Showcase of 20 inspiring web development process diagrams
There is a current trend for web design studios to display a visual graphic outlining the process they take to build a website, usually following a header of just "Process". How useful these diagrams or snippets of info actually are to a prospective customer I'm not totally sure. For me they're really just an opportunity to add a bit of pizazz to your site, when done well.
However I'm not going to spend time judging their importance or outline the benefits of including one in your site, but merely present some examples which I've come across and used as research for my own diagram.
Are process diagrams worth including on your site? What works well? What doesn't? Hit me up in the comments if I left any out.
More reading
A 6-Step General Process for Producing a Website
Are Your Designs Pixel Perfect? - My Design Process
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Yahoo has bought IntoNow, a Palo Alto start-up that makes an iOS app with which users "check in" to films or television shows they're watching.
The purchase is a fast one. The app, which is also called IntoNow, launched Jan. 31 and was produced by a team of seven people. The company's chief executive, Adam Cahan, is a former employee of both Google and MTV.
"Yes that's 12 weeks later… We were all surprised to say the least but it makes a ton of sense and we're ready to rock," IntoNow said Monday in a blog post announcing the sale. "We want to grow the experiences, platforms (yes we've heard you loud and clear: Android, iPad, web-based, etc.) and countries to engage with you, our community. That takes resources and a global scale.
"Yahoo! has shown us that they are excited about what we're doing and committed to continue innovating for our community."
Yahoo and IntoNow didn't disclose how much the tech giant paid for the small start-up, but various outlets have reported the amount to be from about $17 million to as much as $30 million.
IntoNow works by using the built-in microphone on an iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch to listen to TV shows or movies playing nearby. The app, using a database of audio from programming, identifies what's on a user's TV or computer and allows a users to "check-in" to a show or movie and then share what their watching on Facebook, Twitter or via an IntoNow account.
The app can identify the TV show or movie that's playing down to the airing, episode and time of a program, for shows that are up to 5 years old. The app also produces recommendations for what to watch, based on what it identifies as a user's interests and what a user's friends have watched.
"Relying on social channels as a means for discovering content -- whether it's on a PC, mobile
device, or TV -- is rapidly on the rise," Bill Shaughnessy, Yahoo's senior vice president of product management, said in a statement. "IntoNow's technology combines the ability to check in to what a consumer is watching, engage in conversations and find related content."The IntoNow application the team has built clearly demonstrates the opportunities the technology presents across Yahoo's network, especially in regards to our video content, search, mobile and Connected TV experiences. We are excited to have the IntoNow team join Yahoo as we continue to build out these experiences."
We've heard of hackers shutting down the Internet, but this is ridiculous...
A 75-year-old woman from Georgia (the country) unwittingly used a spade to disrupt Internet service to the entire country of Armenia for half a day on March 28.
The woman was illegally foraging for copper to sell as scrap when she hacked through a fiber-optic cable owned by the Georgian state railway, according to The Guardian:
"As Georgia provides 90% of Armenia's internet, the woman's unwitting sabotage had catastrophic consequences. Web users in the nation of 3.2 million people were left twiddling their thumbs for up to five hours as the country's main internet providers - ArmenTel, FiberNet Communication and GNC-Alfa - were prevented from supplying their normal service. Television pictures showed reporters at a news agency in the capital Yerevan staring glumly at blank screens. Large parts of Georgia and some areas of Azerbaijan were also affected."
Local media called the woman the "spade-hacker," but it's not joke for her. She could face up to three years in prison for damaging property, although she's been released for now on account of her age.
| April 07 2011 at 12:22 PM
y the time the first ballot is opened at the Academy Awards next Sunday, millions of people will be chatting about the awards show on the Internet. And ABC will be ready.
Trying to exploit viewers’ two-screen behavior, the television network has built a companion Web site with behind-the-scenes video streams, so Oscar winners will be seen accepting an award on the TV set, then seen celebrating backstage on the stream.
Experiments like this one are a sudden priority in television land. As more and more people chat in real time about their favorite shows — on Facebook, Twitter and a phalanx of smaller sites — television networks are trying to figure out how to capitalize.
It’s as if people are gathered around the online water cooler — and the television executives are nervously hovering nearby, hoping viewers keep talking and, by extension, watching their shows.
Experts like Ian Schafer, the chief executive of the digital agency Deep Focus, say that Twitter and Facebook messages about shows may well be “the most efficient way to drive tune-in.” Though it is hard to prove the link, Mr. Schafer sees it firsthand when a news segment catches his attention or a basketball game is in overtime. “I’ll say on Twitter or Facebook, ‘You have got to tune into ‘Nightline’ or ‘60 Minutes’ right now,’ and then I’ll get people saying, ‘Oh, thanks for alerting me,’ ” he said.
The water-cooler effect makes big shows even bigger — the Grammy Awards had its highest rating in a decade on Feb. 13 — and gives small shows a new way to stand out.
On the same day as the Grammys, Howard Stern demonstrated the latter with his stream Twitter posts during a re-airing of his movie “Private Parts.” Suddenly, some people flipped over to HBO2 to follow along, and Twitter executives were thrilled. Adam Bain, one such executive, wrote, “This is what fiction TV producers should do every week.”
Acts like Mr. Stern’s make television viewing more social, even if the viewers are in separate rooms (or states).
“In a sense, you are in the living room, watching together,” said Jeff Probst, the host of “Survivor,” who used Twitter to talk with fans during the show’s season premiere last Wednesday while flying from New York to Los Angeles. Mr. Probst plans to make such viewing a weekly habit this season.
Television executives say the chats deepen viewers’ interest in a show, making them more likely to watch next time. BET stunned its competitors last month when “The Game,” a sitcom about football players’ relationships with women, drew more than seven million viewers, thanks in part to fevered online chatter. Debra Lee, the chief executive of BET, said “we can now tell when something’s a hit almost immediately — by seeing how many of the trending topics on Twitter belong to us.”
Twitter generally lists 10 such trending words at a time, and in the evenings, television shows are well-represented.
Television networks as well as some technology companies, Twitter chief among them, see benefits to their business from this behavior. Dick Costolo, the chief executive of Twitter, said last week at a mobile conference in Barcelona that online conversations about TV shows turn the programs into events, “meaning people watch them as they happen,” blunting the impact of digital video recording.
He may have overstated the impact of Twitter — digital recording remains prevalent — but it is clear that many people feel they have to watch some shows as they premiere in order to keep up with conversations online.
“We know people are multitasking while they’re watching TV,” said Albert Cheng, the executive vice president for digital media for the Disney/ABC Television Group, which oversees ABC. “The question is, how do we tap into that and create a whole different consumer experience?”
“We don’t have all the answers,” he added, “but we are definitely trying different things and seeing how people are reacting.”
In this television season, ABC introduced iPad apps for two shows, the since-canceled “My Generation” and the medical drama “Grey’s Anatomy,” that sync up polls and trivia to the premieres of new episodes. Those apps, for Mr. Cheng, double as research labs.
Much of the experimentation around the online water cooler is happening on cable before it trickles up to the broadcast networks. Lisa Hsia, the executive vice president of Bravo’s digital media arm, said that its online viewing parties for “Real Housewives” reunions gave a 10 percent ratings lift to the telecasts.
“The key discovery is that we’re not just driving digital growth, we’re driving analog growth,” she said.
The experiments are gaining the attention of TV advertisers looking to leverage the online communication about their brands. For the Super Bowl last year, Nielsen created a blended media score for clients that looked at the impact of both paid media and earned media. The highest-scoring clients had what Randall Beard, the global head of advertising solutions for the Nielsen Company, described as “pass-along currency” in their social media campaigns, like a coupon.
“The best form of advertising is a recommendation from a friend and a family member,” something that social media encourages, Mr. Beard said.
During this year’s Super Bowl on Feb. 6, Twitter users set a new record by sending 4,064 messages each second, the highest number of messages per second recorded during any sporting event.
A recent study by Deloitte of 2,000 American consumers ages 14 to 75 found that 42 percent sometimes surfed the Web while watching TV, and 26 percent sometimes sent instant messages or texts.
Analysts say such behavior will become more common as tablets and smartphones become more prevalent. Programs like “The Rachel Maddow Show,” on MSNBC promote iPad apps, and ABC’s Oscar Web site will come in the form of an app.
It’s not just television networks like ABC that are eager to wedge themselves into the two-screen experience. A wide range of Web sites, including People.com and NYTimes.com, are creating Web pages and apps meant to be viewed during the Oscars next Sunday.
Mark Golin, the editor of People Digital, said the People.com site would feature real-time trivia with a $10,000 grand prize. “We do a lot of run-up content in the days and weeks before” the Oscars, he said.
“We always have a big day after. So why not during the show?”
The curt antagonist on "Pretty Little Liars" - known only as "A" - terrorizes victims by way of text messages and the Internet. ABC Family is using the same weapons to lure its audience.
The network is banking on Twitter's 140 characters and Facebook's "like"-ability in an effort to generate buzz and strengthen the fan base of the freshman series. It doesn't end with social networking. Whether it's iPhone apps or text alerts, TV networks are finding that they have to keep up with an ever-changing social media landscape to keep young viewers interested.
It seems to be working for "Pretty Little Liars," which airs locally at 8 p.m. Mondays. The series nabbed 4.2 million total viewers for its midseason premiere last month. Not gargantuan numbers, but impressive enough for the young cable network.
"We know how influential the dialogue on social networks can be," said Danielle Mullin, vice president of marketing at ABC Family. "That was really key to our strategy. We really tried to use social media as a way for fans to become advocates for us and help get the word out about the premiere."
It also helps that the program, based on the popular young adult novels by Sara Shepard, has a built-in audience ready to help spread the word. Leading up to the series' launch, the network tapped Shepard to participate in an online media call, on which she answered questions submitted on the ABC Family "Pretty Little Liars" Facebook page. To capitalize on the show's premiere and the release of the final book in the series, the network posted Shepard's tweets containing passages from the first chapter on the "Pretty Little Liars" Facebook Fan page.
"We love Twitter; we love Facebook," said series creator Marlene King, who also has taken part in the tactic by participating in a Twitter-based question-and-answer with fans. "You're talking to people in Brazil, in China. Gosh, if I were 14 years old and I could've tweeted the creator of a TV show while sitting in my bedroom - and they're tweeting me back - I'd be delighted."
On the night of its series premiere in June, "Pretty Little Liars" was a "Breakout" search term on the Yahoo Buzz index; on Google Trends, which tracks what's popular on the Web, the "Pretty Little Liars" "hotness factor" went from "Spicy" to "On fire" to "Volcanic." They may not be exactly comparable to stellar Nielsen figures, but a program's social media footprint is just as imperative, according to Dan Neely, chief executive of Networked Insights, a data mining and analytics company.
"It allows for instant feedback in a way that arbitrary ratings can't," he said. "People are sharing instantly what they don't like about a particular scene, or they're asking questions like, 'Where can I go buy the thing she's wearing?' ... and they don't have to send a letter to do it."
How ABC Family is using social networks to sell their show
