Design for buyers
In e-commerce, usability is important, but it isn't always enough to convert users to buyers. Why? Because even if a user can easily buy something on your Web site, it doesn't mean that they will buy. Users don't go to your Web site to be sold. They go there to buy. Your site needs to give them guidance and information so that they can be confident enough to buy a product.

CSS Enhancements in Internet Explorer 6 Public Preview.
It looks like IE 6 gets the box model right, uses the !DOCTYPE declaration to force the browser into standards compliance (or backward compatability) and strict stylesheet parsing, and more.

All this is fantastic, but I still want to know whether they finally support the PNG graphic format with its transparency levels and everything.
via Steve Champeon.

Common browser implementation issues.
via Glish.

Amazoning the news.
Blow up your old notion of "story." See what happens when you apply Amazon's user-savvy approach to typical news events.
via Web Voice.

Links Want To Be Links.
This document explains why you, as a Web page author, should not try to prevent Web browsers from displaying textual links underlined and image links with borders around them. It also discusses common mistakes in setting colors for textual links.
via xblog.

Every Click is an Investment
Once customers click to reach your web site, they have made an investment ... It is hogwash that your competitors are lurking around the corner. Even if they are, who cares? Your customer has hunted you down and you should deliver value.

The church of usability
Builder.com interviews Andrew Chak, Alan Cooper, Jakob Nielsen, Jared Spool and Robert Davis and Paul Laroche.

Computer Workstation Ergonomics Guidelines.
Work through 10 steps to help you decide on what will be a good ergonomic design for your situation.
via Kottke.

The Internet Revolution Rages On.
Don't be distracted by the dot-com crash; when it comes to the Internet's transformation of business, it's revolution as usual.

Again Shirky making a lot of sense. However, I fear that speaking so much, so frequently, will invariably make him say something very stupid soon, and then we'll all lose our confidence in his wisdom. Clay, shut up for a little while, will ya.

The prerogatives of innovation.
In the Web, failures are quickly quenched. And, as with our immune system, challenges make it stronger. We see a similar process with the PC. So what if it crashes; it doesn't bring down the entire system. And even better, we can always reboot and restart. Both approaches encourage innovation by tolerating failure and rewarding success.
via Tomalak.

The Myth of 800x600 The impulse to prescribe all aspects of layout is a leftover ritual from print media, where designers carefully position each page element. But on the Web the practice of defining a standard canvas size before design begins is fundamentally inappropriate.
via Evhead.

CSS1 Column Layouts.
Multi-columnar designs cooked in response to all the CSS2-burdened examples splashed all over the web.

Eazel's Innovations.
Some of the innovative features in Nautilus that are not in Mac or Windows.
via Gillmor.

Debunking the myths of UI design.
via Dangerous Meta.

Clay Shirky talks about the evolution of the Internet.

As always, I find Shirky's insights and opinions very interesting. In this interview by Slashdot members he tackles everything from the way web design evolves, the corporatization of media (or not), micropayments, P2P, WAP, etc. Very good read.

CSS layout techniques.
Catalog of many useful cross-browser CSS layout techniques.

Eric encourages everyone to steal the code found on the site, and also provides many links to CSS resources and tutorials. This is great, it feels like the good old days, when we were all first discovering what was possible on the Web.

Custom Document Type Definition.
Why do a custom DTD? Many browsers are still using proprietary tags. To achieve some compatibility with them, one must sometimes use non-standard tags or attributes.

Qualities of a good URL.
URLs should be simple, concise, and designed to last forever - reflecting the page's content and hiding the implementation. The days of an URL mapping directly to a file are gone.

XML Ain't What It Used To Be.
For users, there are a number of painful side-effects to the growing number of features. The learning curve for XML is growing rapidly, and even XML "experts" can no longer keep track of every specification. Monitoring XML's growth is a full-time job.

Reading List for Designers.
On graphic design, interfase/ interaction/ information design & information architecture, design theory, digital media, community and usability for designers.

And so, Tremendo joins the WSP Browser Upgrade campaign.

This weblog now utilizes only CSS for layout and presentation, and a little bit of the DOM to modify the presentation of the newest post. Ah, also the page is XHTML 1.0 strict... I think.

Microsoft co-opts open source approach.
In a major extension of corporate policy, Microsoft has quietly started a program to provide selected large enterprise customers with copies of the source code for Windows 2000.

Flash Interface Usability.
The use of Flash as a tool for creating straightforward, serviceable, functioning Websites.

Take back the Net.
Michael Tchong, of Iconocast fame, launches this campaign to buy something on the Web next April 3. Says he: "But you can help the Net regain its respect. We must band together and send the world a loud, clear message that the Net will not only survive, but thrive"
I have to say that asking people to spam their e-mail contacts to spread the word is... distasteful. I believe this campaign is not only silly, it will reinforce in the public the idea that the Internet actually needs help, and I don't agree.

Creative Tension
Some Web designers push the medium. Others scorn the flashy stuff. Five leading designers were asked where they stand in this budding religious war. Skip the first 6 paragraphs of intro.
via Tomalak.

The (2001) 5k competition is BACK! Get your entries in until April 8.

Quick and Easy.
Interesting Web-usage statistics about screen and color resolutions (most surfers use midrange settings), connection speed and why web visitors bail.
via usr/bin/girl.

To use or not to use: an XHTML roadmap for designers.
via Camworld.