I'm excited to announce that the all new www.aiaaustin.org is now live and viewable. This project is the result of 6 months of collaboration with AIA Austin and members of its Communication Committee. Some feature highlights include:

1. An interactive Firm Finder that lets you search local architects and view their profiles and projects

2. Blogs by local architects

3. Upcoming architecture events

Additionally, the new website includes information about past and future Homes Tours, committees, and job openings at local firms. 

Take a look around and let us know what you think. We'd love to hear your feedback.

 We're in the final stages of testing the new AIA Austin website. We should be finished in the coming days...if you'd like to be notified when it goes live, please fill out the contact form in our "Contact" section.

Fast Company has a great article on how a variety of companies are using Twitter successfully. It covers a lot of industries and a lot of different approaches...there are probably elements from each that you could emulate for your own business.

It feels like privacy was something of a semi-sacred concept until not too long ago. But over the course of the past few years, there seems to be a shift in how much of their privacy people are willing to give up. Social media has played a large part in that, and to some, Facebook seems to be one of the leading forces. I think there are 2 factors that play into this:

1. The pressure to participate in social media continues to grow, and

2. The technical complexities of using the networks are outpacing people's ability to comprehend the impact of participation in the networks on their privacy.

A recent article in Fast Company asks a great question: Why Can't the World's Best Architects Build Better Web Sites? It goes on to analyze a number of these to show where/how they fall short.

A simpler explanation that is not discussed in the article is that architects are 3-d thinkers/designers...whereas websites are (currently) a 2-d experience. What you'll find in a lot of architects websites is an attempt to transfer the 3-d experience into their websites. This, ultimately, leads to decisions that affect usability and SEO. Even print designers find that moving from their medium to interactive design is a daunting challenge at best.

Research into web site usability testing is proving out the old adage that form follow function. The Eyetrack III study gauged eye movement to evaluate the relative importance of different areas on web pages. The findings showed that there are clear patterns for how people navigate web site homepages.

The lesson for web designers and their clients is that how you architect your pages (especially your homepage) can have a profound impact on user experience. Following the lessons learned from this study and others can greatly improve your user experience. Ignoring them can mean less time spent on your web site and fewer return visits by those who do make it there in the first place.

Vigilant computer users have come to anticipate and protect against viruses being sent to their computers via email and through online links. Now a similar effort is needed to protect your online social and business networks. Clicking on malicious links on Twitter, Facebook, etc can lead to your account being hijacked and used to propogate the virus-like link to all of your contacts.

The NY Times has an interesting story on this. For businesses, there is extra need to be cautious. If someone uses your company's account to send out spam or worse, this reflects on your company and your brand. A simple "I'm sorry" may not be good enough to undue the damage.

Khoi Vinh, the design director for nytimes.com, wrote in his blog Subtraction yesterday about the challenges of backing up large amounts of data from your computer. His conclusion was the same that most of us face: local backups to an external hardrive are not a great solution in the case of a fire or theft and online solutions are prohibitive bacause of limits in upload bandwidth provided by ISPs.

Have you found a great solution that worked for backing up large amounts of data?

One of the key challenges most businesses seem to face these days (in regards to emerging interactive technologies) is how exactly to use these new tools for their business. One of the simplest solutions involving Twitter that anyone can employ is shared here. All you have to do is use one of these tracking tools to keep tabs on your company or brand within the Twitter universe. It will give you insights into positive and negative sentiments being shared by Twitter users and give you the opportunity to then communicate with them.
I have heard from more than a few people about how difficult it is to protect your brand in age of social media. This powerful feature gives you the opportunity to at least become a part of the social conversation revolving around your brand.

The Republican National Committee set out on a relaunch of their website, GOP.com, a few months back and released a new site a couple of days ago. The last 2 days have been an exercise in damage control. Whether this site turns out to be a great tool for the GOP remains to be seen, but there are clear lessons to be learned from their experience already.

Lesson 1: Don't rush to get started

Around March 6, the RNC sent out an RFP (request for proposal) for their new website. They were off to a bad start...the 2 page RFP had only vague objectives and a deadline of March 18! And how quickly did they want this website? 45 days after contract!