May 2nd, 2008 | Tags: feature creep, focus, limitations
A few weeks ago I watched the movie Who Killed the Electric Car? If you haven’t seen it, it’s about the EV1, an electric vehicle made, popularized and destroyed by GM in the beginning of the 1990s.
One of the vehicle’s “flaws” was its limited driving range (roughly 100 miles per charge). Even tough the average American drives 35 miles a day, a lot of potential buyers were turned off by this limitation.
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Posted by Étienne in Design Strategy | No Comments »
April 23rd, 2008 | Tags: automated tests, free tools, online resources
When building Websites, we find it useful to have a list of elements to consider to help us ensure we’re not forgetting anything.
Over the years, we’ve used several online tools and resources to perform automated tests, improve the design, perform SEO, etc. The following is a list of some of the best resources we came across:
Accessibility
We use FAE and EvalAccess to perform automated accessibility compliance evaluations. It’s always a good start.
Posted by Étienne in Web Design | No Comments »
April 12th, 2008 | Tags: contrast, Design Trends, readability, website redesign
At a glance
Earlier this week, Tsn.ca, a popular sports Website in Canada launched its newly redesigned Website. Overall, the Website structure is clearer and information is easier to find but, the overbearing use of upper cap text and shades of gray are questionable design decisions.
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Posted by Étienne in Design Strategy | No Comments »
March 30th, 2008 | Tags: customers, filtering, Interaction Design, real-time interface
Good design: ATP Tennis Live scores

(Upon selecting Live scores)
Clear, using big fonts and real-world tennis conventions, ATP Live scores provides all the information needed in one simple and clean interface.
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Posted by Étienne in Design Ideas | No Comments »
March 25th, 2008 | Tags: cookies, seo, splash page, website redesign
I’m always amazed to see Splash or intro pages on newly redesigned Websites. Asides from the various SEO concerns, Splash pages are wasted clicks that could be easily avoided.
Users are looking for content on your Website. The less obstacles you put in their way, the more likely they are to stay and return.
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Posted by Étienne in Design Tips | No Comments »