Two For The Price Of None!

The following are both responses to replies to previous blog entries from "kirkjerk". These are *REALLY* long so unless you're just really interested in website design/development then you probably don't want to bother because you'll probably be bored to tears and you'll have no clue as to what either of us is even talking about. So, with that in mind, here we go:

---

cite?

I don't think so. I'm not going to go searching through the 200,000+ posts I've made on Usenet looking for a proverbial needle in a haystack. If *YOU* want to go looking for the posts, hey, be my guest. If it helps you any I believe they were made in ADG, or at least a cross post to ADG. Oh and these were involved:
CB_Site_Music_Player_Working_1.png
CB_Site_Music_Player_Working_2.png
CB_Site_Music_Player_Working_3.png

The entire group itself actually helped me in the design process of the site by giving me active critiques of the color/form/style/etc which I then used to create multiple versions of site elements, like the music player, each improved version being the culmination of a generally shared consensus amongst the designers in the group.

There should also be a few posts somewhere where some of the regs talk about how neat the logo design is and asked me how I did it. There's also a few posts by some of my biggest detractors and Hatter Addicts who basically try attacking me on every level *EXCEPT* for that one particular site, which they often try and cite as the *ONLY* good site I've ever made. Considering how much those types absolutely hate me and wish I were writhing in horrible pain and agony for all of eternity...that's a pretty big compliment.

Hrmmm...I do have a few files that have some Google links, let me see if there's any in there.

*searches*

Nah, nothing CB related. There's this one post by Toby Inkster regarding the perfect liquid site:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.2600/msg/d857edcc7bec9527

*searches moar*

Nope, most of the rest of the links I have are either to tutorial stuff I've made or people slurping my ass for helping them figure something out.

Developer with a focus on UI.

Uh huh.

Also, an informed web user.

Uh huh. We'll just conveniently forget about the part where you hadn't ever heard of Flash Lite. ;)

I don't see "box floating in the middle of space" that often...

Once again, that's called a "portal design" and it's quite common (although not to be confused with a "portal site").

except, as I realized from another thread, one off promotional sites, meant to be seen, show of a movie or service, and then forgotten. I don't know what the % of that type of site is.

I have no idea what the percentage is...probably low considering the level of difficulty it takes to make. Currently there is no W3C compatible way to even create a portal design...of course a lot of things aren't W3C compatible so I guess that's not too big a deal. They are just "recommended standards" after all, although some people like to worship the W3C as if it were God almighty of web design.

You really don't get the idea of taking advantage of browser space? Many, many well designed sites are structured with flow design: if you have a big screen, you see lots of content. If you have a small screen, you have to scroll (a current trend is to split the different, and have a maximum column size for readability, and then scroll.)

Yes I'm sure that's what they're teaching college flunkies these days, I've no doubt at all. There's a big difference between knowledge gained via "popular" book learning and knowledge gained directly from the community itself *AS* it's developed and created.

I've already explained why that form of design is deficient and, quite frankly, I really don't feel like trying to explain it all over to you again (all that stuff about scrolling off the navigation controls and having floating/reposition navigation controls as opposed to division frame scrolling). If you didn't "get it" the first time I don't think you'll ever "get it".

Oh, hey, free cl00, the number of websites using that form you like so much that use a floating/repositioning navigation control as well...yeah...like less than 20%...if that. And we're talking about ~supposedly~ "professional" sites here. It's okay though, college flunkies aren't really expected to know any better. And as I said, if you didn't "get it" the first time I explained it you're not going to "get it" now.

Yes it does.

*sigh*

Look, I want you to re-read what I wrote...*REAAAAAL* slowly...and then I want you to re-read it again...and again...and just keep on re-reading it over and over and over again until you agree with me. You can do it, I know you can. There's a few ~key phrases~ and explanations that you're missing there. But with enough repetition I think maybe you'll figure it out. Free cl00, you're not wrong because what you think is wrong, you're wrong because the way you worded it is wrong. And no, it's not what you think, it's what you *SAY* that counts. *rolls eyes*

Users like to know that they can go and use the the fwd, back, reload buttons etc...then they don't have to relearn navigation for every site they go to -- (it's kind of like how Usenet was cool because it offered one user-selected UI for every newsgroup, and you could discuss anything without a new signup or relearning new forum navigation (or stuff like bbcode))

And once again this is one of those things that's basically entirely subjective. For every user you could find that says they need the "comfort" of suckling on the browser's back button teat I bet I can find another that says they like a cohesive, wholly contained site environment with its own custom controls. And in line with that I could start off on a whole great big long rant about the importance of the design environment, probably link to this, yadda, yadda, yadda...doesn't the fuck matter. It's completely subjective. If you don't like doing it that way then create a separate HTML page for every single Flash section. I really don't care what the fuck way you do it, I really don't. I have my reasons for doing it the way that I do it and I can assure you those ways did not come magically floating out of any one person's particular ass as I'm sure they did for you. To be perfectly blunt with you I've heard your side of the argument before, and I've heard it from people who were able to argue it *FAR* better than you're doing...but then I've heard all the counter arguments too...and your side just couldn't hold up. Especially when the only thing your side had going for it was this completely unprovable notion that people were somehow going to be ~upset~ and undone if suddenly they couldn't use the back button on a site.

My side won the arguments, on multiple occasions, not simply on the design aspects as mentioned in that link, but also as far as creating seamlessly loading sites...and *THAT* is the trick...that's where your side loses. You see people have different expectations out of different types of sites and a site that loads seamlessly is generally recognized as a "Flash site"...even if it's not Flash based at all (as many of my sites have been falsely labeled), it's *RECOGNIZED* as a Flash site *BECAUSE* of that seamlessly loading, NON RELOADING site design. Basically it's that flicker, that blanking, that RELOADING that triggers your perception as far as whether you'll use the back button or not. If the site DOES NOT reload and flash on and off then that visual cue for knowing that you can use the back button simply is not there and the user immediately looks to WITHIN the site itself for navigation.

Most Flash designers don't bother with URI construction, or making it clear to the user. I don't know how many times on, say, Boingboing I've seen them bitch "ok, here's a cool product or game, but the dumb flash site means I have to explain how to navigate to it" rather than just give a link.

Uh huh, and most non-Flash designers who use that "flow" page design you like so much never use a floating/repositioning navigation control and title bar...so what's your point? Crap developers are crap and they're infesting *ALL* aspects and areas of website design, not simply Flash designs nor any other form of website design.

You really don't get the iPhone's usecases.

*pats you on the head*

You keep thinking that. ^__^

On the contrary, the iPhone in general, for most people...has no real use. Most people who buy Apple products do so for the branding, the popularity, the "coolness" of owning it and showing it off to people. The vast majority of iPhone users are complete fuckin mallet heads who have no fucking clue at all as to what they can even do with the thing.

Starting with a tangent: ".mobi", if it's catching on at all, will not be popular at ALL with smartphones that have a decent shot at displaying almost any HTML based webpage. At most you're talking WAP-style browsers on cheap devices... (tangent to the tanget: there might be a promising market for that in India and other developing places-- I think my last division of Nokia is banking on that -- but I don't see it as setting the world on fire here, when an iPhone costs $200 plus a pricey but not THAT pricey contract)) Anyway, as you probably know, domains are important as brand-identity. Therefore, most companies will use client detection and redirection on their ".com" domains, rather than trusting people to remember "oh, wait, it's ".mobi"

*sigh*

Yes, they'll use redirection and feature detection...but they'll be redirecting to .mobi domains. And they *ARE* catching on, quite rapidly, for a whole variety of reasons, most of them concerning base resolution and search engines that cater specifically to mobile devices in which .mobi domains get top billing. Most companies are slowly waking up to the fact that the website that they designed for a 1024x768 display simply DOES NOT fucking work on something with a 320x480 display resolution. At that point they slap themselves across the head and say, "Huh, ya know maybe we ought to have a site that's specifically designed for that specific resolution." The only thing really standing in their way is product usage vs cost of development. As I said, most smart phone users currently are iPhone users who, simply aren't, they just have the damn thing to "look cool". *BUT* other smart phones are catching on for those who will *ACTUALLY* use them and once they fully support Flash in 2010 then they'll *REALLY* take off. At that point, once there's a large customer base that's *ACTUALLY* using the damn things *THEN* more and more companies will start seeing the cost effectiveness of designing smart phone specific websites. And once again they'll redirect to .mobi domain names as they'll be a variety of search engines that cater specifically to smart phones and websites designed for best use on a smart phone...in fact I wouldn't be surprised if there aren't some already.

Anyway, iPhone is perfectly wonder for both focused information, in a .mobi WAP like sense, as well as random entertainment and browsing. The problem is you seem to be mixing "entertainment" with "cool looking Flash websites".

Oh there's some irony for ya. An iPhone user snitting about something that "looks cool". *snicker* And no, I'm not mixing "entertainment" with "cool looking Flash websites", I'm mixing "entertainment" with *VIDEO* Oh your fucking gawd, how many times do I need to point it out to you:
www.youtube.com

Look, look man, it's right here:
www.youtube.com

Here, I'll give you another dozen links:
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com

You got it yet? You need a couple more?
www.youtube.com
www.youtube.com

How about now, has it sunk in yet for ya?

Here, let me throw in some stuff from that list that you overlooked so easily:

4. Support of the On2 VP6+ codec.

Dee, dee, dee! You don't know what that is, do you? I mean seriously, you've never even heard of it I'll bet. *nods*

7. Support of alpha transparent video.

...I bet you have no idea what that is either, do you? Quick, run and Google as fast as you can!

19. Custom video/audio controls (can be done ~somewhat~ with javascript but ONLY with certain browsers like IE...and even then with only about half the functionality that you can get with Flash.

Now *SURELY* you can comprehend at ~least~ that part...I hope.

Tha fuck man, what do you think all this video content on the web is just coming out of some guy's ass or something? It's *FLASH* based, for some *REALLY* important fucking reasons, number 4 and number 19 being right the fuck up there at the top. Video is *THE* premiere source of entertainment in the here and now web wise. YouTube and similar site forms is literarily a *BOOMING* web industry. And a good 90% of it is *ALL* Flash based. Or hey, wanna talk about games? Flash based gaming is one of *THE* hottest web markets to get into right now, it's a literal fucking gold rush! Or what about Flash based animation? There are HUNDREDS of websites devoted to Flash animations, both on the professional level and on the amateur level. Simply put, Flash is *EVERYTHING* as far as entertainment is concerned on the Internet. You'd have to have been living in a fuckin cave to even *SUGGEST* otherwise. o_O

You are also harping on a mistake I used to make, thinking "gee, I have a computer at home, and a computer at work, when do I need an iPhone?" And the short answer is,

...you just weren't as "cool" as all the other guys in the office, amirite? *nods*

there's a lot of in between times that the iPhone fills quite nicely.

Uh huh, sure. You can justify it any way you like man, but when it comes down to it, iPhone's are a fad and the only *REAL* reason you bought it is to "look cool"...that's it, that's the *ONLY* real reason. I mean fer fuck sake, you make it sound as if you'd *DIE* or something if you didn't have the Internet constantly at your disposal. People like you probably could use a little "offline" time, especially in that in your quest to "look cool" you'll likely be inclined to do really stupid shit, like try and use it while driving. There is *NO* plausible reason that you would need to be constantly fucking hooked up to the gawd damn Internet 24/7...that's just fucking crazy man. Seriously, you should probably log the fuck off sometime...go outside for awhile...blow the stink off yerself.


You have it to "look cool"...that's it...anything beyond that is just delusional over compensation almost any way you wanna look at it. For one simply the fact that you bought an iPhone instead of one of the many VASTLY superior other smart phones available says to me that you have no fucking clue at all about the thing and you don't actually use it in any meaningful, life altering way. I can think of ~some~ jobs and ~some~ situations in which a smart phone would be a good, handy thing to have...but that incredibly price bloated piece of shit would not the fuck even make the *LIST* of viable smart phone choices. If you own an iPhone...you bought it to "look cool", you didn't buy it because you needed something functionally superior. You went with the OVER PRICED, INFERIOR option simply because of the "coolness" factor in showing the thing off to people. Probably other guys at the office were getting them and, well hey, you didn't want to be left out of the "cool" group, huh? So you just ~had~ to go and buy one. And hey, like you said, there's *ALL* that time between work and home...um...you know...driving and all...er...um...wait a minute...

Dee, Dee, Dee!

Yeah, well, if I had a nickel for every instance of me thinking you're "not getting it" in this thread, I'd have like $1.50 or something.

Hey man, don't blame me for your college flunkie "education", I wasn't the one that spoon fed you a bunch of useless, outdated crap and then left you fucked for lack of any other options. The problem with most people like you is that you get spoon fed all this bullshit when you're in college and people like you are almost completely incapable of learning at all on your own without having that spoon feeding. So the minute you get out of college...yeah...yer fucked man! And all you have going for yourself is the ~very~ limited level of knowledge that you probably half slept through whilst in college. That, keep in mind, was spoon fed to you by deficients who weren't good enough to get *REAL* jobs in the tech sector.

Those on my level...oh man...we fuckin eat, breath, sleep and SHIT this stuff. By the time *I* even went to college, my level of knowledge and skill exceeded the instructors so far that I was simply passed through more than half my courses and the other half was spent doing favors for the administration in exchange for straight As. I have quite literarily spent over a DECADE of my life devoted to learning every single possible thing I could about technology, the Internet, computers, graphic design, programming, networking, etc, etc, etc.

And I'm *STILL* doing it. To strive to be the "best of the best" one must devote themselves entirely to their field. You have to study, you have to read, you have to experiment, you have to *LEARN*...and not by having anyone hold your hand or assigning you homework. You gotta do it on yer own and you have to be serious about it.

No offense or anything, but when you said you were a "Java developer"...I couldn't help but chuckle at that. See that's what they breed in college flunkies, they teach you *ONE* particular skill in a whole *OCEAN* of other skills that you need to be of any actual, viable worth in this field. To me, when you say you're a "Java developer"...that's like you showing up for a construction job and telling the boss man that you're a "hammer user". A hammer is a *TOOL* it's *NOT* the job itself. There's no such thing as a "Java developer" job, there *IS* such a thing as a WEB DEVELOPER job, maybe even a web developer job with emphasis in Java coding, but there certainly the fuck is *NOT* a "Java developer" position...unless you got hired by some complete fuckin doorknob who didn't know his ass from a hole in the ground as far as website development.

Here was my real life experience with your site. I clicked on a link, sounds or something. I saw what was there. I wanted to go back. I went to hit "back" on the browser, but realized it probably wouldn't work the way I wanted. I looked for a big logo to click on-- I tried to look for the site convention. it wasn't there. I looked around again, until FINALLY I found the dumb little thing, looking more like a video reverse button than something that said "site navigation".

LOL, well here was my 6 year old God daughters experience with the site. She clicked the link for the sound clips, immediately found the scroll bead and scrolled down the list, selecting her favorite Care Bear and then immediately recognized that she needed to click on the speaker icons or text descriptions in order to play the sounds. She played three or four of them, then decided she wanted to look at pictures. She immediately moved the mouse right on the back arrow and clicked back to the main page, instantly recognizing how to navigate through the site. Now, maybe you're just not as intelligent as a six year old, I dunno, I mean if it was really taking you *THAT* long to figure out how to click back to the main page...I mean holy shit d00d...it's no wonder you only know Java coding. LOL I mean most parts of the site have only *TWO* primary controls, a scroll bead, and a back button. So basically what you're saying is that you spent like five minutes fumbling your eyes all over the site trying to find what should have been blindingly obvious to anyone over the age of three. Of course, we both know that's not the case. In reality it probably took you less than 5 seconds to figure out how to click back and once you figured it out that first time it was then intuitive for the rest of the site. Now, maybe for you 5 seconds of effort is just *WAY* too much, I mean, hell, you could only be arsed to learn Java coding after all, don't wanna put ~too~ much stress on yer brain, gotta keep things as ABSOLUTELY simple as possible, dumb everything down to the lowest common denominator (you), even if that means sacrificing style and design as well as loading efficiency and bandwidth usage. Innt that right? ^__^

Users like the navigation that works and looks the same on every site they visit. Too often Flash sites - including yours - fail to offer this.

Not really actually. I'm not sure who it was who told you that, but they were pulling shit out of their ass. Most users don't mind different styles of navigation so long as the *SITE* is consistent. NOBODY in their right mind would want *EVERY* website to look exactly the same and work exactly the same...that would just be horrifically boring in about thirteen different directions. Maybe you were sleeping in class that day though and you just misheard what the professor was saying. I'll bet that what he or she said was that navigation should be consistent...within the *SITE*...not the whole of the fucking Internet. Granted you should try and use similar/recognizable forms of navigation, but not to the point where EVERY site looks exactly the same. Nobody wants that. Don't be absurd. Well unless maybe they've got OCD or something...or a severe learning disability. *NORMAL* people don't want every website to look and function EXACTLY the same. They want VARIETY, they want STYLE, they want DESIGN. It's intriguing, it sparks the imagination, IT MAKES YOU THINK! Oh, I know, I know, five seconds of thinking...WOAH...such a strain on you I'm sure. *nods* Tha fuck man, where the fuck did you learn this idiot shit from? Seriously, I'd like to know what flunkie institute you went to just so I can make sure to *NOT* ever recommend it to anyone.

Microsoft has an interesting strategy of A. a higher level of keyboard only control than, say, OSX (for example: you can tab to a checkbox and set it with space, not on OSX), B. strong support for backwards compatibility - both in the "software you can run sense" as well as the "this is the button I'm used to clicking" - their bread and butter is people who like things to keep working the same, UI wise, so you get more of this "most ways you think you SHOULD be able to navigate this, will work". In a lot of cases this increases usability (since the alternate ways aren't visible or distracting" but in some cases, yeah, it can increase confusion.

I would say in *ALL* cases of people first learning how to use a computer (those that didn't grow up with it). I've helped teach and tutor a *LOT* of people over the years with computers, especially older folks, and one of the things they *ALWAYS* get frustrated with is all the various, multiple ways of doing the exact same thing. It makes the computer seem overly complicated and confusing for them which then further intimidates them from wanting to learn how to use it.

Shit, I lost track of which site I was talking about for that... basically a little joke that the subject matter of the site seemed to echoed in the navigation

That's a *GOOD* thing. Again I'll refer you to this article I wrote.

Here's another good post, similar to that one I wrote:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.2600/msg/138d34696c073066

I didn't say "custom scrollbars are bad". If you use them, though, they should LOOK like scrollbars... that means some kind of line, a skinny one, a fat one, whatever, that the little nub moves on. This is what carebears lacked, though I know that's a nitpick.

It certainly is at that. If it takes a person less than five seconds to figure out how to navigate a site then there's nothing wrong with it. The point is that you should stay consistent WITHIN the site itself. Otherwise your argument is essentially like saying that every video game ever made should all have the exact same kind of interface and navigation design/controls. In other words it's absolutely absurd. Now with *SOME* sites, for example government sites and sites designed to give pure information with absolutely no entertainment level, then yes, you would want to use the most familiar type/style of interface possible, but that's the *ONLY* time it holds up. Once again, I point out the fact that you need to keep the site's intended AUDIENCE and the site's PURPOSE in mind when critiquing, which seems to be your biggest problem.

Non-decorated scrollbars on the right of a browser window look fine. Non-decorated scrollbars on the side of what is obviously a text area, look fine. It's when you use them for some kind of iframe looking thing... meant to give the impression that the scrollable area is "part" of the underlying page, i.e. seamless - that a grey Windows scrollbar in surrounded on all sides by tan, with no boundary for the top or bottom or left side of the scrolling area-- looks, frankly, like crap.

Again with the nit picking and subjectiveness. From a purely objective standpoint the only way that argument holds any water is if I was using just the scroller with *NO* back (like on the CB site) because in that case you wouldn't have any frame of reference for what the scroller does, or which direction it's supposed to move, or how far it can be moved. On the CB site it isn't necessary as boundary boxes are used to define the text area and on the IAS site a boundary box isn't necessary because the scroll bar backing defines the text area. Whether *YOU* think it looks like "ass" or not is ~completely~ subjective. I personally like it, as did the site owner and most everyone else, to the point where it's one of the most frequently asked questions I get via e-mail. Of course most of the people who e-mail me about stuff like that are looking for a cookie cutter solution so my explanations usually don't do them much good.

Oh, btw, that was one other thing I forgot to mention about that Flash Windows construct, it's being constructed so that the entire form is ~completely~ skinable, via style sheets. Not simply the colors and text and such, but you can actually skin it with image forms as well. The primary purpose of it at this point is to turn it into a kind of Flash based cookie cutter message board system, similar to UBB and the like. *MUCH* more advanced though. UBB and other such message boards rely entirely on PHP and databases in order to store message and user data. The form I'm working on only holds user data in a database, the messages and threads and such are instead stored as XML files, which allows for *MUCH* faster access all around, far less server resources and less bandwidth usage.

You're not wrong about keeping the navigation visible can be good (though I think your love of "fixed height sites" is misguided) but in that case, make the scrollbars look better...

I think maybe you might be a lil OCD my friend. You're the first person in fact to have ever even critiqued the scroll bars on my site...err, I take that back, one person at one time complained about the SIZE of a scroller I had for a video player at one time, although I agreed with him on that and made it bigger. Although, really, if any of my current navigation controls *REALLY* needed critiquing it would likely be the *SIZE*. Not so much for younger folk, but on occasion I do hear a lot of complaints from older folk who have a lot of trouble accessing various sites with small controls. That's why on the last redesign I did of my Backwater site I made the entire navigation system about 20% larger than it originally was...which got me quite a lot of praise.

Or is it tough to make control that in a Flash/HTML hybrid like Iron Art? In that case, I'd say the problem is you're trying to make a Flash looking site out of HTML...

No I was just making it the way I thought it looked best style wise. I usually try and go for a minimalist kind of feel, so I often look for ways I can take out things that are redundant or not entirely necessary. Taking out the bounding box on the IAS shop makes the design look cleaner and less cluttered.

I was less thinking specifics of "ToC page" or "in screen arrows" and more "boring slideshow" attitude. This might not be your fault, but it doesn't make for an impressive showpiece of web design either.

And once again you fail to recognize the PURPOSE of the site and the INTENDED AUDIENCE of the site. The purpose of that site is EDUCATIONAL and the intended audience is STUDENTS (who are learning) and as such it's a very good form to use. It's not a form I would necessarily use for anything else (maybe a story book scan type of site).

* Even if I accept that the goal of the site was as a short term thing ONLY (which is a bit of BS, people who get married tend to like to have this stuff as a keepsake, also you are still using it as examples of your work) and I should excuse the broken navigation that is hiding the content that used to be there in favor of a calendar (I have several of those at hand, thanks, I really don't need that from a wedding site) ... what advantage does this layout have over a typical blog-style page? (with maybe the calendar there as a secondary navigation...)

So what makes you think that I didn't create an offline version with a date lock set in for the married couple? Keepsakes are best not left up online, unless I suppose it's your server and you can directly control everything.

At least you recognized the PURPOSE of the site, in that it's being used as an *EXAMPLE* of work I've done. Obviously you don't have much experience with portfolios. Many, many, *MANY* web developers will include *EXAMPLE* sites in their portfolios, which are, just that, an *EXAMPLE*, not necessarily a *WORKING* site. In fact many of them will only include a few screen shots and don't even provide visitors with a navigatable model. A person who is looking at the site as an *EXAMPLE* of my work is *NOT* going to give a shit one way or the other about the specific couple featured nor are they going to be interested in looking through their fuckin blog entries. They just want to see what the damn thing looks like and how it functions and navigates on a basic level.

And once again, the ADVANTAGE is creating a *CLEAN*, *UNCLUTTERED*, *MINIMALIST* site design...which btw is specifically what the client requested. And once again, if the site was going to be ongoing and not simply a temporary fixture for a few months then I of course would have made a secondary navigation section, mostly likely a threaded style, modeled after Usenet, which would actually be quite superior to most of the blog forms of navigation currently available.

* BT: well, glad you do such work. There are a few minor features in the content (who cares that Flash can do alpha blended JPGs if the logos shown are gonna have white backgrounds! And some of the .higlights look like they should b--WAIT A MINUTE -- I just looked at the original. I agree losing the "wiggling box" effect is a big plus, but... but... everything that impressed me about the DESIGN of the site is there in the original!!! Your implementation might be fine and dandy, but who cares? This was a nifty looking little site that you redid from scratch. Good for you as a programmer, but as a designer?? God damn, that was the one site of yours that made me think that at least sometimes, you make things that look and sound good, but that wasn't even content you created.

You know I didn't want to say anything at first because you seemed to have really liked the design, so I just kinda kept my mouth shut about it, but um...most designers actually consider that to be one of the *WORST* designs I have...in that it looks overly cookie cutter and generic. I'm guessing maybe you don't have much experience with Flash site templates and cookie cutter website forms in general. If you did you would know that pretty much *ALL* of them look similar to that. And that's why in general most designers try and shy away from that style. I did get a lot of props though on making it *LESS* cookie cutter by taking out that bouncing navigation control. I wanted to take out that overly cliche music as well, but the client wanted it left in.

I've said what I am. "Forum templates" is just not that interesting.

Uh huh, just the hammer is interesting, not the screwdriver, I gotcha. *nods*

* liquid is just fractional positioning and resizing. This is not rocket science in theory, and in implementation (not entirely your fault but) Firefox does it much, much better. Earlier versions just resized letters, but w/ Firefox-- wow. (Opera might have been doing it first though)

Well in case you hadn't noticed not everyone on the planet is using Firefox, now are they? The point in web development is to try and reach the widest audience possible through cross compatibility (within reason).

Well, sorry, I'm all about practical use. Smooth transitions are cool and all but...

Well it is practical in the sense that it proves you have a very high level of ability in web construction. The form pretty much requires an absolute mastery of understanding of both javascript and HTML.

Remind me, is liquid and god level stuff you brag about yourself, or is my emphasis on them from the ED page?

The EDiots try and twist the meaning to suit their attacks. They take the phrase "God Level" to mean that I'm somehow claiming to be the *GOD* of web design and absolute perfection incarnate. When what it *ACTUALLY* means is *CREATIONISM* design. Creating a site that acts like a living thing. Sadly I don't think the EDiots are actually doing it intentionally with the purpose of lying to try and slander/mock me, I think they're just really fucking stupid, which is why they don't "get it".

Now, that said, it *IS* something you can brag about if you can do it, not to the point of calling yourself the God of web development, but as I said before, it shows that you have an absolute mastery of HTML and javascript. You *CANNOT* create such a form otherwise. That sort of bragging though is only up to the "professional" level as far as college flunkies. To a top level designer having an absolute mastery of HTML and javascript is really only the first step so to speak. In order to be a true top level designer you have to be able to code in *ANYTHING*, rather than list specific language you know you list specific programming FORMS that you know (object oriented, scripting, markup, etc). It's basically the difference between someone who can speak multiple languages and someone who is a linguist. A linguist can in theory speak *ANY* language. They don't simply memorize language, but rather understand language on it's most basic and fundamental levels and roots. It's similar for a top level developer, but with programming languages rather than spoken/written languages.

And to the extent God Level coding is just "templates without transitions"... not too exciting.

For someone who isn't into web coding I'm sure it doesn't seem very exciting at all. After all, for someone who isn't into coding all you can see is "templates without transitions". However a web coder see's it for what it really is, creating a pseudo form of web AI, to try and mimic and replicate the reactionary responses that LIVING THINGS have. THAT is where the excitement comes in...but again, AI development isn't going to be very interesting to someone who isn't into web coding, or for someone who is merely at an amateur or flunkie level of web coding ability.

* I guess I havent' seen many "bad web 2.0 sites" And I never would have thought "that's web 2.0!" looking at your image

...actually I don't think you've seen too many websites in general. You were after all completely unable to recognize that one design as being so obviously cookie cutter. You also hadn't any experience with portal designs either. You strike me more as an RL than a Webbie (or Netter). See RLs (real lifers), they have a real superficial understand and experience with the web. Even if they go to a "lot" of websites they only go to "popular" and/or "corporate" level sites, they don't *REALLY* see the Internet. There was a really great example of that on SB where we were talking about game codes and someone mentioned GameFAQs as being "the best" source for codes...and on a "corporate" or massively "popular" level sure...but then for those of us who *REALLY* surf the web, those of us who look at the web at a COMMUNITY level, not simply the first page of Google hits, we've found this site:
http://gshi.org

...which is VASTLY superior to GameFAQs when it comes to codes. But RLs only see the web as the first page or two of Google hits, you don't *REALLY* search into the web, really digging in deep, often at a sub community level.

Sorry you think that. I think I know enough about the space to make meaningful criticisms

Let me know when you can manage to keep the intended audience and the site's purpose in mind when critiquing and I might agree with you.

The mods probably saw an outsider with a big reputation for confrontation coming in, and were content to let it happen in a thread that had already kind of become a joke, but I think have had problems w/ btard invasions before, and so when it looked like it might be progressing to other threads (outside of the Axe, maybe) they had to assume you might be some kind of griefer.

No offense but if the group has had problems before with invasions it's likely because your group is infested with irascible little kiddies who are easily driven to tantrum...which of course we both know is certainly a fact given the way that thread deteriorated so quickly with incredibly childish banality. /b/tards really thrive on that shit, they *LOOK* for people who treat their Internets as *REAL* ~serious~ business as they're very often easily driven to fit throwing, kooking out and spastic meltdowns. Again, that's not a problem with me, that's a problem with the group and with the mods for putting up with that kind of tweenage behavior. I would have never had any reason at all to start moving discussions into other threads if the kiddies hadn't imploded into a spastic tantrum, one that *SHOULD* have been prevented by the mods. But again, as the site is obviously being run by children they try and place all the blame onto me (and anyone else who "invaded" their group) rather than looking at *THEMSELVES* as the source of the problem. Sad to say, it basically makes the entire SelectButton site look like a really stupid joke. *shrugs*

---

A. Bob Sagat is not "hard core", but he is working a LOT more blue than most people who just know his "American Funniest" work would ever guess. (Looking back at the reruns you can kind of see the "O god I'm such a whore" look in his eyes). So right now he's only iffy as a symbol of family friendly humor.

There's this old saying...I forget how it goes exactly...but it's something like this guy goes out and fucks a goat and gets caught and everyone then knows him as a goat fucker. Later in life though he manages to become the mayor of the town, saves the economy, helps orphan children, donates to the poor and then later goes to medical school where he becomes a doctor and then cures some horrible disease...but despite all that, despite all those good deeds he did and all the prestige he managed to get as being the mayor and all the lives he saved by curing the disease...everyone still always just remembered him as "the goat fucker".

The point is you can't escape your past...especially not in Hollywood. You can try and "remake" and "redefine" yourself as much as you like...but no one is ever going to forget what you originally were. Vanilla Ice is another prime example of the "Bob Saget Syndrome". No matter how many times he tries to reinvent himself or switch music styles or change his appearance he will *ALWAYS* be remembered as the doofy white rapper slash wannabe gangster.

B. " pointless exchanges with internet defectives" - what do you mean.

LOL

I was implying that the guy himself was an "internet defective", attempting to project his own failings onto others...and thus when he asked if anyone had a fetish for replying to "internet defectives" it basically made it look like *HE* was seeking out people to talk to HIM and to recognize him...but then since no one replied to him or even acknowledged him, then the answer to his own question was "no", no one in the group had a "fetish" for talking to an "internet defective" like himself.

...I honestly didn't think I was being that subtle with the joke. *shrugs*

Lets just leave it at I find your "interesting people" filter lacking, generating way too much bad karma for its value, and suspect your criteria for evaluating people is as suspect as your criteria for evaluating web site design.

I should hope so, as I mostly judge people on their level of creativity, intelligence and uniqueness. I have a quote about that, it goes something like, "There are only two kinds of people in this world...those that PRODUCE...and those that PERPETUATE." Or alternately "There are only two kinds of people online...those that create...and those that run at the mouth."

Basically, to me, if you aren't creating something, if you're not using your life to it's fullest extent...you're worthless. Completely meaningless at best. Or, as the Scarecrow of OZ put it, "I am convinced that the only people worthy of consideration in this world are the unusual ones. For the common folk are like leaves of a tree, and live and die unnoticed."

It is my observation that human beings are only capable of doing just two things...experiencing...and creating things to invoke new experiences. No matter what you can think of, it can *ALWAYS* be defined as an attempt to experience something, or as an attempt to create something to try and invoke an experience. As such, if your life isn't wholly devoted to experiencing as much as you can and creating things to bring about new experiences, not just for yourself, but for others...yeah...you're just a waste, you don't deserve the life you've been given when you squander it away so foolishly.

* My point was not about critique style, it was that of the sites you put up as examples of your quality work, only one, well, looked very good. Most of them had significant visual and/or usability problems - major ones that, were I in the market for a web designer, would give me second thoughts about hiring you, not just little nitpicks. (though a view of those)

Well that's okay, I generally don't like doing work for people who are ignorant as to how to actually critique a website. Hence the reason I work at Wal*Mart part time, it gives me the freedom to pick and choose my clients as I want them, never being under any obligation at all to take on a job if it doesn't really interest me and for the most part being able to use my creative energies on things that interest me, rather than things that interest someone else.

A lot of people ask me why don't I get a part time job in graphic design and or web design instead of working at Wal*Mart, but the problem there is that I would be going to work and basically burning off all my creative energies on the job, where as working at Wal*Mart when I get home from the job my creative energy is peaked and I get to use it all on things that interest me, things that *I* want to create, rather than what someone else wants. You see I'm not into web design to try and get rich or make a lot of money, I'm in it for the *ART*, I'm in it because I *LOVE* doing it, especially when I get to create sites that *I* want to create.

Creating is *MUCH* more important than the senseless acquisition of money. Generally that's something you see a lot of in those that are worthless. They try and delude themselves with the notion that if they just made more money, if they could just buy more "stuff" then they'll finally be happy. Of course the "stuff" is never enough and as soon as they get one thing they instantly start wanting something else, something bigger, something better, something they don't have that someone else does (like the people at your office who had iPhones when you didn't). That "stuff" doesn't really make you happy, it doesn't really give you very much in the way of new experiences, all it does really is make you want MORE "stuff", which means trying to make more money, which means wasting your life and all your creative energies on some dead end, spirit crushing job that you don't like and that makes you feel miserable day after day after day.

Seriously, there are SO many more important things to judge a website on than download size! Yes, the download size should not be ungainly huge, but look and feel and usability (i.e. how well it gets information to the user, and how good it looks doing it) swamps every other concern.

The problem there though is that most of that is largely subjective. As I said, site size is COMPLETELY objective, either it is, or it isn't, there is no room at all for interpretation.

Your obsession with download size reminds me of people who play "Perl golf", trying to get a function down to least possible number of characters possible. It's a fun little game, but in NO HOW should be mistaken for writing serious code that other people have to use, and is probably only tangentially related to actual meaningful programming skill.

You see to me that means you really don't understand the methodologies involved in limiting site size. In the realm of web design it's not that analytical, there's an actual art to it, one that requires an absolute mastery of understanding when it comes to not only web code, but graphic design and graphic encoding formats as well. Quite literarily as you're making the sites graphics there are ~little~ things you can do at almost every step that could not only reduce the overall file size, but increase the visual QUALITY of the site as well (as far as a purely objective form, via artifacting, pixelization, blurriness and the like). But unless you have that absolute mastery of the skill...you don't know how, you don't understand how it is that you can reduce the file size. And it's the same with code. If you're not good at coding then your code is very likely to be redundant, superfluous, often spaghetti bitched from a third party source, sloppy, incoherent, hard to read and often containing outdated, defunct or non cross compatible coding methodologies. And *ALL* of that has a direct relation to the overall size of the code. By being able to reduce the code to it's smallest possible form you show that you have an absolute mastery of the coding forms involved, that you didn't just simply copy and paste a bunch of garbage from someone else's site and rubber stamped it into your own. You prove your level of worth as far as coding knowledge. Everything else is subjective when you get right down to it.

You're making a huge mistake if you think that just because something is easy to quantify means it's an acceptable overall measure of quality.

See above.

* So, I've avoided taking any pot shots about Care Bears, but do you really think the main reason you get along well with them is because the people are so much better and kinder and gentler and fluffier as opposed to say, gamers? Did you approach the communities with just the same level of swagger and braggadocio?

Of course not. If I had done that they all would have run screaming in terror and likely would have outright banned me within the first five minutes of posting. As I said, I recognize them as a *WEAK* and *FRAGILE* community and social structure, and as such I never brag about anything, I never act condescending, I never act "playful", or sarcastic, or cynical, etc, etc. I don't even make mention at all about my skills or abilities in anything outside of merely presenting my CB site to them. They're completely off the grid as far as trolling endeavors are concerned.

Now with a GAMING site...well generally I see there being three types of gaming sites...one type that's comprised of mostly adults, who often enjoy talking about and discussing retro gaming and the like. The second type is one that's comprised of mostly kiddies who are really just into the latest Pokuman games or what the fuck ever, who think the N64 is a *REALLY* old game system. The third type is a mix of adults who like retro gaming as much as new games, but then also kiddies who want to try and play PRETEND adult by claiming that they're too into retro gaming, when most of the time their only experience with retro gaming is what they got out of an emulator on the family Dell. And most of them don't even like retro gaming at all, they just think it makes them look ~mature~ and ~sophisticated~ so they run around playing pretend.

So, given those three types, when I first arrived in SB I mistook the group for being the FIRST type, being comprised of mostly ADULT gamers, however it then turned out that the group is actually the THIRD type, in that it's infested with kiddies. Had I known that from the beginning I probably would not have engaged or "played" with the group directly, as there wouldn't have been too much sport involved with it and generally I try and not attack the weak and helpless if at all possible. Of course at this point the game is already well under way, so I might as well follow through, even if it's not requiring even the slightest amount of effort on my part to rip the majority of your groups inane little posts apart.

* Again, I explain why I "nitpicked" on the sig: it was there, sigs are generally meant to represent people, and the navigation was seriously bad.

And once again, the navigation was certainly *NOT* "seriously bad" in that the cycle only took about seven seconds. The only way your argument/critique even works is if the cycle time is exceeding 30 seconds or more. If it only takes SEVEN seconds of wait time to see the site you're looking for, then there really isn't any bother at all. FURTHER, it's actually MORE beneficial for me in that it forces people to look at the banners for all the *OTHER* sites as well, not just the one they're planning on visiting. As such, another site could spark their interest in which case they'll come back and look at it after they're done looking at the original site they intended to visit. In effect, it's almost like a form of advertisement for my sites.

...are you getting this now? I mean, do you see it? How *EVERYTHING* on this level is completely subjective? I mean you can literally argue anything from *ANY* standpoint or perspective...and in that particular standpoint or perspective...YOU'RE RIGHT! But that standpoint or perspective can be changed around just as easily as you presented it in the first place, just as I have done now with the above paragraph.

However, you can't expect people to give detailed bug reports out of the blue -- we're not your free QA staff, eh?, just two different people who noticed the same issue and poorly crafted warning message.

Again I had first mistook you for a web developer, I didn't realize you were an idiot. And no, I wouldn't expect idiots to tell me what browser and OS they were using. Normally you need to request that idiots tell you because they're too damn stupid to realize that, that information would be needed right off the bat.

If you had said "that's weird, could you give me the OS/browser/versions etc?" I would be happy to oblige

Yes, that's normally the way I deal with idiots, I'll keep that in mind for future discussions.

-- Windows XP, Firefox 3.0.6, the adobe version identifier page says "WIN 10,0,12,36". IE 6.0.2900 etc reports "WIN 9,0,45,0". The error message on the Yoga site is "This site requires Flash 8, you have Flash 0."

Oh, look at that, I think I just figured out in my head why it's not working. I thought maybe you were using Vista or something, but no, that's not it. The problem seems to be that the script is setup to only take a SINGLE character position, but the number 10 has TWO character positions, which is why it's not working right.

*looks at code*

No, no that can't be it.

*thinks*

...wait a minute...did those idiots change it? Did they change the ActiveX control name?!

*looks it up*

Oh, oh son of a bitch...

ShockwaveFlash.ShockwaveFlash.9
ShockwaveFlash.ShockwaveFlash10

What the fuck is that?! Those MORONS! Tha fuck...why the fuck did they take out the period?!

*sigh*...well it's not even going to run that script unless Flash is detected, so I guess I can just set it up to use 0. The problem will be if they keep changing the fucking control name around at every version...those fuckin retards...what the fuck were they thinking?

*tries something*

Huh, that's weird. They must have fixed it I'm guessing. You should try and go to Adobe's site, go to the Flash download section and see if it'll update your Flash version, I bet it will, and then I bet that site will work.

The problem though is that for all the people who don't have the latest update they are going to have problems and I can't simply change it to just a 0 because then all the people with the fixed version are going to have problems. So for the time being I guess I'll have to include both 0 and 10.

That wikipedia page says absolutely nothing about "iPhone". it's for iPhone-like devices, sort of, but not the iPhone, which is what we were talking about at that part of the conversation.

I'm sorry, I forgot how much you love to nitpick. Developed specifically *FOR* smart phones, mobile devices, etc. The iPhone is both a smart phone as well as a mobile device. I'm wondering though, are you really *THAT* stupid, or was that just all the better of a tactic you could come up with to try and derail the discussion away from the fact that you had no fucking clue at all as to what Flash Lite was?

I just looked at http://coraline.com on my iPhone. I have a nice page, geared at iPhone, I can view a trailer, enter my zip code, and there's a series of link to wellknown movie ticket sites.

So then you're not seeing the *REAL* site, you're seeing an alternative, redirected site made specifically for smart phones. You don't get to see and experience all the fun interactive features, hidden/unlockable behind the scenes footage and games and so forth...the ENTERTAINMENT, no, you just get INFORMATION...which is EXACTLY what I said in the first place.

We might be talking at crosspurposes here. If you're focused more on one off promotional sites, meant to give as much flash and wow, and online games, then yeah, Flash is a higher percent. When I think about all of the sites I come back to on a daily or weekly basis, NONE of them primarily use Flash navigation. (So the 96% figure might be high... there probably are more one off promotional sites created than I was thinking about.)

Not to mention online gaming, video sites...oh yeah, and *EVERY* single site that embeds a YouTube video. ^__^

* So youtube uses a lot of Flash, sure... but did you notice something? The navigation of the main site is pretty much good old HTML? Why do you think that is?

I'm not Miss Cleo so I wouldn't say for certain, it could be for any number of reasons. It could be when they were first developing the site they intended to use QuickTime or Windows Media and then later decided to use Flash once it had VP6+ codec support (which is really one of the only ways to make such a site a viable, cost effective reality). Of course, if they had already developed an HTML navigation system at that point they may not have seen a reason to change it just because they changed the video system. It could also be that their developers just aren't that good, maybe they went to the same flunkie college you did that taught you that Flash was more bloated than HTML? Maybe it was going to cost more? Generally Flash developers get paid a lot more than HTML developers and the like. Or maybe they just wanted to try and appeal to the mass retards who automatically think Flash == bad. Most likely it's that last one as even their Flash stuff is designed to try and look like it's HTML as much as possible. There are a *LOT* of retards who simply won't go to a site if it seems like it's all Flash based, mostly because of all the misconceptions and shit that people pull out of their ass based on very limited user experience. You yourself believed that Flash was inherently bloatier than HTML...where did you get that from? Did they teach that to you in the flunkie college you went to? Did you just ASSume it because it sounded good? Did you just read it online somehow with no proof provided?

* On Flash "direct port access"... we are talking at crosspurposes here. You're talking fat clients, and yeah, a Flash SMTP client might be possible in a way a standalone DHTML one wouldn't... but I'm thinking more like Gmails model, where you want the quickness and responsiveness of a fat client, but you would keep the heavy lifting on the server, and then use Ajax/JSON to communicate with the thin client.

But that's proprietary. You can't go to Gmail and use any mail account you have. With a *TRUE* mail client/browser you can setup and use *ANY* mail account, even multiple mail accounts. Gmail technically isn't a *REAL* e-mail account, it's a pseudo proprietary e-mail account, in that you *HAVE* to use their site to access it, you cannot setup your Gmail account on a standard mail client/browser. Further, such a setup is using a *LOT* more than just AJAX/JSON, that's merely the front end of such an operation. You were implying that AJAX/JSON was all you needed for such an operation, which is quite clearly incorrect on every level.

So I stand by my position: of the 20 things you listed, most are specialty applications for video and a few high end graphic effects -- not things you need to get information to people or even give them a good user experience.

Video is not a "specialty application" at this point. Video is a *STANDARD* application at this point. Especially with YouTube video embedding. But again, an AMATEUR doesn't need to know how his cookie cutter bullshit works, so that list wouldn't be of any interest to someone who isn't a web developer.

You also conveniently skipped over a few things, I'm guessing because you didn't understand what they were. Specifically regarding the use of alpha transparent images and being able to create alpha transparent JPEGs.

Here's a good example I created that I like to use:
http://www.backwater-productions.net/_images/_Scraps/Education_-_Trans.html

Ya got nothin there! You lose. Now, maybe since you're not a graphic designer you don't understand how using alpha transparencies would allow you to create new, more advanced, smaller file sized and more portable (element wise) web interfaces, but again, if you're a web developer...you know graphic design as well as you know coding. If you don't...you're no web developer, just a code flunkie, an amateur. And that list isn't of any interest to an amateur.

Another one you ignored was regarding animated elements. Now, you might try and posture yourself as one of the Amish of the Internet, who inherently hates all animation, all video and wants the absolute most plain jane looking interface imaginable...but uh...the number of people who *DO* like it...yeah they *VASTLY* outnumber you. The vast majority of people *WANT* to see some flashy animation, cool transition effects, animated menus and navigation controls (like the ones on my IAS site).

That IAS site is really a great example, because originally the entire site was built with HTML and javascript and used the later to control the animation of the navigation controls. The animation however was choppy looking on most systems, not directly in synch with the sound clip, and didn't even work at all on a lot of systems until I added in a whole mess load of feature detection scripts and bypasses depending on what browser and OS they were using. The overall file size was also THREE TIMES as large as the current version.

Again, maybe that's not of much interest to an AMISH of the Internet, but to the vast majority it's what they want to see...so long as it's fast loading, not too over the top and not inherently annoying (like the floaty navigation I took out of that one Flash site). Of course the problem is that Flash is something that generally should only be used by developers and not by amateurs, because when an amateur uses Flash it usually results in rather incredibly bloated, annoying, messy looking and well over the top design forms that just look like fucking ass in thirty eight different directions. But as I said, that list is mean for DEVELOPERS, not for amateurs. Amateurs should stick with simple HTML, CSS and limited javascript. If you want to do something beyond that...go hire yourself an actual web developer, because you'll just fuck it up if you try to do it yourself. Either that or find a nice, professionally coded cookie cutter form that you can just plug into your site.

Apple is still the 500lb gorilla in the room viz a viz the future of the real internet on mobile devices.

Not really. As far as the "cool" and generally useless product...yeah...but as far as FUNCTIONAL products...Apple doesn't even get to stand in line for judging. But that's okay, because people who want something just because it's the "cool" fad aren't really going to be using it for much of anything anyway.

And it's still a question mark of when any series of devices will run real flash, and not require a special version.

Um, hello, did you *NOT* read that article in the link I posted? 2010...that's not a question mark, that's a set date. By 2010 every smart phone EXCEPT for the iPhone will be running Flash 10. The only question mark is with your craptastic iPhone...but again, you only have it to "look cool", so whether it supports Flash or not isn't really of much use to you at all.

But for all these non-Flash-based sites, iPhone (and the other ones) tend to work just fine.

They work just fine as far as providing general information, but you lose most all of the entertainment since nearly all entertainment forms online are driven by Flash (for a whole variety of reasons, most of them in that list of mine). But once again, for someone who only has the thing to "look cool" it honestly doesn't really matter at all...I mean let's face it, most Apple users probably don't even know what Flash is, let alone know what they're missing by not having it.

* SEO isn't about making sure "Backwater Productions" comes to your site, it's about ensuring other more generic keywords get to it. What's the most generic search you can think of where your site is in the top 5 links? Like, that someone might type to get to your site? Trust, me typing "cutting edge website design", with or without the quotes, ain't it.

Try this: "offers cutting edge website design" and "productions":

Fourth link:
http://www.aboutus.org/Backwater-Productions.net

Seventh link:
http://www.xomreviews.com/backwater-productions.net

Backwater Productions isn't a very good example of SEO though in that I actually try and AVOID too much recognition and attention. Let's try one of my clients though. Let's try "iron art" in quotes. Oh, look at that, the site itself is listed as the fourth link. Without quotes it's listed as the seventh link.

In case you hadn't noticed btw, and I'm sure you didn't, the DOMAIN NAME itself is the most important factor in search engine listing.

Further, you're actually quite wrong about SEO being the attempt to show up in a random keyword search, it's actually about the NAME OF THE COMPANY being shown as a top search result, preferably WITHOUT quotes. Why? Because most people will remember the NAME of a business, but they won't remember the URL of a business. So most people go to a search engine and type in the name of the business in order to actually find your website. To try and advertise your company through random keyword searches is just...plainly fucking retarded in about thirty eight different directions. Seriously, I don't know where you picked up that misconception, but it's *WAY* the fuck off. I mean, try and use some simple logic here...how many times exactly do you think the phrase "website design" appears on the whole of the Internet? Um, hello, I'd reckon it's somewhere close to reaching the BILLION mark. And your saying that you're trying to make your site, one in a BILLION be the very FIRST search hit? *snicker* Sure man, sure. Even if the domain of your site was www.website-design.com you'd have trouble getting in the top search results.

Now, one trick you can do, and I don't know if they teach you flunkies this in college or not, is to register multiple domain names, with those domain names having keywords related to your business. When someone runs a search for those keywords there's a good chance that your site ~might~ show up in the first few pages of results, granted it'll show up with the wrong URL, but when they click on the link they'll be instantly redirected to the appropriate URL. But then you need to factor in cost effectiveness there, as URLs can get pretty pricey if you're looking at buying a dozen or more of them just for one business.

And again, advertising wise you're really *NOT* going to get much business from people searching for random keywords. You need to advertise the *NAME* of your company and you want to try and have a unique, easy to remember name. That name will stick with people and they'll run a search on that name to find your site. Think about how often you use Google to find a company website like say Home Depot. You don't normally type in "hardware store", no, you type the NAME of the business you're looking for.

Essentially what you're saying is that SEO is about trying to ADVERTISE your business and business name through a search engine...and that's just fucking stupid. There are DOZENS of *MUCH* better ways to advertise the name of your business than through random searches in a search engine. SEO is about the *NAME* of your business bringing up your website in a search. And specifically search engines are designed and built to do just that. Search engines are *NOT* built and designed as direct advertising mediums. If you want to advertise through a search engine then you SPECIFICALLY use that search engines advertising features, like how Google has their little "sponsored links" section. But SEO really has *NOTHING* to do with advertising.

Although, granted, there are a variety of con artists running SEO scams trying to convince businesses that it has something to do with advertising and that they *HAVE* to have it. Even a lot of legitimate web design businesses will offer "SEO services", which basically is just bullshit. It's a buzzword, technobabble to most people. Hell I bet a good 95%+ of the people on the planet couldn't even tell you what SEO stands for, let alone what the fuck it's all about. And even the amateur developers who do know what it stands for most often have no fucking clue at all as to what it actually is, or they have some incredible gross misconception (like yourself).

Here's a fun exercise, presuming at this point that you're still trying to stick to your delusion that SEO is about random keywords...tell us all how to do it. LOL, tell us all the exact methodology involved. Can't do it, huh? Wanna try and pull some technobabble? Go ahead, I'll have a lot of fun ripping it apart. Ya got nothin, kid. And really, if such a form of essentially search engine advertising actually worked...everyone would be doing it...seriously, *EVERYONE*. LOL It's essentially a kind of pyramid scheme when you think about it. Every SEO scam artist promising every other company that ~they~ are gonna magically be the *FIRST* in the search engine...*snicker*...of course they can't *ALL* be first with your lil random keyword search, now can they? *shakes head* You have fun continuing to delude yourself though, it's not really of any consequence to me or any other real web developer for that matter.

Yes, the number of inbound links is important, but so is the PageRank of the pages containing the links, and I doubt webforums are very high at all.

That would depend on what the web forums are linked to. For example ZD.net's forums would obviously have a pretty high ranking. It depends on other factors too. Take a look for a second at one of those examples I posted before:
http://www.aboutus.org/Backwater-Productions.net

...that's pretty neat, innt? Did you know that it wasn't me? I didn't list my site on that site, *THEY* listed it, without any permission from me. There are a lot of websites that essentially try and use a "reach around" style of advertising. Basically they use the popularity of individual sites in order to support their own popularity, whilst at the same time using the popularity they gain from dozens and hundreds of other sites for the mass benefit of everyone in their listings. Basically my site gains popularity from the collective of all the sites they have listed in their service whilst they simultaneously gain popularity from searches of my site.

It works likes this...people who search for the NAME of a company will likely come across aboutus.org and so they essentially piggy back your companies advertising. And then they benefit you in that people who search for random key words will likely come across their site first and will then find your site through them. Although ultimately it really helps them out more than it really helps you out, but hey, every little bit helps (especially since it's free).