When I’m working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong. Fuller, R. Buckminster (from QuotationsBook)

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A recent opinion article in Computerworld ponders the role of org charts and what they reveal about an organization.  They are useful in detailing who reports to whom and which department pays the salary.  But the very act of viewing an organization through this type of chart perpetuates an outdated way of thinking, with a silo’d, hierarchical structure that often fails at meeting client/customer expectations or responding quickly to changing conditions.  So what to do? Some massive reorganization?

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Web page design best-practices used to dictate designer for a monitor of 640 x 480 pixels, then 800 x 600 pixels, and at a recent meeting I heard one of our schools lead web designers say they’re new minimum is the 11xx screen width.  Which with browser windows, toolbars, etc. give an effective width of something like 960 pixels.  But want to be sure?  Take a quick tour around the Google browser sizer .

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Packt publishing has a new WordPress book out:  WordPress MU 2.8: Beginner’s Guide.  WordPress MU, especially with the BuddyPress set of plug-ins, is a powerful and flexible framework that power a company blog or social networking site.   Just check out SUNY’s new Academic Commons for a fantastic example of what can be done with this combination.  WordPress MU 2.8: Beginner’s Guide overall is a good introduction to these tools, and even for an experienced WordPress person I found some useful tips and valuable additions to my WordPress ‘tool belt’.  But the book is also not without its flaws.

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Here is another session from WordCamp NYC.  The topic is WordPress-as-content management system, and the story of the transformation of the Harvard Gazette.  They took the paper’s static html site and transformed it to a WordPress powered site in just 3 months.  It is always interesting to see how adaptable WordPress is to fit various needs, and the Gazette implemention is very well done.  both video and audio versions of the session are presented below.  Watch for the discussion about their administrative interface — they have customized the edit-posts panel in a very nice way that divides the listing according to category.  Making it easier for editors to get right to their content.

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I’ve been thnking quite a bit lately about the merging domains of traditional, static web site design, and social networking.  Jay Collier at the Bates Online Media group has recently blogged on the subject, and how it is influencing the Bates College site content.  He has posted a terrific diagram outlining the Architecture of Online Engagement, which starts with “powerful organizing ideas” and moves through first impressions, shared interests, collaboration and learning, and even getting something done, on the path towards deepening personal and social impact.  Too often I find site design discussions still center around content and informaton dispersal — a more static, one-way push concept.   Engagement, ideas, collaboration and impact — these are the concepts that we need to get front-and-center in site discussions.

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