“We always say we don’t have enough time, but maybe the problem is we’re just trying to do things too well.”

“Failing Fast” is one of the best concepts I’ve picked up from reading the 37 signals blog. The recent “Polaroid approach” post only reinforces this idea.

Go through a ton of stuff and give it all a quick shot. Then see what sticks and devote more resources to that. That way, failure is cheap. You’re actually expecting failure and embracing the idea that only a small percentage of your ideas are truly good enough to earn a big chunk of your attention.

Another great read on the same topic is “The Freedom of Fast Iterations: How Netflix Designs a Winning Web Site” from User Interface Engineering:

“We make a lot of this stuff up as we go along,” the lead designer said. Everyone in the group laughed until he continued, “I’m serious. We don’t assume anything works and we don’t like to make predictions without real-world tests. Predictions color our thinking. So, we continually make this up as we go along, keeping what works and throwing away what doesn’t. We’ve found that about 90% of it doesn’t work.”

…Ironically, teams that fail fast improve as fast, if not faster, than those who try to get it right the first time. The reason is simple: Teams trying to get it right the first time fail as often as everyone else does. However, when they fail, they fail really slowly and struggle to pinpoint problems because they’ve changed so much at once, making it harder to identify solutions

Something I read a few weeks back is still ringing in my ears.

From 10 Harsh Truths About Corporate Websites:

Tweeting on a corporate account or posting sales demonstrations on YouTube misses the essence of social networking.

Social networking is about people engaging with people. Individuals do not want to build relationships with brands and corporations. They want to talk to other people. Too many organizations throw millions into Facebook apps and viral videos when they could spend that money on engaging with people in a transparent and open away.

Instead of creating a corporate Twitter account or indeed even a corporate blog, encourage your employees to start Tweeting and blogging themselves. Provide guidelines on acceptable behavior and what tools they need to start engaging directly with the community connected to your products and services. This demonstrates not only your commitment to the community but also the human side of your business.

Of course the article is directed at “corporate” websites but the crossover to higher ed is obvious. Part of me wonders to what extent a university can be “engaging with people in a transparent and open way”. In the end it all comes down the culture of each institution. It varies. Does this make sense?

Listen to this 3-minute clip.

A fav podcast right now is the “Third Coast Audio Festival” from Chicago public radio. Basically a podcast composed of panels about radio production.  The clip ends with a funny uncut exchange between a radio guy and a city zoo official.

http://collegewebguy.com/assets/Resound-clip.mp3

My web job is tucked away in what is essentially a newsroom/public relations office. As such, I’ve become familiar with the trials and tribulations of my coworkers as they write press releases and interview faculty for stories. Whether the subject matter revolves around science, research, community projects, anything really, ..there is almost always an academic language barrier to overcome.

In preparing and disseminating academic information for public consumption, you need the skills of a translator.

It isn’t something unique to academia. I imagine that science writers have the toughest go of it.

I’ll admit it. I’m just a commoner, probably of below-average intelligence. And it’s easy for stupid people to mock things they don’t understand. But some realities of life are obvious even to the casual observer. One of those realities is this:

Any specialized occupation that invents it’s own language as a way of perpetuating it’s own exclusivity, …deserves the hassle of never getting good press.

Additional Reading:

Why Academic Jargon Thrives

When Ideas Get Lost in Bad Writing
”Graduate students in analytic philosophy often get the message that if you write in a way that is accessible to nonspecialists, it means you are going to hurt your career,”

Sometimes we talk about “content” as if it were just another random ingredient of the web development casserole.  The majority of blogs you read will rant about social media, the latest and greatest tools, etc.. but all those things are ancillary to great writing and engaging content.  Reminds me of a recent Zeldman Q&A:

“

Q: Which of the initiatives that are on the horizon do you think will benefit the Web’s future the most?

A: I don’t think any technology out there holds to the key to a better web experience for all. As far as I can tell, the web’s future will be driven by the same thing that drove its past: good ideas, good writing, good design. And the surprises that communities spring on the makers of sites and applications that serve them.”

and something else:

The reason for this lack of industry focus on narrative is that we still think the web is a set of technologies. We are still primarily tech geeks. Which is why corporations still don’t trust web designers to make marketing and branding decisions, even though we should understand this medium better than anyone. Instead, these old-school marketers bring their inapplicable print design narrative voices into our new medium, and they fail miserably. But a lame transplanted voice is still better than no voice at all.

Laurel Hechanova’s post on the mStonerblog struck a nerve with me.  Do universities do more harm than good when they deploy “cool/edgy/hip” website design(s) in attempts to attract young students?

“As a designer, there are certain things I cannot, in good conscience, do for you. Making you look like an uncomfortable poseur is at the top of that list.”

…I will not simply appropriate a “cool/edgy/hip” style for you. In other words, I’m not going to take MTV.com’s Internet-clothes and make you.com wear them unless you truly are loud and possess a fleeting, celebrity-obsessed attention span. If your institution was founded before the turn of the century and currently has a well-earned reputation for being serious and focused, slapping some textures and grunge fonts on your website will seem unpalatable at best and disingenuous at worst. Like Christiane Amanpour reporting live in a Slipknot t-shirt.

I think I’ve been guilty of this, on occasion.  I don’t think I’m alone.