According to Wikipedia a website wireframe is a visual guide that represents the skeletal framework of a website which basically means to visually plan the layout of each individual element of the website e.g. the content, navigation system and other functionality and how all of these elements will work together to create a user-friendly experience / website.

A wireframe can be broken up into three main components namely: information design, navigation design and interface design.

Information Design

Information design is the process of preparing/planning the presentation of data so that the end user can understand it and use it efficiently. The layout of the information depends on the data type you want to present and the interaction between the user and the data.

Navigation Design

Navigation design is part of the information architecture or structure of a website. This includes different methods of finding your way throughout a website or careful planning on how the end user will flow from one piece of information to another so that the user can achieve a goal.

Interface Design

User interface design is to make the user interaction with your website as simple and efficient as possible. Good interface design is getting the balance right between functionality and visual elements to create a website that works well and is visually appealing.

Why is a website wireframe important?

There are a number of reasons why a website wireframe is of high importance. These reasons include: promoting usability on the website; enabling you to look objectively at elements which can help you improve your website’s conversion rate; it gives you a visual presentation of your website structure or sitemap that can help you identify possible flaws and how a visitor will navigate the website. It also clarifies how a feature/functionality will work and if the functionality/feature will reach the goals you have set out for it to achieve and if it is even necessary to implement the feature or not. Most importantly it saves you a lot of time in both the design and development phase. The developers will know and understand exactly what they are building and the designers will be able to design more sufficiently.

I hope this article helped in explaining what a website wireframe is and how you can benefit from it. Wireframes don’t need to be visually impressive with fancy graphics. It can be as simple as drawing a couple of blocks and naming each element. There is a number of software available that can help in creating basic wireframes. One of my favourites is Balsamiq Mockups which is very easy to use and not that expensive. See a basic example wireframe below made in Balsamiq Mockups.

Instagram, launched in October 2010, allows users to take pics, digitally filter them & share them to various social networking sites including Instagram itself. The application has accumulated 30million users since January 2011 & 5million pictures are uploaded daily.

Upon its launch, Instagram was only supported on iPad, iPhone & iPod Touch. Earlier this month the application was extended to work with Android Camera Phones running 2.2 (Froyo) or higher, seeing more than a million downloads within the first 12hours. The app is distributed via iTunes App Store & Google Play.

Both CEOs posted the acquisition announcement on their respective platforms, adding that the companies would continue to run independently, though the staff would be integrated & work together to strengthen and grow each company independently in areas where the other has achieved success. Mark Zuckerburg’s statement added that Instagram users would continue to be able to share their pics with users of Facebook’s competitor social networking sites as they had been able to before. They will also maintain the ability to have followers & follow other people independently on Facebook.

Users have expressed worry about Facebook’s Privacy policies being carried over to Instagram because of the acquisition, & that Facebook would use information on them gained from Instagram to target Ads to them. Some even adding that they will be closing their Instagram accounts.

With Instagram currently being a fully Mobile Application, the purchase will give Facebook a much sought after ‘in’ to the mobile market.

The acquisition is sure to strengthen Facebook as a force given that the companies are both built on Photo Sharing & have done relatively well in their own rights. We will be watching to see what great ideas & improvements are brought to both these products with the fresh ideas & outlook the new staff will bring to each company.

References:

http://blog.instagram.com/

http://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10100318398827991

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instagram

http://mashable.com/2012/04/09/facebook-instagram-buy/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/facebook-acquires-instagram-for-about-1b/2012/04/09/gIQA180H6S_story.html

http://www.forbes.com/sites/onmarketing/2012/04/11/what-facebooks-acquisition-of-instagram-means-for-brands/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-voakes/the-numbers-behind-facebo_b_1418406.html

Timeline… Milestone… Cover picture… You almost want to add the word ‘Mufasa’ to the mix!

But just like ‘Mufasa’ in the story brought so many good changes, Timeline brings so many business benefits to the table:

1. Identity: Timeline allows brands to create a personal identity with rich images.
2. Timeline: The chronological view featured in Timeline allows brands to show off their history.
3. Image: The new cover photo creates a great image when done right, and says a lot about the brand on first contact with fans.
4. Private messaging: The new interface allows fans to reach out to their favourite brands via private messaging.
5. Highlighting:  This newly added feature allows important page updates to be highlighted and pushed to the top of the timeline for users to view.
6. Admin Panel:  Opening the admin panel has never been easier.  Instead of navigating to another page to make changes, updates, view analytics, etc. you can now open your admin panel directly on the Page.

All of this taken into consideration, the new Timeline will make Social for business faster, more effective and give the fans an attractive page to visit and interact with, inevitably building brand awareness and association.

From March 23 the new iPad will be available in Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Macau, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden.

The new iPad features a stunning new Retina™ display, Apple’s new A5X chip with quad-core graphics and a 5 megapixel iSight® camera with advanced optics for capturing amazing photos and 1080p HD video and still delivers the same all-day 10 hour battery life* while remaining amazingly thin and light. iPad Wi-Fi + 4G supports ultrafast 4G LTE networks in the US and Canada, and fast 3G networks around the world including those based on HSPA+ and DC-HSDPA.** Additionally, iPad 2 is available at a more affordable price starting at just $399.

The Wall Street Journal reported that consumers were lining up outside Apple Stores around the world looking to buy themselves the computer device, furthering Apple’s lead in the fast growing Tablet Market and sending the company’s share price to a record $600.01 (R4587.72) extending the market worth of the world’s most valuable company to almost $560 billion.

The official launch date for the iPad 3 in South Africa is yet to be announced. So we wait for the beloved iPad to hit our shores in anticipation.

Sources:

http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2012/03/14New-iPad-Arrives-in-the-US-Nine-Additional-Countries-on-Friday.html

http://www.euronews.com/business-newswires/1439175-apple-touches-record-high-as-ipad-3-sales-run-hot/

http://www.ponder.co.za/ipad3-release-date-and-what-to-expect/

So let’s take a look at the latest (February 2012) stats from W3Counter. (http://www.w3counter.com)

These stats reflect a different picture than the one that was prevalent about two or three years ago. I think it is safe to say that, unless Microsoft comes out with a totally fresh and usable product, both Google’s Chrome and Mozilla’s Firefox will surpass it in the near future. Chrome is by far the fastest growing browser, having gone from nearly non-existent in early 2008 to the browser with the second biggest share in 2012. In that same time period Internet Explorer’s usage has nearly halved. It should be noted that these statistics represent all the versions of a given browser as a collective whole. For example: Internet Explorer 8 usage is at 14.71%, Chrome 17 at 14.4% and so on – with the total for all Internet Explorer versions making up 30.7%, Chrome 25.1%, Firefox 24.4% etc.

I am sure many web developers and designers would smile when looking at the latest Web Browser Market share statistics. It seems as if the days of endless struggle with older versions of Internet Explorer might be a thing of the past very soon.

Personally, I use and prefer Google Chrome. What first drew me towards it back in 2008 was the screen real estate. The bottom bar disappeared and the top and navigational bar minimalistic, allowing for an overall clean and visually pleasing browser. Secondly, I loved Chrome’s speed.

In the end however, the important thing is that the game has changed. Microsoft no longer has monopoly, competition is healthy.  Who knows – Microsoft might still come back and surprise, but at the moment the picture is different. The browser war has been fought again and again and it seems there just might be a new winner soon.

The Infografic below outlines the Social Media Buzz for the Oscars 2012.

Some interesting finding in this Infographic is that

• The Help generated the most likes on Facebook and Tweets on Twitter, but is did not top the list in terms of Award Nominations,
• Hugo received the highest number of Award Nominations but not much social media comments or tweets.
• Meryl Streep generated the largest global share of voice of all the actresses nominated for an Oscar.

Being part of the Social Media community is like being there at the Oscars.

When I just got my new iPad, I was enthralled by the notion of the newsstand app where you can subscribe to your favorite magazines, but then realized the magazine subscriptions are mainly for international publications and not the local South African ones I prefer to read.
It was then that I discovered mysubs and zinio, apps that allow you to download almost every local and international magazine. They even have the Afrikaans versions of these magazines available for certain editions.

This immediately solves magazine storage issue as I can subscribe to almost all the magazines I read as well as buy previous editions. My current storage stash can now be dissolved as I acquire my favourites, and I can now carry the whole collection around wherever I go – allowing for ease of access and reference.

You can find these apps and other similar apps on the Apple store or the Android store for your tablet. If you haven’t been able to justify spoiling yourself with a tablet, this just might be a good enough reason to go and get one.

YouTube will now be displaying content from Video Partners & Content Producers who share revenue with them on all platforms available.

Content owners had previously been able to opt out of their videos being displayed by YouTube on some devices, some in the hopes that they could make more money through other Video distributors such as Netflix. YouTube informed Partners at the end of January that they now plan to display their content everywhere & needed them to sign off on this deal so they may go on with the change.

Video Makers who are working with YouTube through its new Channels Programme have been signing up with Multi-Platform distribution agreed upon as a condition. Big Media Companies such as Vevo will continue to keep some of their content off certain platforms such as the YouTube app on the iPhone, because of technical issues like ad servers and branding, while other public video Creators (some of which have Millions of views & followers) will have to conform to the new rules.

As YouTube has such a wide reach, Video Makers who want to ensure their Videos get maximum reach will continue to share them on YouTube, though some may not be happy with what they may see as empowering a monopoly.

Reference:

http://allthingsd.com/20120213/youtubes-offer-video-makers-cant-refuse-were-putting-all-your-stuff-everywhere/

The release of their S-1 Documents revealed interesting information about Facebook’s business operations. Most of the Social Network’s revenue is generated from advertising & associated fees, their payment infrastructure enables users to buy virtual and digital goods from their Platform developers. Of the $3.71 Billion[1] revenue generated in 2011, $445 million was made through virtual goods sold by Zynga Games who account for approximately 12% of Facebook’s revenue with Facebook taking 30% of all Virtual Goods sold by Zynga Games, such as FarmVille and CityVille.

Facebook’s public offering will make it a public company, enabling anyone to buy shares in the company. Though this means huge amounts of cashflow for the company to further their visions, it also means monetising the company which could compromise Mark Zucherburg’s idealistic & user based approach to running the pioneer social network. Just as Apple challenged Microsoft for Software supremacy, Facebook now challenges Google for Internet supremacy. To strengthen this challenge, they will have to begin to split focus as their users, who have always been at the fore of their business and who form the basis of the business value proposition will now become the product of their business, firstly, and secondly the shareholders will now also need to see returns on their investments.

The company is expected to be listed on New York Stock Exchange or the Nasdaq in a few months and investors from around the world will be watching eagerly to see how this long awaited listing performs. Internet advertisers will be looking to see what this does to the performance of their ads, especially in comparison to long dominant Google.

References:
[1]: http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000119312512034517/d287954ds1.htm
[2]: http://mashable.com/2012/02/02/facebook-ipo-tech-stocks/

Google’s social rival, the massively popular micro blogging site Twitter, are on the forefront of the accusing camp. After the new search algorithm was launched by Google, Twitter accused Google of trying to drive traffic to their social network by manipulating search results. A Twitter representative made the following statement: “For years, people have relied on Google to deliver the most relevant results any time they wanted to find something on the internet. As we’ve seen time and time again, news breaks first on Twitter, as a result, Twitter accounts and tweets are often the most relevant results. We’re concerned that as a result of Google’s changes, finding this information will be much harder for everyone. We think that’s bad for people, publishers, news organisations and Twitter users”.

Personally, I think Twitter has a point. Twitter has had a massive social impact over the last few years (the “Twitter Revolutions” for example) and breaking news can often be found first on Twitter. If results from Twitter (or any other site for that matter) is the most relevant, the information should be available first in Google search results. This also ties in with the aforementioned Search Engine Optimisation. If you have to compete with only slightly relevant data from Google itself, you’re in for a losing battle. One option is to embrace the change from a social marketing perspective. But is this really best for the user?

In conclusion, it seems that many are worried that relevant results get pushed down in favour of Google + content. Fundamentally, relevancy is what it all boils down to. Google might not be in the wrong here, they are certainly entitled to promote their social network, but they should not compromise the quality of their search results in the process.

Twitter/Facebook - image credit - www.cbsnews.com