I’m new to the video world. I don’t own a video camera (well, my phone, but that’s not why I got it), lights, mics, editing software or anything else associated with video production. Naturally, of course, I don’t let that stop me from tackling self imposed video assignments at work. I’m certainly no expert (much …
Author Archives: Mike Rivera
Issues With Your Supply Chain?
Global Forces Shaping the Future of Business & Society
McKinsey’s managing director, Dominic Barton, and other partners discuss global trends and how to act on them. Full story requires subscription. Hat tip to @benhinnen
Peter Merholz Presentation: Upgrade Your Mandate
Higher ed organizations are poorly structured to create exceptional customer experiences across all points of contact. In this talk, Peter Merholz discusses the symptoms of broken organizations and how they can become truly customer-centric.
Tension Between Marketing and Usability: Part 2
In my previous post about the push and pull between marketing a site and making it usable, I try to make the case that the DU site leans too heavily toward marketing when all available data suggests usability is more important. However, on second glance, I believe I need to clarify my stance and I’ll …
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Tension Between Marketing and Usability: Part 1
Nick Denardis of EDU Checkup critiqued the University of Denver’s redesign and gave it a 94%. Pretty good. He liked the strong visual impact of the homepage, that content was geared toward addressing student needs and that the underlying code was done with SEO and accessibility in mind. What Nick didn’t know, couldn’t know, was …
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On Apple & Adobe Flash
There’s lots being said about Apple, Adobe and Flash support. This is the 6,342,213th opinion on the matter, but the first from me. First off, what’s the big deal? Well, Adobe and Adobe/Flash supporters are up in arms about Apple’s increasing discrediting/dislike/disbarring of Flash on the Iphone and Ipad (no, I don’t capitalize iPhone and …
Flickr for Photo Workflow
Many higher ed institutions use Flickr to share photos with their constituents. We launched DU’s Flickr site this summer. We also set up an “internal” Flickr account for our overworked photographer Wayne. It was meant to cut down on his daily grunt work and, I’m happy to report, it has. Here are some of the …
Health Care Bill(s) & (Many) Higher Ed Websites
Some random connections: Similar in that the “solutions” don’t account for the real audience that matters: patients / students Similar in that those with ultimate decision making authority are swayed too much by lobbyists and insiders Similar in that those in positions of power tend to be too insular in their thinking and don’t go …
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Entropy and the Web
Websites want to be chaotic. They don’t like order, hierarchy, or staying on brand. Your efforts to tame it or control it are largely futile. The best you can do is point it in the right direction and then keep on eye on it. Turn your head for just a minute and suffer the consequences: …