Jim Dalrymple, talking about his first Apple news website, MacCentral, that he started in 1995:

1995 was so much different — there weren’t many Mac websites around then. In fact, we received a lot of the press releases via snail mail, so breaking news was a few days old at best. MacCentral was one of the first news sites to go daily — we wondered if there would be enough news to post updates on a daily basis, but it all worked out.

Apple-Centric Websites Sure Have Changed a Lot in 16 Years

My thanks to HelpSpot for sponsoring the RSS feed this week.


At HelpSpot we’re big supporters of open source software and simply couldn’t run our business without it. So, 6 years ago we created Open Source Help Desk List to assist companies looking for an open source help desk software solution. It’s success has been beyond our wildest expectations; serving as an invaluable tool for thousands of companies to find the solution they need. We hope it can help you as well.

If you’d prefer a professionally developed and supported help desk application, then give us a look: HelpSpot: Help Desk Software.

Thanks!

Ian Landsman
Founder, UserScape

P.S. Checkout the newest project we’re working on, the PHP framework Laravel

Sponsor: HelpSpot & Open Source Help Desk List

Kevin Purdy gives some suggestions for staying productive at home. One of them is having a routine, such as starting work at the same time every day and taking a lunch break, etc.

I’ve found that as a self-employed guy who works from home, having a routine and a daily schedule helps keep me from over-working. My schedule is more than just a way for me to stay productive and on track, it’s also how I set boundaries for how much time I work.

How To Work From Home Like You Mean It

Stephen Hackett:

Microsoft is compromising where it matters the most — the user experience. […]

To Microsoft, the product comes first. Apple puts the customer first.

I felt the same way after using the Galaxy Nexus. In my review I wrote:

In short, the Galaxy Nexus seems more like a phone that its makers can brag about making rather than a device that its users would brag about owning. It has all sorts of features that seem great on posters and billboards and board meeting reports, but none of those features enhance the actual user experience.

It’s not that Apple puts the users first out of the goodness of their hearts. Designing a killer user experience is part of their core business model. They put users first because happy customers are good for business.

When you are having a brainstorming session with your business partners, it is easy to raise the flag that user experience is your company’s number one priority. But on a granular level, putting the user first is extremely difficult. It takes a lot of time, energy, and attention to detail. When it gets into the nuts and bolts of putting the users first, it’s easy to stop when you reach good enough.

But good enough is a recipe for irritated users, not happy ones.

Like I said in my piece yesterday on the iPhone being 5 years ahead of other software:

You can use Apple’s ideas and you can copy their products, but you cannot copy the time and energy they put into those products, and you cannot copy their attention to detail. Those you have to do on your own. Five years later, some companies still haven’t figured that out.

(As an aside, Apple’s march against good enough will also be found in so many of the 3rd-party iOS and Mac OS X developers. That is because like begets like. Attention to detail breeds attention to detail, and excellence breeds excellence. Android, however, is good enough. Therefore, so are the majority of its 3rd-party apps.)

Stephen Hackett On Windows 8 and that ‘No Compromises’ Mantra