links for 2009-10-04

"We have brainstormed on the most important design issues and asked designers across the globe what design decisions they often have to make when designing a portfolio website. We also asked designers what questions they would like answered or analyzed in our case study. In the end, we came up with a bag of 40 solid portfolio-related questions — sorted, grouped and ranked according to importance. Finally, we searched for a good mix of established design agencies and well-designed portfolio websites of small and large agencies." Really good read.

"But doing either of those things means you’re missing out on some great typography options. Font stacks can make it possible to show at least some of your visitors your site’s typography exactly the way you intend without showing everyone else a default font. Read on for more information on using and creating effective font stacks with CSS."

Graphic files.

"The new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll is filled with fascinating data. But with Obama currently under pressure from military commanders to increase troops in Afghanistan, the poll’s numbers on that war may be the most ominous. The survey finds that a total of 51% oppose a troop increase, 19% strongly, versus only 44% who support one. The poll also finds rising public pessimism about the war, with 59% less confident that it will be successful. Bottom line: Obama — who’s in the process of deciding whether to increase troops, or to scale back the American presence there, as Joe Biden reportedly wants — is now finding himself trapped between commanders and the public."

"In this tutorial we are going to make a slick content slider for a computer shop, with the help of jQuery and the MopSlider plugin. The slider is going to be generated with PHP and we are using a plain txt file as a data source for the notebook configurations."

"Regardless of my views on content censoring, I don't think that's the real story here. My real issue with this is the hypocrisy of Apple's explanation for the censoring. They said that the iSinglePayer app was too political, but they allow other, far more political apps. Like a "Conservative Talking Points" app." Apple once again proves they do crazy stuff.

"I'll say it again: the public's deal with the BBC is: we pay you the licence fee, you give us programmes, we can do what we want with them within the confines of copyright law. The studios promised that they would boycott US free-to-air television unless they got a version of this (called the "Broadcast Flag"). They didn't get the Broadcast Flag, and they didn't boycott. They have shareholders to answer to, and those shareholders won't put up with corporate tantrums that promise no licensing revenue until the rest of the world rearranges itself to the company's convenience."

" The Senate voted Wednesday to spend $2.5 billion on 10 military cargo jets that the Obama administration does not want. The 64-34 vote came on an amendment to the defense appropriations bill." Those conservatives sure don't want to spend money.

"I've said this before on this blog and I'll say it again. Traditional local media companies; radio stations, TV stations, local newspapers, and the like, are in a tough situation. Each of those businesses had a monopoly or near monopoly on their audiences a decade ago. Now none of them do. The owners and operators of these businesses have been trained to think their strengths are local and relevant content, their monopolies or near monopolies on distribution (spectrum in the case of radio and TV), and their brands. All of these assets are waning quickly. But there is one asset that is still quite significant and the value of it is growing, not shrinking. It is their large, well trained, and well connected salesforces."

"Here are some innocent tips and tricks to get your website to load faster behind the scenes. Most of them are either simply good practice or tools to help you out along the way."

"PDFAmigo lets you create interactive, fillable PDF forms in your browser."

"This guy paints himself… no trick photography … no photoshop …he just paints himself…" Very cool.

"Better pack some cash on your next trip abroad. Americans are finding that their credit and bank cards aren’t as convenient as they once were while traveling overseas. The problem: American cards lack a special chip, now commonly used in many foreign countries, causing the cards to be rejected by some merchants and kiosks. But the United States banking industry has no immediate plans to adopt the technology."

"But when it comes to science, it's perfectly ok to not have the foggiest idea what you're talking about. After all, it's "complex and esoteric," and not the sort of thing respectable people need to concern themselves with knowing…"

"A few calls later and I found that a number of IT guys I know are genuinely excited about installing Windows 7 in their shops, guys for whom Vista didn’t even register. We’re about see an IT renaissance, and it will be driven by Microsoft." I agree.

"While it may sound as anachronistic as a witchcraft trial, blasphemy remains punishable by death in countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan. In addition, Ireland recently introduced a defamation law making blasphemy punishable by fines up to 25,000 euros ($37,000). What's more, six U.S. states (Massachusetts, Michigan, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania and Wyoming) have laws that, in some way, prohibit or regulate blasphemy, noted Ron Lindsay, a lawyer and president of the CFI International in Amherst, N.Y. CFI also cites efforts by the United Nations to introduce anti-blasphemy resolutions that many say would curtail free speech about religion."

"This lush coastal nation of 10 million, rich in minerals and tropical fruits, and dark at night from lack of electricity, has known harsh dictators and army shooting sprees in its 51 years of independence. Neighbors to the north and to the south have experienced bloody civil wars; Guinea, the former French colony that angered Charles de Gaulle with its refusal of partnership, and locked up tight for decades under tyrant ideologues, was too brutalized to unravel. But it has never known a week, or even a 10-month period, quite like the last one."

"Laporte said he has costs of $350,000 a year with seven employees now but revenue of $1.5 million and that revenue is doubling annually. It will increase more as he announces new means of distribution (to the TV; he believes that podcasting is too hard for the audience)." Impressive.

"I wish you had some kind of (free to join) commercial partner program that would make it really easy for me to build a Twitter product and share revenue with you."

"But any movement which also criticizes the President for giving a speech to schoolchildren, which cheers when the United States loses its Olympic bid, is mostly just engaged in the business of throwing a bunch of Kaká at the wall and seeing what sticks. I don't know whether it's unpatriotic — but it's pretty freakin' dumb."