‘old days’ when developing in assembly language or worse… punch-cards.

Essential Complexity relates to the problem being solved by the software to be developed. Essential Complexity by definition cannot be removed: if a customer wants their website to do 20 different things then the solution must deliver those 20 things. By reducing Accidental Complexity to zero does not give us any significant improvement to the problem.

Let’s follow Brooks’s ‘conversation’ as he describes the problem of Essential Complexity:

“The hardest single part of building a software system is deciding precisely what to build. No other part of the conceptual work is as difficult as establishing the detailed technical requirements, including all the interfaces to people, to machines, and to other software systems. No other part of the work so cripples the resulting system if done wrong. No other part is more difficult to rectify later.

“…the most important function that the software builder performs for the client is the iterative extraction and refinement of the product requirements. For the truth is, the client does not know what he wants. The client usually does not know what questions must be answered, and he has almost never thought of the problem in the detail necessary for specification.

“…it is really impossible for a client, even working with a software engineer, to specify completely, precisely, and correctly the exact requirements of a modern software product before trying some versions of the product.”

What about Agile?

Some time ago Bullseye chose to address these all-too-frequent issues by making Agile our preferred approach to project delivery.

The Agile Manifesto states:

We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. Through this work we have come to value:

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools

Working software over comprehensive documentation

Customer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

 That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more.

There are twelve principles behind the Agile Manifesto:

• Customer satisfaction by rapid delivery of useful software
• Welcome changing requirements, even late in development
• Working software is delivered frequently (weeks rather than months)
• Working software is the principal measure of progress
• Sustainable development, able to maintain a constant pace
• Close, daily co-operation between business people and developers
• Face-to-face conversation is the best form of communication (co-location)
• Projects are built around motivated individuals, who should be trusted
• Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design
• Simplicity
• Self-organising teams
• Regular adaptation to changing circumstances

 A bit more from Brooks

“Much of present-day software-acquisition procedure rests upon the assumption that one can specify a satisfactory system in advance, get bids for its construction, have it built, and install it. I think this assumption is fundamentally wrong, and that many software-acquisition problems spring from that fallacy. Hence, they cannot be fixed without fundamental revision – revision that provides for iterative development and specification of prototypes and products.”

“Incremental development – grow, don't build, software.

So, even back in 1987 some of the key aspects of Agile: Customer satisfaction by rapid delivery of useful software, working software delivered frequently, were seen as the basis for successful software delivery.

So is Waterfall wrong? Nope! Bullseye continue to use waterfall where appropriate. Even in Agile projects we have some sequential or waterfall steps. We call this type of project ‘Wagile’.

Surely Agile is the Silver Bullet? Nope! Agile projects can fail as readily as waterfall, or any other method of delivering projects, though with Agile you get early visibility of issues. However, Bullseye believe that by using Agile and Agile principles we improve our chances of succeeding in the ultimate objective of any software project: giving our clients the software that they need rather than what they think they want.

Much of what is written above comes directly from Brooks’s article and I make no apology for that. The issues described in the article are as relevant in today’s Digital World as it was back in 1987. I urge everyone to read the full article (see link below), and perhaps even buy his book, “The mythical man-month”. In it, amongst many other topics, he describes Brooks's Law: Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later.  But that’s a topic for some other time.

References:

·         Brooks, Fred P. (1987). “No Silver Bullet — Essence and Accidents of Software Engineering” - http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~cah/G51ISS/Documents/NoSilverBullet.html

·         http://agilemanifesto.org/

 

- Duncan Keir, National Solutions Director, Bullseye

Sales and Marketing have always held hands when it’s come to pitching and business development. But with the rise of content marketing, the marketing team can now be more accountably involved in improving the smoothness of the sales cycle. That is – they are able to anticipate where friction and concern may rise and can provide the right information and content to prospects or clients digitally – in order to avoid glitches or delay.

A good content management system has become the right hand of marketing. Content and websites can be updated almost instantly with latest news, new products/services, new web pages, publicity, response to world events, anything that will proactively manage information before issues arise. From a marketing perspective, once you have a good CMS, updating is instant and has no direct cost. It couldn’t be easier to manage the information channel.

From a B2B perspective, when brands have never been so barraged by information and distractions, nor had so much scrutiny over budgets and decisions, it’s vital for future outsourced partners to be quietly able to continue to engage with relevant and compelling content, no matter what unforeseen event may occur.

It’s not possible to anticipate every issue of course, though many are related to information that can be supplied such as:

·         the costs to a prospect of status quo,

·         how their specific status quo can be improved and when,

·         a more accurate picture of ROI that can be achieved through similar solutions,

·         where the industry norm is at.

And if you work within the digital industry, you could say this has never been more important. Finally social media and digital are no longer being referred to as ‘emerging technology’ and is there anyone left on the planet who doesn’t accept that digital is here to stay? But there is still confusion around ROI and the cost of not embracing digital fast enough.

Providing content – not sales pitches – but genuinely informative and interesting information can help prospects solidify what they need in their own mind, and therefore effect how quickly they are ready to outsource.

 

Caroline  Herrman

We all talk too much.

I know I do and anyone around me for seven seconds or more confirms it. Hell, it seems like the only times my mouth isn't babbling on is when I'm shovelling food in it or I'm unconscious. I'm not really sure about the unconscious part sometimes because it's not like I'm there to report on it. My wife has given me some very odd morning looks since we moved in together.

But my dad is a very different story. He's one of those practical guys who wanders in from the garage and wipes car grease off his hands right when you're saying something to your friends. He has a talent for arriving right when you're saying something you think is pretty damn brilliant. He just stands there listening for a few seconds and turns to leave. But as he goes he'll say something over his shoulder that blows your train of thinking to smithereens and makes you all feel a little bit stupid. Well... a lot stupid.

These statements of his usually point out something so obvious that no one else noticed and often use less than five words. Now don't get me wrong, having that level of insight and ability to communicate it is admirable, really. But it's also unbelievably irritating to live with day in and day out. I don't blame him though. I guess when common sense is the core of your personality you can have a hard time understanding why the rest of us need to be ridiculously unreasonable before we settle down and get things done. My dad just skips all that and goes to the done part.

So that long example of how I can't shut up leads me to the point of this blog. I’m really irritated at our ongoing inability to learn that simple lesson about shutting up and really paying attention before we say anything. I think that as an industry (consulting or UX, or UCD, or whatever we're calling ourselves now), we've been talking so long to try to justify what we do and how we do it, that we've lost track of the done part. I’m lucky because my dad’s nature really confronted me with it early. So if you go back to paragraph one you can understand why I’m mad at myself too.

Over the coming months I want to spend some time here talking about this issue. (Here I go again, with the talking.) Are we really paying attention? Are we listening to our clients, are we listening to their partners or vendors, are we listening to their end consumers? I don’t think we are to be honest. We just have too much to say to let that get in our way.

 

-Joseph Borne

With all the talk on social media and online marketing solutions, one can easily think of them as two separate entities and struggle to see how they fit together to add business value. 

Digital business is about assessing strategically the role of digital in all facets of business life, from supply chain management to marketing, to point of sale, to customer service and internal management.

It’s about finding digital solutions that will increase efficiency, reduce operational costs and be accessible to a wider audience.

Social media tools are online platforms that gather individual thoughts on a myriad of topics. From personal opinions on social, environmental and governance issues, to product reviews and customer experience, the topics discussed can range from which company sells the best light bulbs to the issues encountered by citizens after a new law has been voted.

Using social media and online marketing tools gives you access to audiences that might have been a little tricky to reach and evaluate before the digital boom, and provides you with marketing analytics about your customer’s journey.   

While it can be challenging to decide on the best strategy for your business given people have many interests, there are digital specialists who know the digital trends, how to help you target your customers, and to deliver online marketing solutions that will give you a return on your investment.

After all, the end game is about:

·         collecting feedback on your products and services;

·         better understanding purchasing behavior;

·         highlighting any gaps in your market;

·         gaining new customers;

·         raising your brand’s profile and reputation.

Merging digital solutions with digital marketing becomes an incredibly powerful tool. It gives you in-depth and unprecedented analytics on consumers’ purchasing behaviour: every marketer’s dream.

-Danielle O'Connell 

By Claire Cooper, Business Director NZ

 Another week has whizzed by and I have witnessed more great businesses and ideas pouring out of NZ.

Let me start with a company called MEA Mobile.

I was lucky enough to hear Rodney Macfarlane, Partner at MEA Mobile speak at a recent iOS Meet Up.  

They are mobile technologies company that works to develop bespoke applications for clients but they also do a lot of their own internal app development.

What I really liked about this business is that they spend time working on the business as well as in the business. They are also creating products through this approach which they are using to generate new revenue streams.

The mantra for their own project work is to get many ideas in market early, see if any fly and then tweak the ones that do.

This rapid development approach has been a successful tactic.

In 2011, MEA Mobile received investment from K 1W1, owned by Sir Stephen Tindall. K1W1 has a track record of providing support for emerging New Zealand-based companies with strong innovation and technology base including Icebreaker and Lanzatech among others. 

I saw a demo of the company’s own invention iGloLEDset. It’s a real time Wi-Fi controllable coloured LED light and they have developed an iOS/Android LED lighting control kit to go with it. Basically it would make you the envy of all your friends at a house party, with the ability to do all sorts of crazy light combos.

From a business perspective they have been using it in shop fronts in the US. In particular they have created a bespoke version for WESC. Customers can basically download the app from the app store and then interact with and control the lights in the shop window.

This is just one of hundreds of apps the company has created. To see more of their recent projects click here.

I was then fortunate enough to meet a very interesting man, Dr Zeke Chan. 

Dr Chan is the inventor behind some cutting edge golf profiling technology, SwingProfile. It’s a world first that instantly creates swing sequences from live golf video. 

All you need to do is set up your camera and swing; SwingProfile will extract and display your sequence immediately and give instant feedback. 

Dr Chan has just returned from the USA after winning two awards at the PGA Merchandise Show 2012 - the Best Overall Product award, and the Best Market Research award.

Watch this space for more developments on SwingProfile http://www.youtube.com/embed/q_mR-YFcpt0  

See you soon for the third in our NZ Innovation Series.  

-Coops