Nick Cowie » ozia2007 http://nickcowie.com Web standards, accessibility and such like with a bias toward Government web sites Wed, 19 May 2010 14:04:26 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 en hourly 1 Oz-IA/2007 aka Sydney day 2 http://nickcowie.com/2007/oz-ia2007-aka-sydney-day-2/ http://nickcowie.com/2007/oz-ia2007-aka-sydney-day-2/#comments Sat, 22 Sep 2007 14:45:56 +0000 Nick http://nickcowie.com/2007/oz-ia2007-aka-sydney-day-2/ After a late night and a good coffee I was ready for Oz-IA/2007. It was a jam packed days with lots of good presentations and time to met lots of people between sessions including somebody I had not seen for 12 years. I will run through the highlights of day for me.

]]> After a late night and a good coffee I was ready for Oz-IA/2007. It was a jam packed days with lots of good presentations and time to met lots of people between sessions including somebody I had not seen for 12 years. I will run through the highlights of day for me.

Designing sites people love - balancing emotion with business reality - Elizabeth Pek & Andy Coffey

This presentation delat with the redesign of the Sydney Morning Herald website. Interesting for me because of the time I spent with News Digital Media and how both major media companies structure their online teams and business. Also the SMH is an information site much like the State Library should be. Time to adapt the lesson SMH learnt to my next project.

Is length still an issue? - Iain Barker

Dovetailed beautifully into the previous presentation, as the SMH homepage is close to 3000px long. Some interesting research, but to put it simply users will scroll on the home page, if they expect to find the information there and it can improve usability and the overall user experience.

“There’s no I in team” – a case study in collaborative information architecture - Patrick Kennedy

I need to improve the quality of IA and UX at the Department of Culture and the Arts, mentoring as described by Patrick is exactly what we need.

Fast, cheap & somewhat in control - 10 lessons from the design of SlideShare - Rashmi Sinha

Some great lessons that Myles would of killed to of heard. But the same lessons can be applied to small discrete projects that you can afford to fail, in the Government or business.A very useful presentation for me.

Post Oz-IA

Drinks courtsey of Greg and Happener Recruitment, followed by another dinner at I am Spice, though not as spectacular as the night before, maybe my expectations where too high. Good company though.

]]> http://nickcowie.com/2007/oz-ia2007-aka-sydney-day-2/feed/ 0 Sydney day 1 http://nickcowie.com/2007/sydney-day-1/ http://nickcowie.com/2007/sydney-day-1/#comments Fri, 21 Sep 2007 14:41:05 +0000 Nick http://nickcowie.com/2007/sydney-day-1/ After a late arrival yesterday after a QANTAS groundcrew managed to damage the rear cargo door just prior to take off and the resulting two hour delay. As photographs where sent around the globe to QANTAS engineers in Sydney, the Civil Avaition Authority in Canberra and Boeing in Tacoma to get the ok to fly after some panelbeating. Lachlan and Lisa where good enough to pick me up from the airport and deliver me to my hotel, which is great little apartment around the corner from Oz-IA.

First stop today was …

]]> After a late arrival yesterday after a QANTAS groundcrew managed to damage the rear cargo door just prior to take off and the resulting two hour delay. As photographs where sent around the globe to QANTAS engineers in Sydney, the Civil Avaition Authority in Canberra and Boeing in Tacoma to get the ok to fly after some panelbeating. Lachlan and Lisa where good enough to pick me up from the airport and deliver me to my hotel, which is great little apartment around the corner from Oz-IA.

First stop today was Pistol Clothing which does tshirt printing on demand. Apparently most Sydney geeks does not know that this service exists. Unfortunately they did not have some of the more exotic colours in my size in stock. So I have to pick up the results on Monday.

Next was Geeks on the Grass in Hyde Park, time to catch up with a few old friends and make some new ones, before getting a quick tour of the museum care of Ajay aka funkycoda.

Next involved Ben sneaking me into a internal News Digital Media presentation on the mobile web. It was good to see such an intelligent approach to the mobile web by a large company. None of this get rich quick that seems to permeate the mobile space. But a balance approach of new opportunities for existing services and the limitations of the mobile web. The other surprise was how many people I know who now work for News Digital Media.

Back to the hotel, before pre dinner drinks with Ajay and Stephen Collins while waiting for Ruth and Gary before heading of to Spice I Am for dinner. The place has an fantastic reputation and it deserves it, the food is truely amazing, I highly recommend eating there at least once when you are in Sydney. I know I will eat there more than once in the next week. If want to see what it looked like keep an eye on Ruth’s and Gary’s aka Tuna flickr stream. Looks like Gary is uploading as I type this.

A final drink with Lindsay Evans, before heading back to the hotel with Ajay so he could look at problems on a web site. And Myles you thought you were they only one who gets help the website is breaking while having a quiet drink late on a Friday night.

]]> http://nickcowie.com/2007/sydney-day-1/feed/ 2 Oz-IA/2007 http://nickcowie.com/2007/oz-ia2007/ http://nickcowie.com/2007/oz-ia2007/#comments Wed, 29 Aug 2007 12:46:27 +0000 Nick http://nickcowie.com/2007/oz-ia2007/ Oz-IA/2007 - Sydney, September 22nd/23rd 2007

With both WDS07 and OZ-IA/2007 rapidly approaching, and a most of the local blogspace reminding people to sign up with Web Directions before the discount pricing ends this Friday at 2200 WST. (You should go at least once Ashul!).

It is time to put in plug for Oz-IA/2007. Disclaimer, by putting the Oz-IA logo on this post, I am will go into the draw to win a free ticket to Oz-IA. However, as soon as registrations opened I bought a ticket, so if I do win the ticket to Oz-IA/2007 I will have to find a fair way to redistribute it.

]]> Oz-IA/2007 - Sydney, September 22nd/23rd 2007

With both WDS07 and OZ-IA/2007 rapidly approaching, and a most of the local blogspace reminding people to sign up with Web Directions before the discount pricing ends this Friday at 2200 WST. (You should go at least once Ashul!).

It is time to put in plug for Oz-IA/2007. Disclaimer, by putting the Oz-IA logo on this post, I am will go into the draw to win a free ticket to Oz-IA. However, as soon as registrations opened I bought a ticket, so if I do win the ticket to Oz-IA/2007 I will have to find a fair way to redistribute it.

My willingness to buy a ticket straight away, should indicate how much I enjoyed Oz-IA last year and how much I am looking forward to this year’s Oz-IA. Actually I have been harassing Eric most of this year, to hold another Oz-IA close to WDS so I attend both. I am so glad Oz-IA/2007 is on the weekend before WDS2007, after Mark Bernstein attempted to make my head explode with his keynote at 0830 on the first day of Oz-IA/2006 after fours days of WDS06.

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