Monthly Archives: March 2006

In the beginning there was the internet. Quickly this became a means of transferring information to people and a teaching tool. The word spread like a viral badger campaign and soon lots of text based websites were available. The number of these resources became so big that companies sprung up just to handle searches on this wealth of information. All was good and slowly people added more content like putting an image on their now called web page. Information was shared for free and everyone was allowed to grow together as each webby helped another. Over time and through a rather dodgy rotating gif black and red period, websites evolved to something pretty and pleasing to the eye in some cases. Designers pricked up their ears to this new medium which now was not just for the geeky unix bods.

For a long time when training people about web design I have constantly been approached with one main query. The query is around the look of web standards websites and inparticular the organisational ones campaigning for web standards and accessibility. To be honest, it has become both a little embarressment and also a point of contention. Most of the people I end up teaching are designers first and as such approach things from a visual point of view. These people do not initially perceive what can be done with standards and that by adopting them there is no loss of design. The main reason really was the design and visual quality of the before mentioned websites.