Logos For My Abandoned Startup, Rent-A-Toll-Pass.com

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I came up with this business about 3 years ago when I first moved to Orlando, FL (which has a LOT of toll roads) and got a Toll Pass. Whenever my parents came down to visit I’d mail them my SunPass Toll Pass so when they drive down from St. Louis, MO they wouldn’t have to stop and pay all the tolls. Instead they were able to just drive right through the toll plazas in the dedicated lanes and the tolls would be paid automatically. So why not start a company that rents out toll passes to vacationers so they don’t have to spend $28 buying one? read…

 

Quick Fix Up: The Media Viewer in Steam

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This is the perfect example of a little user experience hiccup in media viewers that use thumbnails and sliders. If you start browsing the images and trailers in a games’ profile in Vavle’s Steam store, you’ll notice that you have 5 thumbnails shown to you at a time. Clicking on a thumbnail shows a bigger version of it above. When you reach the 5th thumbnail shown you have to manually move the slider over to show the next 5 thumbnails. Basically creating a sloppy user experience where you have to work harder than you should to view all of a game’s screenshots and trailers. This isn’t going to piss off any customers but it should still be fixed. read…

 

Redesigning Wikipedia’s Gradient Tabs

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(This is more of a person preference than a fix.) Ever since the much needed Wikipedia 2010 redesign I kept noticing my eyes getting pulled upward towards the gaping white space at the top of Wikipedia. This bothers me so here’s my proposed changes. read…

 

Creation: The Tell Others Icon

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Fresh from my secret lab, I bring you the Tell Others icon (with matching drop down menu). I didn’t like the ShareThis, Addthis, Addtoany, or OpenShare icons so I made something that makes a bit more sense to the average internet user. I honestly believe that the sharing icons we use today are confusing, not immediately recognized, and underused. The new green icon with “shout” symbol, combined with “Tell Others” text brings home the message a lot quicker than plus signs asking you to share something. read…

 

Invention: Sequential Text Boxes

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Windows does it when you’re entering your serial key right after installation, and online forms do it when you’re typing in your phone number, social security number, or zip code. Sometimes, online forms have multiple text boxes for numbers with multiple sets. Instead of the user manually tabbing or clicking over to the next text box to type, the developer can code up some “auto tabbing” JavaScript to move to the next text box automatically as you type in the numbers (Windows and Microsoft Office do this). Unfortunately, no one actually warns you when the form does this on its own. Many times users fill in the first set of numbers and hit the tab button manually only to find out the form tabbed over an extra time, resulting in them having to go back to the previous text box or accidentally filling in the wrong one. read…

 

Invention: Keyboard Shortcut Reminders for Online Forms

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Millions of people around the world, young and old, rich and poor, don’t know that they can move to the next text box in online forms by hitting the [TAB] key on their keyboard instead of moving their hand over to the mouse and clicking on the next text box. I made these as a reminder for these poor unfortunate souls. Just imagine all the time saved from filing out billions of logins and registration pages worldwide. read…

 

Invention: Butterfly Menu – A Multi Paned Contextual Menu Concept

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Take a look at this monstrosity I created about 2 years ago just for fun. I thought separating and color coding menu actions was a good idea at the time. Unfortunately, the reality is that at first glance the average user would shit themselves after seeing such a menu pop up after right clicking. Lets go through the reasons of why I thought this would work, and why in reality it would not. read…

 

Enough with the “Desktops are Dead” Articles. Desktops are Alive and Kicking.

Every time a new gadget that can browse the internet comes out (Laptop, Netbook, Phone, Tablet) a certain group of people collectively line up to take turns shouting from the mountaintops about how the desktop’s days are numbered. Annoying the piss out of the rest of us who don’t jump to conclusions and think before we speak. These are the same guys who decades ago, after seeing airplanes for the first time, wrote articles about how we’d all be in flying cars by the year 2000. Heck saying desktops are dead is like saying “Entertainment centers with 50″ flat screen TVs and surround sound are dead.” after seeing the iPod play video. read…