Rikcat Industries » Brief Morsels http://www.rikcatindustries.com The Portfolio of Rik Catlow Sat, 28 Feb 2009 04:08:00 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 The Laws of Simplicity http://www.rikcatindustries.com/2008/06/27/the-laws-of-simplicity/ http://www.rikcatindustries.com/2008/06/27/the-laws-of-simplicity/#comments Fri, 27 Jun 2008 14:53:19 +0000 Rik Catlow http://www.rikcatindustries.com/?p=44 A couple weeks ago I was given a copy of John Maeda’s book “The Laws of Simplicty” and it synthesized a lot of my previous design philosophies. The first law that he talks about, the law of reduce, is one that I have long believed to be one of the most important rules for designers. Design is about subtraction more than addition. This is one of the hardest things to teach because designers are creative and make things, but unless it solves the design problem, adding things to a design is more about ego.

Well, if you don’t own the book already you should snag a copy because I think it gets to the essence of how designers, technologists and business people should be approaching problems.

]]> http://www.rikcatindustries.com/2008/06/27/the-laws-of-simplicity/feed/ 4 Command Shift 3 http://www.rikcatindustries.com/2008/04/07/command-shift-3/ http://www.rikcatindustries.com/2008/04/07/command-shift-3/#comments Mon, 07 Apr 2008 15:21:40 +0000 Rik Catlow http://www.rikcatindustries.com/?p=41 Just noticed that this site is ranked in the top 100 out of over 11,000 sites on Command Shift 3. Wow super surprised. Those of you unfamiliar with Command Shift 3, it’s basically hot or not for web site designs. Its a fun site and has some really good use of the meta data provided by the voting. Sites are also ranked by related tag, so this site is currently 20th in designer and 3rd in simple. So cool, be sure to check out the site and participate.

]]> http://www.rikcatindustries.com/2008/04/07/command-shift-3/feed/ 5 Email Standards, Coding, & the NFL Network http://www.rikcatindustries.com/2007/11/30/email-standards-coding-the-nfl-network/ http://www.rikcatindustries.com/2007/11/30/email-standards-coding-the-nfl-network/#comments Fri, 30 Nov 2007 21:00:34 +0000 Rik Catlow http://www.rikcatindustries.com/2007/11/30/email-standards-coding-the-nfl-network/ Email Standards

On the heels of my posts about email client standards in early October, Email Standards Project has launched with a website that features a list of email clients and the support for the Email Standards Project Acid Test. This project is being led by Freshview, makers of Campaign Monitor and MailBuild. It’s great to see this getting off the ground and I hope it gains some traction.

Should web designers know how to code?

Really good post on nclud debating whether designers should know how to code. I agree that it is not totally necessary for a web designer to be a CSS master, but I do think designers who know how to code produce better work in general. The biggest problem with not coding your own designs is handing it over to another person to translate. Also, if you code your own work, you can make improvements to the design in the coding process.

NFL Network

If your a football fan that has Time Warner, Cablevision, or Comcast you probably didn’t see last night’s game due to a dispute with the NFL Network. The cable companies insist on making the NFL Network a premium, pay to watch channel. Well, the NFL Network basically streamed the Packers versus the Cowboys live on their website last night. I found the broadcast quite enjoyable and glad to see the NFL fight to get the channel to be on basic cable packages.

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