There is no sure-fire way for your website to win an award. After all, there are a lot of websites in the world, and only so many awards given out in a single period. There are some ways to improve your chances, though, and adding interactivity is one of them.People love to be in control, and interactive features are a great way to do that. They are even making their way to television, and users will have more Direct TV control than ever before in the coming years. With that being said, adding interactivity to your website has to count for somethingsimply having a trail of letters follow the mouse around will hardly guarantee your success. Instead, the interactive elements should be designed to improve the relationship between your company or product and the customer. There are several ways in which you can do this. Continue reading ‘Interaction: a key to success?’
The internet is cluttered with websites of every genre, but there are a few that stand out for me. They expand my horizons beyond the books in my library and make dull research come alive, feeding my imagination and transporting me to new worlds.
If a news item about a scientific discovery sends me searching for an in depth discussion, I turn to pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sciencenow/ where I will find photos, videos and facts to explain the findings.
When I want to Continue reading ‘Three websites that can teach you something new’
Like stars themselves, star websites need a certain “it” factor to shine. They need to make viewers want to come back for more. While award winning sites are each unique in content and design, there are general characteristics that they share.
The best websites avoid unnecessary clutter. Having unneeded frames or graphics will just annoy visitors. Music, which many websites have set to play upon loading, is often superfluous and can drive guests away. Much like jewelry or makeup the elements that make up a website should not clash or have Continue reading ‘Four general characteristics of award-winning sites’
When designing a website there is often a temptation to utilize animated graphics. To those who are putting up a new site as their first foray into blogging or e commerce, animated graphics may seem like an easy way to grab the user’s attention and make the pages more interesting. However, in most cases all that will be accomplished is annoying the user. Animated graphics do have their place on certain types pf web pages, but only if the animation is relevant to the entire site or specific page(s) that they are placed on.
For example, Cindy Continue reading ‘The pros and cons of using animations on your website’
Forget Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg. The new wave of filmmakers is here, but you might not know where to look for them. Enter Vimeo, the video-sharing website which launched in 2004. The site, which is more discretionary in its content than Youtube, hosted its first awards ceremony October 9 at the SVA Theater in New York City.The awards featured winners in nine different categories: Continue reading ‘First annual Vimeo Awards winners announced’
No, the Webby Awards are not Spiderman’s newest trophy. Instead, they’re an all-inclusive celebration of the Internet, awarded to those who make us laugh, cry, or just stare in awe at our computer screens.The Webbys are awarded by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences. I’d never heard of it before, but I recognized several names: the Academy includes musicians Beck and David Bowie, artist and animator Matt Groening, Virgin’s Richard Branson, and Harvey Weinstein, among many others. All told, the group contains over 750 names. It’s impressive that they had the foresight to begin issuing these awards in 1996, when the Internet was only a seedling of the megalithic network it has grown into. Continue reading ‘Webby Awards honor websites and more’
If you’ve ever looked at a website so full of animations, graphics, and poor color choices that you didn’t know which way to turn, be thankful for the Interactive Media Awards. This competition seeks to raise the standards of what constitutes a “good” Internet site. The governing body is the Interactive Media Council, Inc., an organization of web professionals with experience in design, development, and advertising. Winners are rewarded with online tools they can use to increase traffic and market their success.Entering costs 125, or 75 for nonprofit categories. While this entry price is a little steep, the IMAs offer over 70 very specific categories, improving your chances of winningyou won’t be judged against a site of an entirely different genre. However, the categories are dispersed over the four quarters of the year, so only a certain number can be entered at any given time. The Council also emphasizes the rewards that can come with winning an IMA, including highlighting your site’s expertise in a specific industry and getting an evaluation by qualified professionals. Continue reading ‘Interactive Media Awards want to improve the internet’
There are many ways to win a prestigious web award, but without fantastic design, your website could be dead at the starting line. Design improves usability and encourages users to explore your content. Many cutting-edge websites have experimented with design in several ways, but there are a few basics to learn before trying to break the mold.
- Don’t distract your visitors with moving text, animations, or sound. These sorts of movements, which aren’t initiated by the user, are distracting to the point of rudeness. They also make for long load times for users with slow connections. People won’t be patient for something they haven’t asked for. On the same note, if the text is scrolling faster than the user can read, they won’t speed up for it.
- Follow HTML standards. Making sure your code is in standard HTML can be tedious, but it’s worth it for everybody to be able to read your site, no matter what their browser. This can also make browsing your site more efficient, such as when the browser loads placeholders for images with height and width tags instead of slowing the entire process. You never know what browser your clients will be using, so prepare for all of them. Continue reading ‘Design tips for an award-winning website’
Unlike most website awards programs, the CLIO Awards have been around since 1959. That’s because they honor creativity in advertising and design in all media. For example, in 1983 Apple made special arrangements to air their famous 1984 commercial before Super Bowl XVIII. The Clios have survived more than half a decade, despite a historically disastrous 1991 ceremony where the presenter and the winner’s list both failed to appear, and the Awards now include an Interactive Category. While Interactive applicants don’t have to be websites, the 2010 winners do include several, such as HBO Imagine and BK.com. Other winners included the Monopoly City Streets online game and a Pringles “Can Hands” ad.The Clio awards are known for their exclusivity. Less than 10 of submissions make it to the CLIO Shortlist, from which the Gold, Silver, and Bronze statue winners are selected. Even more impressively, less than 3 of all entries win a statue, with less than 1 receiving the Gold CLIO. One piece in each medium may also be awarded the prestigious Grand CLIO. Continue reading ‘Clio Awards celebrate advertising and design’
The best accordion website in the world is Accordions Worldwide. It was founded by Harley Jones, Vice President of the New Zealand Accordion Association, and also has an office in China. Among its main sections, it features a News Center, CD Reviews, Celebrity Interviews, and a Stolen List, where users can report instruments that have been stolen. The site also includes a healthy dose of Accordion Humor.This may seem extraneous to you, but consider: if you were doing a paper on accordions, or wanted to play one yourself, wouldn’t you want to know which site is best? And what if you could also find the best site in almost any other imaginable category? That’s the thinking behind Beesker, a “recommendation” site that awards the title of “Best On-Topic” site in a variety of fields. On the home page, you can either search for your subject in the search box, or browse an extensive toolbar. Continue reading ‘Beesker has found the best accordions websiteand many more’