Another Fail Blog...

This one will be particularly funny to anyone who works in advertising and has ever had to do a stock photo search.

In a strange twist, the blog has a picture of some graffiti from the wall in a local restaurant I visit. I was once there with my girlfriend really early in our relationship and I was so desperately nervous and trying to be interesting. I went to the men's room and while I was drying my hands I saw this:



I relayed the joke to Jackie and was quite relieved when she thought it was as funny as I did! It has been a long standing insider between us (until now).

Looking out...

The viral video chart this week has a new entry...with a bunch of babies on roller skates. I am not one to argue with results but my reaction to this commercial was adverse. The new Microsoft browser bit was pretty bad too. I am not afraid of vomit but somehow it just seems too far from Microsoft's identity to be real. I honestly wondered if it was an attack the first time I watched it.

While I am being negative, I truly wish that Cadbury eyebrow dance would just go away. That is the creepiest.

On the positive side, the Xbox project natal thing is really exciting. Looks like I am going to have a 'Minority Report-like' interface to my entertainment system in the next year or so.

I also continue to be impressed with how much more Chik-Fil-A does with so much less. Their approach does require lots of one important thing: creativity. While campy, their latest guerilla-like tactic is fun and it is getting results. Check it.

Have a good weekend. I am totally wiped out after visiting with marketing executives at three different cable TV stations in D.C. Yesterday.

Functional Specifications

What else is new? I have been busy. This week I am wrapping up a lengthy functional specification document, a test plan and starting a training plan. My life has become one long document after another. It may be time for me to make good on an old promise to do a series of blog posts focused on the deliverables necessary to design and develop an enterprise web site and content management system.

On Information Architecture...

Earlier in my career, when I first made the switch from web developer to producer, I found myself needing to see the database schema before I could make any further decisions. Overtime I discovered my role as a producer and I learned and began to respect a process for getting through a web site project. Before long, I stopped envisioning normalized data structures and SQL queries.

But, I have recently started thinking about the information in a very stark way again. It's the wire framing process during the architectural phase...And how clients look at the information and immediately start taking positions on where something is or how much relative weight it has on the page. I find myself day dreaming about some other way to get through this part of the process and I land on something more like a diagram of the actual data objects than a wire frame interface.

Perhaps this is a logical interim step? I am not one to go adding unnecessary work but I have seen so many review meetings derailed because it is difficult for the client to separate defining what the elements on the page will be vs. how the pages will look and/or function.

Soggy

Dear God:

I believe we have had enough rainy days for the summer. I know it is important but I am thinking at this point everyone has enough to drink until October, right?

Best,

Jake

Moved...THANK YOU...

...Jackie, Max, Josh, Sean, Eric, Stevie, Ian, Colin...could not have done it without you guys.

I am happily settled in with Jackie at the new place. I was just getting used to calling myself a 'Cantabrigian' too. I am now a resident of Jamaica Plain, which is a 4.4 square mile neighborhood of Boston. So, I am officially a Bostonian...a title I have long claimed but never truly earned until now. All those years I traveled across the country it was just much easier to say I was a Bostonian than a 'Winthropian'...The actual; town I grew up in which borders Boston to the Northeast

In either case, I am very excited about my new home with Jackie. We had so much help from friends and brother Max...we were able to clean, scrape, sand and paint an entire two bedroom apartment and move me in three days. And, this was no simple white-washing...the bedrooms, living room and kitchen all have unique color schemes.

The cats, after an evening of sulking around with their little tails held low, seem to be settling in. They are nervous but they also love the boxes and stuff. I think, what with the spare bedroom and all, I will buy them one of those cat towers for a house warming gift...

Moving...

I am moving to Jamaica Plain this weekend...too much to do to Blog very much...