NBCNEWS.com Succumbs to the Grid

When the Mashable site was redesigned into the now familiar grid layout, I wrote a blog post bellyaching about the infinite scroll, various usability issues and somehow Jakob Nielsen. I’m still not a big fan of the grid approach to website design because it’s not design, it’s the process of dumping content into boxes that descend like fish food over time to the bottom of the page and I find that solution lacking creativity....

Yahoo! And the Art of Branding Gibberish

As I’ve mentioned more than once, designing logos is an awful way to spend your time. There’s no hiding. You’re out there in front of the client with your brilliant idea on a white sheet of paper as the marketing director and his recent and eager grads wait to ask probing and pointed questions about things they read concerning logo development last night....

The Noble Pelicans

Pelicans are the inglorious flying garbage-trucks of the water-bird kingdom and as such are despised by man, fish and God. Violent, hateful missteps of nature, they fly with the grace of downed aircraft before zeroing in on their prey and skewering it with their beak/spears before stowing it to die slowly in their giant,...

Grading the New Mashable

Many, many years ago Christmas morning was a chaotic riot of laughter, terrific screams, minor injuries and general twitchiness. As amazing a sight and experience as the pile of toys was, there was the overriding stoic presence of my father checking his watch, waiting to put the hammer down and march us all off to church....

This is the End: Last Call for the Obama and Romney Campaigns

You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.

We’re finally in the home stretch of the 2012 Presidential election and like a Chili’s at last call, it’s all about some action now. The lights are on and Smilin’ Joe Biden is looking less debonair than he was a few hours and drinks ago,...