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Hillary Clinton’s old website

On Sunday, Hillary Rodham Clinton announced she would definitely like to be the next President of the United States of America. Before that announcement HillaryClinton.com looked like this: a holding page linking to the website of her official office.

HillaryClinton.com on 27th March 2015, retrieved from archive.org
HillaryClinton.com on 27th March 2015, retrieved from archive.org

Blue, a notoriously popular colour in web design, seems deployed here according to colour theory:always reassuringly safe, friendly and almost frivolous when light, while the darker blue brings a more serious tone. The background gradient gives an abstract sense of a horizon; the ground and the sky; don’t stop thinking about tomorrow. We’re meant to be reassured. The contrasting darker blue used for the ‘Hillary’ headline – really a logo – fits it quite well: we’re on first name terms with Mrs Clinton, but we’re still encouraged to take her name seriously as a strong and powerful proposition. The colour contrast emphasises the seriousness of ‘Hillary’ as a concept. We’re meant to be impressed.
The gradient is deployed as a background image rather than modern css: old-fashioned but fine for a lightweight single page site. There’s a technical fail, however, whereby the bottom curve of the ‘y’ descender in the logo (also deployed as an image) has been truncated by over-zealous cropping. This could have been avoided with modern web typography – or a steadier hand.

But never mind because the typography itself is interesting. Continue reading Hillary Clinton’s old website

A slower web

Another great article from A List Apart, this time on re-purposing old content.  I found especially interesting  the insight that the web has not yet adapted to slowing down, and ease of access leads to a lack of context for old content.

The network touches

Your site is not your product

Rather a website becomes part of your product – one channel or manifestation of it. This point stands out in a talk, still engaging today if a little orthodox now, given four years ago by Tom Coates on the web of data, called Everything the Network Touches. It’s an amusing listen and includes some early breakdowns of the “internet of things”.

The audio is archived at the site for the 2010 dConstruct conference in Brighton.

Twitter Bios I Like

About yourself in 160 characters or less

A Twitter Bio shows up in the header of a Profile view,  and would be encountered, alongside name and avatar, when browsing a list of Twitterati;  both placements make them key for conversion.

In crafting a Twitter Bio users can enter any text, including hypertext. This leaves many choices of content, tone, link strategy and so on: straightforward, ironic, informative, inspirational, cryptic, humourous or even empty, which do you need?

Continue reading Twitter Bios I Like