The Economist's lean-back vs. Lean-froward journalism experience

Great interview with Andrew Rashbass, CEO at the Economist group, on the key to successful branding of journalism. What I like is the bit about learning the difference between print and on-line, interactive journalism:

...they came to realise that there was a distinction between what he calls the "lean-back, immersive, ritual pleasure" of reading the Economist in print compared to the "lean-forward, interactive" way people used the site.

All I know is that I enjoy both the print and on-line version. There are times when I want to sit back and read and the audio articles are really handy when in traffic and while I'm in the kitchen.

More or Less

For another tangent that I've always had interest in...designing user experiences. This is a great post on the dangers of complexity in your application designs. The thing to beware of, don't mistake simple design with brain dead design. I see this happening more and more, especially with internet apps and the crutch of "we can release it ad-hoc as new features are completed."

Consider the moaning that gets posted in Facebook status messages when they make seemingly random UX changes. Even the slightest, most subtle change is noticed with resounding hew and cry. Of course Facebook can regress and it's a free service anyway. So all those Facebook users out there feeling like guinea pigs might as well get used to it.

But the lesson for your enterprise-minded and software-for-sale developers there are some good lessons in this article.

Truly exceptional experiences are crafted when complexity is removed whilst the level of power and control is maintained.

Not an easy challenge and requires, dare I say it, planning. But sometimes the best planning isn't enough. You need to assess design all along the development process. Not always easiest on the developers but the best way to ensure adoption and user's preference for your product.

Digital peeping

A timely article from the Atlantic Wire on government and corporate surveillance of social media. The later half of the article addresses how the Government and our outdated Electronic Communications Privacy Act, circa 1986, opens doors to government entities who want to look at e-mail content, and how service providers comply most of the time:

In the second half of 2010 alone, the government sent 4,601 such requests to Google, who complied 94 percent of the time. 

 Your Social Media Will be Monitored

Ethics people!

Apple employees may have trouble keeping corporate secrets in their pockets, but the folks who find obviously confidential stuff seem to face a moral dilemma figuring out what to do with the things they find. A recent Gizmodo post, "Man Get Hard Drive Full of Secret Apple Documents", details how one Apple Store inadvertently gave a customer the store's back-up hard drive rather than a broken hard disk that the store replaced for the customer. Ok, ok, simple or complicated mix-up that can be blamed on "amateur hour" or "lack of adult supervision" at Apple, but the fact that the customer turns around and tries to sell the hard disk to the press is just plain stupid. Really, where are your scruples? Or at very least your sense of avoiding arrest? Semi-Bravo to Cult of Mac for telling the customer the right path, but only after publishing screen shots. Who knows if the right thing was done.

Not Again?!

Cnet reports that Apple loses another unreleased iPhone. Really? Dunno, something just ain't right.