Embrace Open Source
Open Source Software might be just the thing to get those creative juices flowing when you have a creative itch to scratch. Conventional wisdom will tell you that web product development needs to follow specific steps; industry standard prescribed phases and deliverables may prove valuable, but also can impede creativity. The cost of starting without pre-developed tools can switch focus to building the tools and not the product. The product manager may then elect to work in the abstract and put ideas on paper in a technical vacuum before making choices on platform or functionality. Buying a technology platform before you know what you need is expensive, but open source platforms might just be the thing that frees the web product mind from cost and constraints get the ideas on the screen as quickly.
Change. We have all signed up for change and a lot of it this year. As a culture, we elected change in our government on the basis of “change we can believe in” and we are undergoing a massive financial and cultural change in our country. Change is a word that seems to be inner-twined in every conversation, yet change is often rebuked and even feared in basic parts of our lives. Its ironic, really… but this rebuke of change seems especially tied to technology that we use everyday.
Recently, Ikea decided to change its font for its print and online content from Futura to Verdana to better standardize its print and online design. You would think that font changes would not be contriversial, but there was indeed a backlash. “Ikea fans were outraged, finding Verdana less elegant than Futura,” according to Associated Press Writer Stephen Nasstrom. What this shows you is that a large part of your customer base will respond negatively to any design change, regardless how minor.
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The buzz around social networking seems to have slowed a bit, but the ubiquity of discussion about social media is still very much alive. As major media outlets like cable news, network television, radio and producers of goods and service find social networks invaluable sources to keep in contact with their audiences, social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook and Bebo continue to find ways to monetize their traffic and network data. Will there ever be a solid financial model that will support the continuation of free, ad supported social networks?
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