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College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia is looking for a Web Programmer. For details and to apply online, visit: http://swem.wm.edu/jobs/

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Microsoft launched a new search engine Bing.com. It is a revamped version of Live.com search engine, which has not been successful in the past few years. But I do like Bing’s features and new preview tools it offers on the search results page. It offers a clean design and many customization options to the user.

Test drive the Bing.com!

Here is a short video about Bing:

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LIFE magazine in partnership with Getty Images launched life.com photo library. The site has amazing collection of stunning historic photos from World War I until today. You can also search LIFE photo archives through Google Images.

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I have been using Evernote on my iPhone for the last 6 months and it is simply the best note taking application out there. Evernote can synch with your desktop and your web account. It works on these platforms: iPhone, iPod Touch, Windows Mobile, MAC, and Windows based desktops.

So, let’s say you record a voice note or take a picture on your iPhone while sitting at a cafe, then later you can download that note on the web or through your desktop. Evernote also makes a great desktop version of of its software and you can take notes on your computer which can later show up on your iPhone. This app truly shows that line between mobile, web and desktop are blurring, which is the future of computing.

Kudos to the designers and developers of Evernote, it is simply the best note taking iPhone app out there. Happy birthday Evernote!

Download it today.

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10 great tips for Graphics Design majors in college. (via zeldman.com)

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Amazon.com’s latest version of its ebook reader, Kindle 2 has been making headlines around the world since it’s public release last month. The new version of Kindle has many improvements in its interface and design. However, there are still some usability issues with the product.

I recently read usability review of Kindle 2 by Jakob Nielsen and I agree with most of his arguments about some usability failures of the device.

It is really exciting to see how much potential this devices has in transforming the publishing industry and book readers in coming years. When I tested Kindle 2 I really liked certain aspects of the device and dissapointed with some its design & usability issues.

My suggestion for Kindle engineers is to make the screen touchable just like an iPhone, which will dramatically improve the navigation and usability of the device.

Here are some of things that I liked and disliked about Kindle 2.

The Good:

• Form: Light Weight and Thin
• Readability: Screen is readable on any angle
• Navigation: Easy to Read & Turn book pages
• Legibility: Adjust Text Size to small to large
• Ergonomics: Anti-reflective & black and white screen reduces eye strain

The Bad:

• Form: Mouse (aka four-way joystick) is very difficult to use
• Readability: Screen area is small, keyboard takes up too much space
• Navigation: Navigating links or table of contents in blogs, newspapers and magazines is not intuitive
• Form: Power On and Off button is clunky, not sure when it is on or off
• Design: The design of the device is not cutting edge

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I attended this conference a year ago and it was really a great event. You get the chance to rub shoulders with some well-known authors and web professionals. This is one of those conferences where you can run into both Jakob Nielsen and Steve Krug. Highly recommended!

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Sometimes the rebranding and redesigning of products, web sites and logos are disliked, and even hated by customers. In the past we heard horror stories of eBay’s homepage redesign, or Coke’s introduction of New Coke. I recently saw the newly redesigned Tropicana at the store, and personally it really looked some generic store brand product, and it did not stand out from the competitors (since there are gazillion different products in this category). Recently the company announced that Tropicana will be going back to the old design for their packaging after hearing from many disgruntled customers of their dislike of this new design… I guess this must have been a very expensive exercise for the company.

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One of my favorite new programs on my desktop is Miro 2.0. Miro is a free HD player, and can be installed in Windows, MAC and even Ubuntu.

It can play any video file format, including Quicktime, WMV, MPEG, AVI, XVID, and more. The Miro’s interface is very clean and easy to use. You can subscribe to video casts or download HD videos directly from the web. And the best part, it is free.

See Miro 2.0 in action below.

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I found a great site put together by The Participatory Culture Foundation (PCF) that breaks down in detail of how to create internet videos from scratch.

Here are the six steps to publish your video online:

1. Get the right equipment.
2. Capture audio and video.
3. Edit raw footage.
4. License your work.
5. Publish it online.
6. Promote your video.

Check out their complete step-by-step guide.

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Folks at Litmus, who provide email & browser testing service put together a nice & short overview of how different desktop email programs render HTML emails.

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I like dual monitors on my desktop, but I am not sure about this laptop from Lenovo with dual screens…(via)

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According to Robert Hoekman, User-Centered Design (UCD) is broken. His in depth explanation on why UCD no longer works especially with teams on limited time and resources is very convincing, and possibly have some truth in it. Read this three part article at Peachpit, and you might agree with him at the end.

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Recession Tips for Web Designers by Jeffrey Zeldman is very timely and offers good tips on how to survive in these difficult times as a freenlancer.

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