Earlier this year, we honored Webby for Good nominees using WordPress to bring positive changes to the world. On November 15th, 2018 industry experts and technology innovators from across the EU will meet for the Webby’s European sister show, The Lovie Awards. Winners are selected for creating a stunning overall digital experience as well as for excellence in select areas: websites, apps, mobile sites and podcasts, online advertising, internet video, and social media.
This year, WP Engine partnered with The Lovie Awards to bring Lovie For Good, a project highlighting digital experiences bringing positive change to the world. From an algorithm to promote compassionate leadership to campaigns recognizing the importance...
Countless publications such as Wired and the New York Times live on WordPress. The News Pro Theme gives you the look and feel of a full-featured publication. Display featured stories, article snippets and different categories. The theme even includes built-in ad space so you don’t have to account
Last week, our first hackathon of the year kicked off with more than a dozen teams and respective projects. After the 48-hour build period was up, those groups presented their cutting edge ideas to a packed audience of WP Engine employees. The presentations lasted an entire day, and only after all
The process of disabling the 5.0 editor should not be a hassle. In the coming days, we will be rolling out an admin notice that will display on the Dashboard page* of your site(s). This notice will have information about adopting the new editor and will provide buttons to install/activate the
Freewheeling Freelancers will Dominate the Future Jobs Market
Freelancers are at particular risk of exploitation from employers. In some cases, the scope of their work can be increased with no new pricing negotiations, they could be left waiting for weeks to be paid, and they typically don’t enjoy the same health or retirement benefits that in-house
How Blockchain Can Solve Major Problems for Gig Economy Freelancers
The modern workplace includes a ridiculous number of freelancers and third-party service providers. Despite this prevalence, a survey by the Freelancers Union shows that 50 percent of freelancers have trouble getting paid for their work. Delayed payments are the main issue, though one-third of
Past Bitcoin to Making Money from the Blockchain
As the cryptocurrency bubble has gone up and down, there have been other developments in blockchain technology that warrant our attention. According to the Brookings Institution, blockchain based voting can reduce fraud significantly while increasing voter turnout thanks to the ability to vote from
10 Ways to Use Exit-Intent Popups for Good
Sumo.com called attention to its online chat feature before users left the site. The popup was simple and friendly. It made it easy to initiate a conversation with a knowledgeable staff member. Happily, it was also not pushy: users could simply say No Thanks. (Image source
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The Most Hated Online Advertising Techniques
In 2004, we wrote about the most hated advertising techniques based on research conducted by Christian Rohrer and John Boyd. Online advertising has changed significantly since then, giving us plenty of new formats to test and new questions to ask. With that, we decided to run a study to determine
Accot-Zhai Steering Law: Implications for UI Design
Why people have trouble maintaining the cursor on a straight path has to do with human physiology: the elbow and wrist, which enable the movement of the hand, describe an arc, not a line. Try it yourself: hold your arm out directly in front of you and move your hand from left to right. You’ll
10 Usability Heuristics Applied to Video Games
Subway Surfers, an endless-runner mobile game, does a nice job crafting error messages. After users lose mid-game, they’re prompted with a dialog that reads, Save me! (Which would not be a good dialog prompt in a productivity app, but is acceptable in the playful context of a game.) To continue
7 Tips for Successful Customization
Customization allows users to make selections and set preferences in a system, with the intent of giving users more control over the user experience. Customization allows users to select the content, layout, functionality or design that appeals to them. However, customization tools require work and
Instructional Overlays and Coach Marks for Mobile Apps
Minimizing the amount of instructions focuses the users’ attention on a single, primary action. The less text overall, the more likely it is that users will read it and then actually follow that instruction. This idea of deferring secondary content is not unique to coach marks, but applying it to
Journey Mapping: 9 Frequently Asked Questions
The end of a journey-mapping project does not mean that the map is final (see above about future-state and current-state maps). Journey maps should be iterated so the map matches the current experience, even after system changes have been made. For remote teams, selecting a tool that allows easy
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UX Responsibilities in Scrum Ceremonies
Since UX is typically working a sprint or more ahead of the engineering team, it is already a challenge to keep the team aligned. It is for this reason that attending daily standup and clearly and concisely communicating what UX is doing are so important. Additionally, UX should listen to other
10 Usability Heuristics Applied to Video Games
PlayerUnknown’s Battleground Mobile (PUBG Mobile) on iOS keeps Help documentation accessible and visible in the top right corner of the game homepage. However, simply having a Help section doesn’t make finding what you need any easier; it’s also important that the help content is clear and
Which UX Deliverables Are Most Commonly Created and Shared?
Figure 1. Wireframes and prototypes are the most popular type of deliverable among UX professionals. They are used to communicate (and perform usability tests on) page layouts, information hierarchy, and, in the case of interactive prototypes, interactions. They can use varying levels of fidelity
6 Tips for Successful Personalization
Personalization is based on system’s assumptions about the users’ needs based on past behavior. Users rarely have any control over these assumptions. As we move into a world with more and more “smart” devices, we need to make sure that users can override these personalized settings if they
Minimize Design Risk by Focusing on Outcomes not Features
Encourage team members to be creative and think of different ways to approach a goal. Generate multiple solutions and get user feedback early. Activities such as storyboarding and wireframing have two major benefits: (1) they give team members a way to communicate ideas visually; (2) teams can
A 60-Second Trailer of the 60-Day Report on Cybersecurity
Melissa Hathaway came across our radar recently when President Obama tasked the former Bush administration aide with leading a 60-day review of Bush’s Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative; a largely classified, purported $30 billion, multi phase plan to address cybersecurity issues
A 60-Second Trailer of the 60-Day Report on Cybersecurity
She explained that the original design of the Internet was driven more by considerations of interoperability rather than security, and as a result we are now faced with almost insurmountable issues. Some examples include online criminals who steal our information, mass bandits who have the ability
JS-Kit Score: Turn Your Site into a Localized Digg
Of course, because this is the only page on ReadWriteWeb that is running a Score widget, it won’t have any data on which content is the highest rated site wide. But the ease of installation is what really catches the eye. JS-Kit is building a suite of tools for web publishers that are modular
How to Battle Anxiety and Depression as an Entrepreneur
While depression may affect one in three entrepreneurs, it doesn’t have to stay that way. Talk about the topic. Don’t be afraid to admit that you’re not okay. Expressing yourself should be safe, and can open dialogue among entrepreneurs that can increase awareness, offer you support, and
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ShiftLeft Raises $20 Million to Ensure Security Keeps Pace with Accelerating Software
Recognizing this growing issue, investors are betting big on solutions that can help developers better secure code, and offer customized security for every version of every application in the DevOps cycle. In fact, application-specific cloud security startup ShiftLeft today announced that it has
A 60-Second Trailer of the 60-Day Report on Cybersecurity
Finally, Hathaway sees this as a unique opportunity for the United States to work with countries around the world, and with organizations on an extremely local level. “We cannot succeed if our government works in isolation,” she added. It requires “leading from the top” from
WordPress for Good: Relieving Fatigue . | Beyond Blue Links: Making Clickable Elements Recognizable
Beyond Blue Links: Making Clickable Elements Recognizable
With that said, the flat-design trend (a style of interface design that emphasizes 2-D flat illustrations and is well exemplified by iOS 7 and Windows 8) has some website designers taking the minimalist approach to the extreme. The idea behind flat design is to simplify the interface. However
Users Interleave Sites and Genres
The user's sponsored link clicks were disappointing from an advertiser's standpoint: she wasn't looking to buy on their sites, merely to look at the information they provided. For example, after having identified several possible projectors, the user wanted to estimate total cost of ownership by
Changes in Web Usability Since 1994
The change from 1994 is that scrolling is no longer a usability disaster for navigation pages. Scrolling still reduces usability, but all design involves trade-offs, and the argument against scrolling is no longer as strong as it used to be. Thus, pages that can be markedly improved with a
