July 29, 2009 - 6:43 PM
Smashing Magazine - The Good and the Bad
A review of Smashing Magazine - An online magazine for web designers and developers.
The Good
Smashing Magazine has current and relevant articles on web design related topics. They must scan the web (blogs and twitter) to see what the hot topics are and quickly craft a story. Are they experts on the subject matter? It's hard to tell. On many articles the authors are not well known names. The author of "The Roadmap To Becoming A Professional Freelance Web Designer" describes herself as "a 20 yr. old college student" so I'm not sure how much freelance experience she has. The following article was co-written by Jeremy Keith who is clealry and expert.
Good example - Misunderstanding Markup: XHTML 2/HTML 5 Comic Strip
The Bad
Smashing Magazine puts too much emphasis on "look & feel" without any real context. What was the goal? What were the design and development parameters? How is success measured and is the site meeting any goals - new business, more traffic? The two sentences they provide for each example don't provide much information. It reminds me of the print annuals that show "award winning" work with little context. In this case showing designer portfolio sites, or any self promo work, is not the reality of everyday design work. How many times are you both the designer and client on a project?
Bad example - 50 Fresh Portfolio Websites for Your Inspiration
Conclusion
Smashing Magazine has some useful "how to" articles on current web design topics from experts. Avoid the "50 sites" type articles which are fluff with no value. Designers add more value than just "making things look good" (i.e. decoration) and developers add more value than just "adding cool features" (i.e. bells and whistles).
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