Last week when I had a open question post there were several asking my thoughts on this health care bill being voted on this afternoon.

I have a lot of mixed feelings… and being my wife is an anesthesiologist some interesting viewpoints from her also.

The one constant I am pretty sure about is that nobody knows what is going to happen… The whole huge rush to get this thing passed right away (much like that stimulas crap) is what scares me a bit.

Like I said I have a lot of mixed feelings on this. As much as I would love to have free health care for everyone in America (which we actually have in Lincoln Nebraska through PRIVATE FUNDED companies) I just have never heard one good argument on how its not going to completely bankrupt our country.

But history will tell the tale. I am willing to concede the possibility that Obama and the rest of the democratic leadership might actually know what they are doing and unlike every other government run program (medicare, social security) this one will actually work.

What do you think?

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About This Health Care Bill

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Here are some interesting posts from around the ‘Net to catch up with over the weekend:

• Jonathan Fields: “7 Sneaky Ways to Write Irresistible Headlines” (also see Aliza’s video of Jonathan from SXSW here)
• Harvard Business Review: “How Social Is Too Social?”
• WebProNews: “To Get Clients, You Need To Pull, Not Push”
• Mashable: “10 Essential Social Media Tips for B2B Marketers”
• NPR: “When Employers Make Room For Work-Life Balance”
• NPR: “The End Of 9-To-5: When Work Time Is Anytime”
• GigaOM: “Whatever Happened to Web 2.0?”

What are you reading this weekend?

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• Script Installation Service — We Install All Scripts
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Want to get your job, product, or announcement out to hundreds of thousands of very targeted ShoeMoney readers? Create a marketplace listing today!

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This is a guest post by my friend Joseph Porcelli who runs a Boston based non profit called Neighbors for Neighbors. And he needs your vote.

How many neighbors do you know on your street?

When was the last time you did something together as a community?

Have you ever had to deal with crime in your neighborhood, or known a neighbor in need but did not know where to start?

Well, if you lived in my neighborhood in Boston, you’d know lots of your neighbors, you’d have hosted an event in the last six months, and you’d know exactly what to do about crime cause you would know your local police officers. If a neighbor needed help you’d know where to go for resources.

How is this possible? It’s because we’ve leverage the Ning.com social network platform as the new online social infrastructure for our neighborhoods. Just like you invest in your businesses to earn fiscal capital, we make it possible for neighbors to invest their good intentions to earn social capital.

My name is Joseph Porcelli, and I’m the founder and Chief Executive Neighbor at NeighborsForNeighbors.org. I’m writing today to ask for your help in sharing our social infrastructure model with you, so that you too can communicate and collaborate with your neighbors and public servants like we do.

My hope is you’ll be inspired to vote for us to win $250,000 to fund our operation as we are competing in the Pepsi Refresh Challenge.

OUR HISTORY:

Neighbors for Neighbors is a Boston Based 501c3 nonprofit I founded with my neighbors in the summer of 2004. We originally set out to increase awareness about crime in our neighborhood, but soon realized that our neighbors wanted to meet each other, do activities together, and serve each other. To keep up the momentum we had created, we turned to technology so that everyone could share, create, listen and participate directly, without our intervention.

WHAT WE DO TODAY:

Today, Neighbors for Neighbors is pioneering the new online social infrastructure for neighborhoods by operating neighborhood-centric, community-generated social networks powered by Ning.com. The networks serve as a soundboard for voices and a springboard for action. Unlike Facebook, Neighbors for Neighbors connects people who live, work and serve their neighborhoods, with the intention of bringing people together offline to do activities with and for each other.

Check out our pilot network http://jamaicaplain.neighborsforneighbors.org

OUTCOMES THEY’VE PRODUCED:

Our members have created over 140 groups ranging from running and reading groups to advocacy groups organizing for affordable housing. In the last year, we came together as a community over 500 times. Together, we’ve transformed our public spaces, increased safety, and grown our collective grassroots innovation and problem-solving capacity.

Over the last year we’ve received national recognition as a Gov 2.0 leader for our work in connecting and building trust among residents and public servants such as police officers. We are even key partners in the Boston Police Department’s Virtual Policing Strategy, as seen on BPD News.

HOW YOU CAN HELP US:

Imagine what would be possible if your neighborhood — and every other neighborhood in the world — had a network like ours. What would you create and what problems would you solve?

We are not too far away from scaling our operation and you can help!

Please vote for us right now and every day this month.

With $250,000, we’ll will hire staff to:

Sustain the Boston operation (currently we are run by volunteers and have no funding)
Meet the demand for and provide technical and operating support to individuals and municipalities who wish to replicate the NFN model in their neighborhoods
Convene the “Neighbor Movement” where individuals, organizations, and community technologists will share best practices and build broad support for neighboring.

CONCLUSION:

You invest in technology to build financial capital and we invest in technology to build social capital. By helping us you’re helping yourselves, your families, and your neighbors.

Please vote to help fund our important work!

I also suggest you follow us twitter @NeighborTweet. You can help increase our chances of winning by tweeting – Vote to help fund @neighbortweets online social infrastructure for neighborhoods http://pep.si/shoenfn #pepsirefresh

Thank you, neighbors from all over,

Joseph Porcelli,

Your neighbor in Boston.

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Today we’d like to publish something completely different for a change. India, the country of mysterious paradoxes; the land where civilizations and times intermix, a mysterious place which attracts people from all over the world. In today’s showcase we are presenting a little showcase of this astonishing contrast between wealth and misery, contemporary technologies and ancient historical monuments, plenty of languages, cultures and traditions.

We present people, places, traditions, culture and a broad overview of the incredible beauty of India — something different and inspirational for a change. Please let us know if you are interested in seeing more similar posts on Smashing Magazine in the future in the comments below.

[Offtopic: by the way, did you know that Smashing Magazine has one of the most influential and popular Twitter accounts? Join our discussions and get updates about useful tools and resources — follow us on Twitter!]

The Beauty of India

Heart You

Feet. Jaipur

catching up!

Diwali lights

Aishwarya Rai in the making

Golden Temple before Sunrise

A Dreamer Among the Humblest

10 Interesting Places to Visit Before You Die

Smiling.Pali

A glance inside, a glimpse outside

Dark eyes. Pushkar

Prayer at the Temple

Taj Mahal, the other side. Agra

colors-of-india

Sweeping. Varanasi

India. A table

Colorful Masks

Bananiers en paix

back to India

Silent Prayer / Amritsar, India

Little Red Riding Hood

Golden Slumbers

india – gujarat

colors-of-india

sri meenakshi sundareswara temple

colors-of-india

India style

I n d i a *

colors-of-india

India

India Wedding

Tata Ace – The True India Truck!

india

l’homme de mehrangarh

India

damsel at Pushkar

India- Faces

Mosque (Agra India)

Temple

Lal baba

Colors

India

Would you like to see more similar posts on Smashing Magazine?

Would you like to see more similar posts on Smashing Magazine in the future?polls

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An intense debate about business models, bubbles, capitalism, quality of life, market share vs. profit share, running a business vs. selling a business, and a variety of other related topics from episode 46 of This Week in Startups. This is really good stuff.

(There’s 47 minutes of material before the interview. The video above picks up where the interview starts. The interview is what’s really worth watching.)

If you’re interested in finding out more about David’s point of view, check out REWORK — now a New York Times and Wall Street Journal best seller.

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WebWorkerDaily readers are a diverse bunch. Every week, I profile a different reader and ask them to share what they do, how they do it, and some of their favorite hints and tips.

Who are you and what do you do? My name is Maurice Cherry, and I’m the founder of the Black Weblog Awards, the web’s premier Internet event celebrating Black bloggers since 2005. I am also the creative principal at 3eighteen media, an online media company that handles theme design, email marketing and design, copywriting, copyediting and social media consulting. In this role, I am currently doing some consulting for the Henry W. Grady Health System Foundation, which funds Grady Memorial Hospital, one of the largest health systems in the country. When time permits, I also do some freelance writing on technology for Black Web 2.0 and TechDrawl.

I always start my day with a fresh pot of tea and go through my email and my RSS subscriptions in Google Reader. After that, depending on the day, there’s meetings with clients around town, working on client projects at home or collaborating with other creatives on projects around the city. Oftentimes, you can find me at a Starbucks or at Octane Coffee working feverishly on a new article or on proposals, or coding and designing a new web site.

My portable gear is pretty minimal: I have a Gateway T-Series laptop (aka “Deanna Blu”) with a 320GB external HDD and a Logitech Trackman Marble (I’ve always used trackball mice). My home office has an HP Slimline PC running Windows 7 Ultimate connected to a 24″ LCD monitor. Also, I have a T-Mobile G1, which pretty much never leaves my side and sometimes serves as a 3G modem in spots where I have my laptop and there’s no Wi-Fi.

On the software end, the tools that help me be great are few. I use Freshbooks for invoices and client management, Dropbox for synchronizing files between my two machines and phone (as well as between me and my clients), Belvedere for elegant file management between my machines and my external HDDs (two 1 TB drives) and Thunderbird 3 for mail (tricked out with a few different plugins and filters). I also use Google Calendar and Google Tasks a lot since the updates sync to my phone and my mail client effortlessly. I’m still pretty old school on project management, though — I use Microsoft Project, a Moleskine and a Marvy Uchida LePen.

I have three tips, actually.

1. Get a change of scenery from time to time. Working from home can be great, but explore coffeehouses, restaurants and coworking spaces to give you a change of pace.
2. Realize that occasionally you have to meet your clients where they are. Sometimes, that means they’re not going to be as technically savvy as you are. You can either spend time getting them to your level, or you can slide tackle (à la Nathan Smith) and just get the job done.
3. Track everything. Track your web stats, your finances, your project timeline — track everything you can. It’s the best way to see when you’re making progress.

If you would like to be profiled on WWD, get in touch with me at simon (at) gigaom (dot) com.

Related GigaOM Pro content (sub. req): Enabling the Web Work Revolution

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Just in case you missed any of them, here are the five most popular posts on WebWorkerDaily this week:

• Confessions of a Freeware Junkie

Doriano is a freeware junkie. In this post, he explains where he goes to find the best free tools.

• How to Make a Conference Pay Off

Just got back from SXSW? Meryl explains how to make sure the time you spent at the conference is not wasted.

• Roundup: Social Media Monitoring Tools

Doriano rounds up the current crop of social media monitoring tools

• The Power of Your Little Black Book

We already know everyone we need to know to succeed. Amber explains why.

• It’s the Social Media Strategy Struggle

Aliza asks, “Where does strategy end and where do tactics begin? And what the heck is the difference between goals and objectives?�

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I recently wrote about TaskPaper coming to the iPhone and my appreciation of simple and easy to use task lists. Another option for people who just need a simple, easy-to-use to-do list is YouDo, an iPhone and iPod touch app.

YouDo’s interface is reminiscent of desktop notepads, and with its simplicity the analogy works for me.  Each day, the app presents you with a blank page to which you can add your tasks. If you don’t complete the tasks by the end of that day (or at least strike them from the list), the incomplete tasks appear on the “Overdue” list. I do have friends and colleagues who take this day-to-day management approach and I wouldn’t hesitate mentioning YouDo to them if they were in the market for an iPhone or iPod touch app.

YouDo bases itself on tasks and dates versus TaskPaper which uses projects, tasks, and notes as its organizational foundation. All of the task management options are accessible from the main screen; there are no arcane sub-menus to master.

If you manage your tasks a couple of days to weeks out like I do, YouDo lets you scroll ahead to put tasks on future dates, with the option to view them on the “Upcoming Events” tab. While I was OK with this feature early on in my testing of the app, I came to think that it could grow tiresome for some people. While a recent update added a home button and the ability to move tasks to a new day, I still would like to see more date management and navigation features in future versions,

Have you tried out YouDo?

Related GigaOM Pro content (sub. req): Enabling the Web Work Revolution

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Eye tracking has recently been debated on many fronts, with a particular focus on the ways people misuse it, and how some use eye tracking only as a way to "wow" clients. In our experience, however, it's invaluable in bringing to light key findings that are otherwise unattainable through other user testing methods. Eye tracking offers UX people the ability to:

• Leave a participant alone during a test to focus on the task at hand, and therefore
• Capture real physiological data about their conscious and unconscious experiences. This data is unique to eye tracking.

Eye Tracking for Rich Applications

Recently eye tracking has been heavily used in website design and testing. When I became involved about eight years ago, the sites tested were mainly flat HTML. Researchers were able to produce beautiful heat maps that were useful for comparing and optimising simple screen layouts and online advertising placements.

The invention of rich, interactive, and transactional interfaces, however, has meant producing eye tracking results is now more complex. Each interface has multiple states and people can interact in pretty much whatever way they like. People can choose their own way through a task to completion and the eye trackers can't tell which state is what as a person's eyes are tracked. Additional analysis is now required to separate these interactions, and fortunately eye tracking technologies have advanced to make this process relatively simple.

If this new level of sophisticated analysis is not achieved, this will result in eye tracking data being misused and eye tracking will retain (inappropriately) its novelty status.

Usability Testing Fraternities Lock Horns

Think Aloud

Think Aloud (TA) is an age-old usability testing method. People are asked to speak their thoughts, feelings, and opinions during a set of usability testing tasks. This is done with the help of the facilitator, who “skilfully interrupts" the process frequently to find out why people do particular things during the test.

In my opinion, when people are faced with lots of interactions on screen, considerable cognitive effort is required. Adding TA to this experience will inappropriately add more cognitive load to the task that would not normally be present. This can lead to misleading additional eye fixations and dwell times on outputs, which clouds the analysis. Often a poor facilitator will prompt users to the next stage (when was the last time someone knocked on your door and helped you find the right button when you browsed at home?), again spoiling the desired realism while testing.

We know there are three types of memory “storage" systems: sensory memory, short term, and long term. Our sensory memory retains an exact copy of what is seen or heard, and is generally thought to last between 300ms and a few seconds. Our short-term memory tends to remember between five and nine “items" (George Miller, et al) of information. If we start to talk about our actions in a TA protocol, these precious (milli) seconds and snapshots of information are quickly forgotten or overwritten. After that, what are they basing their commentary on?

Eye Tracking

There has been considerable debate about the usefulness of usability testing with eye tracking. Many TA proponents claim their methods, when carefully performed, will find enough issues compared with eye tracking, which they consider to be too difficult, time consuming, and expensive to bother about.

To my mind, this criticism arises from a situation where some people use eye tracking to make wild claims about how all websites should be designed. These can be found in numerous blog posts written that offer tips and guidelines. These include 23 Actionable Lessons From Eye-Tracking Studies, Web Form Design Guidelines: An Eyetracking Study, and Eyetracking Study Reveals 12 Website Tactics. These articles have been widely referenced and retweeted; however, they should be taken with a grain of salt. Without a clear understanding of the methodology used, the information should simply be seen as an investigative tool in your design process, not as the Holy Grail.

Of particular concern is Jakob Nielsen's F-pattern research. This was produced in 2006 and I regularly hear it mentioned in design meetings in Australia. This study was done using the regular TA protocol, which means that participants' eye gaze data is very likely not valid because they were talking to the experimenter during the study. Try doing an everyday task like driving, cooking, or cleaning while all along the way verbalising every little step, and see how your behaviour (actions, methods, or time to complete) is affected.

Retrospective Think Aloud

Retrospective Think Aloud is another usability testing method that has been used for many years. In this case, participants give their opinions of a task after it is completed and the interview is recorded for later reference. Of course, it is hard to remember what you did during a task.

Retrospective TA with eye tracking (RTA) is a method in which participants are quickly calibrated on the eye tracker and then asked to do the testing task without interruption from the facilitator. In fact, the facilitator can even leave the room during a test. Following the test, the facilitator immediately asks the participant to score their experience and then replays the eye gaze video of the participant's experience to them. This replay of their eye gaze triggers the person's memory of what they did, thereby mitigating the memory issue. Expanding on this, the eye gaze can also be removed to ask what the participant thought they looked at before revealing their actual interactions.

Think Eyetracking, an early adopter of the RTA eye tracking protocol (which they renamed PEEP), have published a jointly researched academic paper with Lancaster University, UK. Their academic article can be downloaded on the Think Eyetracking Blog. They also had a very popular blog post about it in 2008 that generated some controversy.

Below are some eye tracking heat maps created by Think Eyetracking that show a comparison of a Google search task done with TA (on the left) and RTA (on the right). Note the dramatic differences! It is obvious that the behaviour is very different, with long dwell times and numbers of fixations apparent in the TA output, probably caused by the participants staring at and browsing the screen while verbalising their actions.

Recently, Tobii Technology from Sweden created a unique feature in their Tobii Studio software where during the eye gaze replay stage of the test, the software records a video and audio record of the participant and facilitator as they review the eye tracking session. This can be paused, replayed, and scrubbed to allowing a full detailed analysis of the session with both visual and audio cues. Find out more about RTA on Scribd or watch this video:

Usability labs are set up to approximate real life. We regularly see experimenters set up their testing facilities like offices or lounge rooms to make the person feel at home. TA asks people to talk to someone while they are busy doing a task—where's the real life in that?

Eye tracking is the only real way to test a rich application without distracting the participant.

See Where People Looked, Not Where They Think They Looked

Here are some examples from our recent work at Objective Digital.

We allow people to complete tasks in a focused way, and also obtain real physiological data about what they are doing. It is difficult to argue with and almost impossible to fake these measures. We are not making assumptions about what they looked at and in what order things captured their attention. Some recent client projects encouraged us to use eye tracking to identify:

1. Where do people look first?
2. What don't they look at?
3. What they looked at before the usability issue occurred?
4. How people learn an interface?

1. Where Do People Look First?

Very simply, eye tracking can tell us exactly what caught people's attention first on a screen. Jay Eskenazi put this very clearly in a comment on the IxDA forum in 2009:

Eye tracking measures unconscious behavior—and provides data that people simply cannot verbalize in other common user research methods, especially TA usability testing protocols. Decades of psychology research show that much human behavior occurs at an unconscious level.

The human eye, for example, can make up to 5 fixations per second and this occurs below people's level of conscious awareness. So in a 30 second scan of a typical homepage, the customer may be looking at up to 150 items on the page. Your customers (or research participants) simply cannot verbally tell you where their eyes are going and this is exactly the value that good eye tracking data provides.

Our experience is that visual attention data IS correlated with behavioral performance metrics. If people don't "see" something, then they are less likely to click it.

2. What They Don't Look At

Case study 1: Eye tracking shows what things on the screen people didn't look at. Importantly, the data revealed what space was being wasted in the design and what areas of the page were essentially ignored.

Recently, when we tested an internal CRM application for a finance company, eye tracking proved that customer service staff ignored the very information the company wanted them to focus on. In the task, they weren't even required to click on the screen.

The image here shows clearly that in the first few seconds of usage staff focused primarily on the bottom right rather than the bottom left where they were meant to focus. This would not have been observable if simply interviewing them. Considering this screen is used 300,000 times per day, any improvements to the design that make the correct part of the screen more obvious will drive positive outcomes for the finance company's customer service.

Joanna Lewis, whom I work with, recently wrote a blog post about what people ignore.

3. What They Looked at Before the Usability Issue Occurred

Only with eye tracking can we see all the options that people consider, even unconsciously, before starting and completing a specific task.

Eye tracking shows you where people immediately look on a screen. Yes, they can find a target and do a usability task just fine. But where did they look first, especially for ecommerce where time taken can force customers to leave you or stay? Rob Tannen puts this very clearly:

[Eye tracking] does have value as a secondary diagnostic tool. In the context of usability testing, eye tracking does not determine the presence of a usability problem, but helps determine what led to that problem in conjunction with performance data, facilitator observations and user self-reporting.

Case study 2: As the video clearly shows, this user was looking everywhere except at the Donate area on the right. After looking at the navigation both at the side and at the top, the rest of the page was viewed but at no point did the user focus on the Donate area in the main image. It clearly highlights the fact that this call-to-action does not stand out in the prototype, and users are also expecting to see something within the navigation. Equally, the heat map below gives an indication where all six people we tested would expect to see this link.

Case study 3: When users were asked to change one of the options on this screen, the eye tracking heat map below showed very clearly where they were expecting to go. People did not see the areas they were supposed to (indicated in red). Eye tracking of the first second they looked at the screen allowed us to make the site more efficient as it clearly indicated where the functionality should have been positioned.

The heat map below shows the first second of eye tracking on a prototype applicaiton. Users were heavily fixated on one area of the screen, and it can be assumed that this is where they were expecting to find the function they were asked to look for (the buttons).

This experience can also be seen in our financial institution case study.

How Do People Learn an Interface?

Eye tracking is also useful for change management and training when a new system is introduced to staff within a business.

Where do people look the first time they see an application? How about the second time, and the third time? Eye tracking shows very clearly how people learn to interact with a system.

Case study 4: A new user visiting the website

The new user is seen to skip back and forth between the right hand side panel and the selections and information on the main part of the page to complete the task.

A frequent user of the website

The frequent user skips back and forth less frequently than the new user and is more focused on completing the task.

An expert user of the website

The expert user is highly focused and directed and completes the task with minimum effort.

This example was again from the banking CRM case study. The client even used an eye tracking video as part of the training package for customer service reps. It was used to show them the best way to look at the interface the instant a customer identifies themselves at a branch.

Role-Played Customer Service

The eye tracking data gathered from the CRM examples above was gathered during a simulated customer service interaction. The bank branch staff member was tracked during a 45-minute role-played customer interview. Afterward, the usability issues were discussed when the staff member's eye gaze and screen interactions were replayed to him. I can't think of any other way to do this type of test that essentially involves three people: participant, role-played customer, and facilitator.

Commonly Reported Eye Tracking Advantages

Eye tracking offers unique advantages above and beyond traditional TA. Other widely known advantages include:

1. A more relaxed testing environment where participants give feedback in their own time, and actually find more usability errors.
2. Executives like eye tracking because it produces compelling physiological data that can't be argued with.
3. Real time eye tracking data also provides for a better observation experience. I frequently find that if I am observing a participant's gaze data in real time while they complete their tasks, I am better engaged and glean more detailed insights about the user interface.

In TA, sometimes it can be very hard to see what a person is talking about during the test. I once mentioned this to a TA proponent and they suggested that if the TA is managed well it wouldn't be a problem. During the test, they would have the test facilitator ask the participant to hover their mouse over the part of the screen they are describing so that the observers can see what is being discussed. I'm sorry, but this just means the participant gets even more distracted from the task at hand.

Written by James Breeze, Objective Digital Pty Ltd., Australia Technical QA by Jon Ward, Acuity-ETS, and Rob Stevens, Think Eye Tracking UK. Images and videos collated by Anna van Egmond.

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From the “Planning is guessing” essay in REWORK:

Make decisions right before you do something, not far in advance. It’s OK to wing it. Just get on the plane and go. You can pick up a nicer shirt, shaving cream, and a toothbrush once you get there.

It’s something travel backpackers have long known. That’s why they pack light, avoid rigid itineraries, stay frugal, and follow a mindset similar in many ways to Getting Real/REWORK.

Marcel Uekermann noted that similarity and recently wrote about how he’s been applying Getting Real guidelines to his traveling habits for years. He breaks it down into three points. The first: Planning is Poison.

There is no need for pre-planned routes or pre-booked hotels. Get on the road and figure your way from there. I find the idea of not knowing where to stay overnight exhilarating.

Next up: The Less Principle & Avoid Preferences.

How many hours have you spent preparing your bag for every eventuality, packing too much stuff you did never touch while on the road. I once lived through 10 days just with just my hand baggage (My main baggage didn’t make it). Sure, I stocked up on underwear, a toothbrush and t-shirts but I imagined it far worse. I perfectly understand this doesn’t work for long trips or hikes, but you can believe me, I do no longer feel like I forgot something at home.

Read the full piece.

Along the same lines, “How To Think Like A Lightweight Backpacker” [The Ultralight Backpacking Site] lists some basic questions you should ask when planning a backpacking trip or looking at gear. Examples: How can I make this lighter? What lighter version can I carry? Can I leave this behind? What multiple-use items can I use to cut weight? Etc.

Ask of each item, “do I really need to bring this?” A small kettle can be used to fry things, in, so leave the frying pan home. Another question to clarify this is, “will I use it?” I carried a small chess set on more than one backpacking trip, but never found another player.

Simple, fast, light = freedom and agility.

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I’ve been asking folks at SXSW for their web working advice as well as their favorite web app so far this year — not necessarily a new one, but one that they find themselves using all the time.

Here’s my video interview with Jonathan Fields, author of the book “Career Renegade.” His blog is about entrepreneurship and personal development.

Stay tuned for more video interviews from SXSW.

What is your favorite web app so far this year?

For the GigaOM network’s complete SXSW coverage, check out this round-up.

Related content from GigaOM Pro (sub. req.): Enabling the Web Work Revolution

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Image: Wikipedia/CC

HTML, CSS and JavaScript have always been visible to the interested end user. Whether through the good old view source option in your browser, or something a bit more sophisticated — like developer favorite Firebug — the code has always been there to learn from.

It’s part of what makes the open web open. But when it comes to JavaScript, it’s possible that openness may soon be a thing of the past.

Alex Russell, developer of Dojo JavaScript Library, recently posted a follow up to his SXSW panel, worrying that tools like Closure obfuscate code to the point that it renders view source meaningless.

What’s different from some tools in other languages (like ActionScript obsfucation tools) is that Closure and others of its ilk aren’t primarily designed to obfuscate, they’re simply optimizing code, making it smaller and faster. As Russell writes, “the Closure Compiler can deliver code that’s much, much smaller than I can wring out by hand and that performs better to boot.”

In other words Closure creates better, faster JavaScript.

However, there’s a trade off that most of us generally ignore — the code generated by such tools is useless from the perspective of curious users trying to learn JavaScript by viewing your source code.

As Russell writes in a followup comment, “poll any average group of web developers and they’ll tell you straight-up that that’s how they learned… not be stealing, but by dissecting and inspecting and tweaking and then re-implementing a technique in a new and unique situation.”

Webmonkey’s own seminal JavaScript tutorial advises: “the best way to learn JavaScript is to look at scripts other people have written. JavaScript, just like HTML, can be viewed by selecting View Source on your browser. Do it frequently!”

Tools like Closure make the source you view of little use. True there are some “de-obfuscation” tools out there — like jsbeautifier.org — but none of them work with tools as sophisticated as Closure.

Now curious newbies trying to teach themselves JavaScript may not be top of your list of concerns when writing code for your website, but Russell is right when he suggests that these “second-order beneficial effects,” that is, the ability to view source and learn from it, are part of what has made the web a success.

The danger is that in taking away the usefulness of view source we’re creating a much less democratic environment for those trying to learn HTML, CSS and JavaScript from tomorrow’s web. And as Russell writes, that’s not “a vision of the web that holds my interest.”

So what’s the answer? Well, there isn’t one really. Some ideas floated by Russell and commenters on his post include letting browsers do the Closure-style byte code compiling before the script is rendered, building better de-obfuscation tools or simply serving up uncompiled versions of the same JavaScript for interested users.

See Also:

• Firebug 1.5 Adds More Web Developer Tricks to Firefox
• Social Hosting, Good Parenting Are Keys to Open Source Success
• Yahoo’s Faster, Lighter YUI Tools Simplify Building Complex Websites
• JavaScript Tutorial - Lesson 1

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There are times when we get so consumed by what we want to do that we forget who it is we want to be. I’ve participated in several interesting conversations around this topic recently; two that really stand out to me.

The first was when I interviewed eight-year-old entrepreneur Ryan Ross. During the interview, he said that running a business was easy and fun and everyone should do it. And that if we all did, we could help more people around the world.

Then I had the opportunity to ask billionaire Sir Richard Branson at a recent web conference for his thoughts on keeping his passion alive and giving something back as part of his work as an entrepreneur.

I don’t think it’s an easy feat to stay connected to our core values and who it is that we want to be. No, strike that. I think it’s easy to get so distracted by the “busy-ness” of our businesses that we forget our purpose, our mission, or our vision for our life and who we hope to be.

I want my life to be about giving back, helping others and being of service, but then the days happen. I move from one to-do item to the next, and before you know it, a month or three months or even a year has passed, and I haven’t really spent a big portion of my time encompassing or embodying the traits that I hope will make up the biggest portion of my character.

I don’t know the answer for sure, not yet at least. Maybe we figure it out with time, with age and with wisdom. Maybe it’s wishful thinking, but I hope there comes a time when I can focus much less on the things I hope to do and much more on the person I want to be.

Maybe instead of (or at least alongside) a to-do list, I should have a “to-be” list and then make a concerted effort to complete them both.

How do you instill more of the “being” even with all the “doing”?

Photo by Flickr user foxspain, licensed under CC 2.0

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Hey there!

You’ve probably noticed that we’ve begun adding a few new features to Think Vitamin (like Think Vitamin Radio!) and welcoming some new regular writers to the team (like @Grace Smith, @KyleBragger, and me!). During Future of Web Apps Miami, we began experimenting a bit with a news feature, rounding up items that are timely, helpful, and quite a few that are downright inspiring and smattered with quirk.

We’d love your help matching up great contributions with our editorial schedule, it’s a time for you to submit great content you’ve been working on or have discovered yourself and get a little link love from Think Vitamin.

• Monday—All things web design (ux, photo, illustration, art, graphics, CSS, jQuery, tutorials, and more)
• Wednesday—Core stories on web development and business (apps, people, practices, and more)
• Friday—The best in “interestingness!” (lego constructs, stop-motion animation via YouTube, Flickr finds, Tumblrs, and much more)

Send links to news@thinkvitamin.com (Big Hint: we love giving credit where credit is due! So include sexy email signatures with links to your content, but also to your personal Twitter, Blog, etc.)

Cheers!

Chrissie

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Zoho recently launched an update to Zoho Show, its online presentations tool and Microsoft PowerPoint competitor. This new update ups the game against SlideRocket, Google Docs, Acrobat.com Presentations (part of Acrobat.com, covered here), and the soon-to-launch Microsoft PowerPoint Web App by adding thirty slide transitions, and improved import and export of PowerPoint presentations (including support for its slide transitions).

There are also new advanced options on Zoho Show’s “Publish” menu for sizing embedded presentations, which should prove welcome if you are wanting to integrate Zoho Show presentations on your blog or web site.

Zoho has also improved support for Google Chrome. Previously, if you were a Chrome user you could only view Zoho Show presentations, but now you can have full access to all of its features.

Zoho and its web office applications may not get the headlines like Google Apps does, but its attention to usability and features like those in this update make them a player to watch in the web office market.

Have you tried out the newly-updated Zoho Show?

Related GigaOM Pro content (sub. req): Enabling the Web Work Revolution

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Editors note: In his first article for Think Vitamin Rob Smith looks at his top five themes for e-commerce for 2010. Whether you are considering starting an online shop or have one that isn’t performing as well as you would like these valuable tips will help you on your way.

Purchasing online and e-commerce has been growing at a rapid rate for many years and during that time things have changed massively. From online merchandising to order management to delivery, things are constantly evolving.

This article is aimed at giving what I believe are 5 important themes in this area over the next year, and what you can do to help yourself or your clients prosper.

1: Focus on Growth and Existing Customers, Not New Ones

The number of online customers has been growing at a fantastic rate over the past decade fueled by the widespread adoption of broadband. This has resulted in an ever growing number of new potential online customers.

Due in part to the recession, and in part due to the slow down of broadband adoption as it reaches near ubiquity, the growth of potential customers is predicted to slowdown in 2010. This has the net effect of new customers being harder to acquire due to reduced amount of overall growth, and more people targeting these new customers as online retailers keep appearing every day.

This leads to the need to focus more on how well we do with our current customers. Examine your customer contact strategy and ask these questions:

• Do you regularly communicate with your customers?
• Have you segmented your database into groups of like minded people?
• Do you then send targeted messages to those segments?
• Have you increased your average reorder rate in the past year?

These questions will give you a good insight into how well you’re doing with your current customers. The time has come to step up your activity to try and retain and grow your current customers.

All the time other online retailers are targeting your customers to try and win their business. You need to work hard to keep building relationships with your customers so they don’t even think about looking elsewhere.

Bodon (a UK online and catalogue company) do a good job of email marketing and customer care, including emails like ‘You haven’t shopped with us for a while and we miss you’. These do a really good job of reconnecting with the user.

2: Tie your Channels Together

Customers will no longer accept (without damage to your brand) discrepancies across your channels. If you’re a bricks and mortar retailer then you need to be able to tie your online offering to your offline offering to ensure customers are not disappointed.

They should be able to order online and pick up in store an vice versa. If you have a telephone mail order element to your business that should tie in with your online business to allow order tracking. There are many more examples, but the bottom line is this:

Customers are becoming channel blind. They see all your ‘ways to order’ as being interlinked and interchangeable.

Here in the UK, Marks and Spencer (a “national treasure” of a retail company who have both bricks and mortar shops and online ordering) have done a good job of tying their channels together. You can order online and get it delivered to home, work, or to a store.

You can return items to a store or by freepost direct. It all makes the experience more congruent and feels like you’re dealing with one helpful company. Argos (one of the biggest UK retail companies) also do an excellent job with the ability to reserve items online for store pickup.

Gap, on the other hand, do a poor job. There’s been little investment in the online channel for the UK and Europe, you can’t even purchase online at point of writing, let alone reserve or see what stock is available.

3: Mobile is Coming

I know, it’s been coming for years. However it’s widely believed that smart-phone adoption will reach a critical mass in the next 12-18 months. What does that mean for us? Customers will have access to the internet or at least a much richer media experience via their phones. People generally always have their phones with them. On the train in the car, the office, at home on the sofa. Many more people have phones than laptops.

What does this mean for e-commerce? Will people really shop and look through entire catalogues to order? Maybe not. Will they bob on their phone to track their order? Maybe. It’s all about context and how they are using their phone to communicate with you and your service.

Some companies are already striving ahead. Pizza delivery companies like Dominoes and Pizza Hut are doing well in the space creating applications and mobile focused websites to help with ordering. It’s important to note that we don’t mean iPhone applications here. It’s a combination of applications and mobile focused websites that are the key. The iPhone is still not a massive % of the mobile space.

Other notable successes in this area are Amazon and Interflora. Some notable failures are Tesco (UK supermarket chain), Sainsburys (UK supermarket chain) and play.com (online entertainment retailer) – all without a whiff of a mobile site on my iPhone.

4: Focus on Form as Well as Function

A lot of e-commerce sites have become very good at getting the basics correct. Good, clear statements about delivery, stock availability and product information are becoming much more commonplace. Checkouts are getting easier to use and less cumbersome.

There’s been a positive focus by most major retailers over the past year to really improve the customer experience in this very functional way. If you or your clients have not got a lot of e-commerce best practice in place then you need to do so before you rapidly fall behind.

Now has come the time for these retailers, as well as smaller retailers, to invest more time in the form side of their sites. By this, I mean the visual merchandising and guided purchases. There’s a lot more that can be done by bundling “like” products together, allowing people to purchase packages of products as opposed to just one.

A good example of this would be a retailer who delivers products for the home. More needs to be invested in tieing products together via well photographed roomsets where people can then quickly and easily purchase items they like from that room. Especially if the brand is stylish or well regarded this approach can work very well as people very often like to reflect the image that a particular brand projects.

This can of course be done by smaller retailers as well. Electronics sites could easily bundle TV starter sets together or the ultimate HD kit . Not enough is being done to intelligently link single products together to form a more cohesive whole, and a better buying proposition.

Good examples of this are starting to crop up in many places but there’s still a lot to be done. Glasses Direct (online glasses retailer) do an interesting virtual mirror (even if it is only for Windows), Next (large UK retail brand for clothes and home) have a lot of videos showing models on the catwalk, and tobi.com even has an augmented reality dressing room focusing on the product and it’s form and connection with user, rather than the function of selecting and checking out.

Watch this YouTube video to learn more

5: Tweaks, not Wide Spread Overhauls

This is a theme for many normal websites, not just e-commerce sites, and revolves around tweaking and gradually evolving, instead of scraping and starting again. It’s a habit of the web industry, especially if you start working with a different agency or developer, to be tempted to throw out your current site and start again, and do that every two-three years.

This is incredibly expensive in comparison. The return on investment of an entirely new site without changing any other aspect is normally quite low, especially in the short term. It is wise to heavily evaluate what you will get from a new site. Why can’t you just refresh your current one, or just tweak some of the functionality and processes to make it more up to date for your customers’ needs?

Very often, a concentrated and considered approach to optimising your conversion rate can help your sites profits much more than a complete site overhaul. It’s not as sexy, and it’s not as exciting for either side, but it’s Return on Investment is normally far in advance.

Good ways to look at how to measure conversion rates can be heatmaps, user testing (either face to face or remote), and looking deeply into your analytics.

Amazon are the king of small changes done overtime making big overall differences. They continually evolve what they do but at a slow pace. The thing is, they do not want anyone to notice anything is changing – big overhauls will cost Amazon millions of abandoned carts due to everything now being different. To learn more about this read “Hidden Secrets of the Amazon Shopping Cart”.

Conclusion

A lot, as ever, is changing in e-commerce as it does every year. Customers are becoming more sophisticated in the way they use technology and the way that they shop. The better the experience they get from your site the better you will be at cutting through the noise of countless other retailers.

It’s really easy to start an online shop, it’s pretty tough to start a really good one. Make sure you have the basics sorted out first before looking towards future themes and cool technology. If it’s hard to pay on your site then all of the above should not be your focus. If on the other hand you’re now looking at ways to eek that extra bit of conversion and customer delight out of your site, then these are for you.

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College and university websites have a lot of roles to fill. They need to provide information for prospective students (both new and transfer), parents of students and prospective students, current students, and alumni. In many cases, they’re also the gateway to the school’s intranet and the public face for both academics and athletics. They often need to include reams of information in a way that makes everything easy to find. It’s a huge challenge.

And the truth is: most college and university websites are horribly designed. Either they look like they were designed fifteen years ago and then forgotten about, or they’re so overloaded with information that it’s almost impossible to find what you’re looking for.

But not every college or university website is horrible. There are some excellent sites out there, and below are some of them. If you know others, please share them in the comments to this post!

[Offtopic: by the way, did you know that Smashing Magazine has one of the most influential and popular Twitter accounts? Join our discussions and get updates about useful tools and resources — follow us on Twitter!]

General Colleges & Universities

Appalachian State University
Appalachian State University has a simple color scheme and makes great use of icons in their header.

Ball State University
Ball State University uses a sophisticated color scheme and typography combined with plenty of negative space.

Bates College
The bold header and grid-based layout work well on the Bates College site.

Bennington College
Bennington College uses a unique layout and design.

Berea College
Berea College uses a clean layout, and the cutout in the navigation bar for the logo really sets it apart.

Case Western Reserve University
Case Western Reserve University uses a unique layout and color options.

Champlain College
Champlain College uses a sophisticated, muted color scheme and excellent typography.

Colby-Sawyer College
Colby-Sawyer College has a simple layout with plenty of negative space.

William & Mary
The bold header image and excellent typography set the William & Mary site apart.

The College of Wooster
The College of Wooster uses an interactive, animated header.

Denison University
Denison’s website makes great use of negative space and a simple layout.

Dickinson College
Dickinson College’s site has a great color scheme and a subtle background image.

Elon University
Elon University’s site includes a lot of details that make the site look really polished.

Hamilton College
Hamilton uses a simple color scheme and straight-forward navigation.

Hampshire College
Hampshire College uses a unique, sophisticated color scheme and typography.

Lenoir-Rhyne University
Lenoir-Rhyne University has a clean layout and bold header slideshow.

Marlboro College
Marlboro College makes good use of a simple layout and color scheme.

Middlebury College
Middlebury College has a completely unique layout with excellent typography.

Minot State University
Minot State University uses plenty of negative space and clean typography.

Nebraska Wesleyan University
Nebraska Wesleyan has one of the best-looking college sites out there, with a fantastic background image and excellent typography.

Northland College
Northland College uses unique typography and grunge elements to stand out.

Oglethorpe University
Oglethorpe University uses a modern color scheme and typography.

Ohio Wesleyan University
Ohio Wesleyan uses a bold color scheme and graphics.

Simmons College
Simmons College uses a clean, grid-based layout and sophisticated color scheme.

Sweet Briar College
Sweet Briar College steps outside of the norm for a college website and uses a more relaxed, feminine design (appropriate for a women’s college).

Syracuse University
Syracuse University has a fantastic grid layout and modern color scheme.

Thomas Edison State College
Thomas Edison State College has a great illustration in their header and a sophisticated color scheme.

Tufts University
Tufts has a unique layout and excellent typography.

The University of Alabama
The University of Alabama uses a grid layout and plenty of negative space.

University of Connecticut
The University of Connecticut’s site has a simple layout and navigation.

University of Maine Farmington
The University of Maine Farmington’s website uses a basic grid layout and great typography.

University of Miami
The University of Miami uses a muted color scheme and simple, horizontal navigation.

University of Minnesota Morris
The University of Minnesota Morris’s site incorporates a number of small details that give the site its polished look.

University of Nebraska-Lincoln
A simple color scheme and clean, grid-based layout give the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s website a polished and sophisticated look.

University of Portland
The University of Portland uses a simple layout and color scheme with plenty of negative space.

University of Rochester
The large background image and non-standard navigation set the University of Rochester’s website apart.

University of the Sciences in Philadelphia
The University of Sciences in Philadelphia uses a fantastic bright color scheme and clean typography.

Ursuline College
Ursuline College has a simple layout, good typography, and lots of negative space.

Vancouver Island University
Vancouver Island University uses a grid layout and fantastic, monochromatic color scheme.

Wake Forest University
Wake Forest University’s site has clean typography and a simple layout.

Wesleyan University
Wesleyan University uses a grid layout and sophisticated color scheme.

Westmont
Westmont utilizes a slideshow header and great color scheme.

University of Aberdeen
The University of Aberdeen has a fantastic grid layout.

Bournemouth University
Bournemouth University uses bright accent colors and tabbed navigation.

University of Bradford
The University of Bradford uses bright accent colors and a grid layout to stand out.

University of Chester
The University of Chester uses an obvious grid layout, an animated header, and simple navigation.

Edge Hill University
Edge Hill University has a header slideshow, minimalist color palette, and lots of negative space.

University of Hull
The University of Hull has a unique layout, simple navigation, and great accessibility features.

Kingston University London
The Kingston University London’s website uses bright accent colors and simple navigation.

University of Leeds
The University of Leeds has a simple layout, minimalist aesthetic, and good typography. They also make excellent use of icons to simplify navigation.

University of Oxford
Oxford uses a simple color scheme and clean layout and makes good use of negative space.

University of Southampton
The University of Southampton has a bold header and simple color scheme.

Community Colleges

Salt Lake Community College
Salt Lake Community College uses photorealistic and grunge elements, combined with a unique layout.

Passaic County Community College
Passaic County Community college uses an obvious grid layout and a great color scheme.

Anoka-Ramsey Community College
Anoka-Ramsey Community College has a unique color scheme and a good use of negative space.

Columbia State Community College
Columbia State Community College has a simple layout and color scheme with clean typography.

Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising
FIDM uses an excellent bright color scheme and a prominent slideshow.

Jamestown Community College
Jamestown Community College’s site has a simple layout and navigation.

Joliet Junior College
Joliet Junior College has a simple layout with a good use of icons.

Hagerstown Community College
Hagerstown Community College has a good color scheme, clean typography, and simple navigation.

Lone Star College System
Lone Star College System makes good use of transparency.

Washtenaw Community College
Washtenaw Community College has great hand-drawn elements, and a unique layout and color scheme.

Northland Community & Technical College
Northland Community & Technical College has a sophisticated layout and color scheme.

Northwest Iowa Community College
The Northest Iowa Community College site uses a mix of collage, photorealistic, and hand-drawn elements.

Art and Design Colleges & Universities

The Art Institute of Boston
The Art Institute of Boston combines a simple layout with bold header graphics.

Kansas City Art Institute
The Kansas City Art Institute uses bright colors, a collage-style background, and loose grid layout.

Memphis College of Art
The Memphis College of Art site uses bright bright pink accents combined with a simple design and clean typography.

Minneapolis College of Art & Design
The patterned background, animated header, and clean typography set the site of the Minneapolis College of Art and Design apart.

Moore College of Art & Design
Bold graphics and a textured background makes the Moore College of Art & Design site stand out.

The Ontario College of Art & Design
The Ontario College of Art & Design uses a grid layout and modern orange and white color scheme.

Pennsylvania College of Art & Design
The Pennsylvania College of Art & Design uses a modern color scheme and bold header.

California College of the Arts
The California College of Arts uses a unique color scheme and animated header.

University College Falmouth
University College Falmouth’s site has bright accent colors, lots of negative space, and simple layout and navigation.

Maryland Institute College of Art
MICA uses a grid layout, muted color scheme, and excellent typography.

SCAD
SCAD’s minimalist light-on-dark design sets it apart.

Corcoran College of Art & Design
Corcoran’s mix of minimalist grid design and bold colors is fantastic.

Emily Carr University of Art & Design
Emily Carr University of Art & Design has a wonderful minimalist layout and clean typography mixed with bold accent colors.

Oregon College of Art & Craft
Bold background, great typography, excellent navigation.

Ringling College of Art & Design
The grid layout and bold background give the website of Ringling College of Art & Design a unique look.

Other Institutions, Colleges & Universities

Asian University for Women
The Asian University for Women’s site has an excellent gold and maroon color scheme and plenty of negative space.

California Institute of Integral Studies
The bold typography and great color scheme of the California Institute of Integral Studies sets it apart.

Rochester Institute of Technology
The orange and cream color scheme, simple navigation and clean typography make the Rochester Institute of Technology’s site unique.

Conclusion

While the vast majority of college and university websites out there are in need of serious overhaul, there are some fine examples of sites if you look hard enough. If designing a site for a college or university, remember that simplicity and negative space are both important, regardless of the amount of information a site needs to contain.

© Cameron Chapman for Smashing Magazine, 2010. | Permalink | 106 comments | Add to del.icio.us | Digg this | Stumble on StumbleUpon! | Tweet it! | Submit to Reddit | Forum Smashing Magazine
Post tags: showcases

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Soge Shirts is a site that sells funny shirts for men, women, and children. Some of these shirts are pretty funny, they have sayings like “I’m here to drink not to meet you.” and “Human Stripper Pole.” Also you can order each design in a variety of styles and colors, they have tanks, t-shirts, sweatshirts, long sleeved shirts, even boxers. Check them out at www.sogeshirts.com.

If you would like to see your website or company featured on Free Shirt Friday click here

Get a sneak peak at the all new ShoeMoney System

This Post Is From ShoeMoney’s Internet Marketing Blog

Soge Shirts

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It’s Friday afternoon. You clean up and get ready for respite. Surprise, surprise … within an hour of checking out for the weekend, a phone call comes in. What do you do? Ignore the call? Pick it up? As a web worker who can work anywhere, any time, is it possible to mark the end of the day?

The best time to deal with this situation is at the start of a relationship. “I treat my consultant/contractor work like a regular job, and set expectations when I first speak with a prospective client. I explain what my work hours are and that I’m not available in the evenings or weekends,” says Deborah Edwards-Onoro.

Like most web workers, you may be flexible and accept occasional out-of-hours work. Still, it could snowball into a regular thing. “Frankly, if you don’t set the parameters ahead of time, you’re setting yourself up for expectations that aren’t going to be acceptable,” says Michele Wilcox.

What if you have multiple clients and they all decide to call on you at the same time, or you bite off more than you can chew? Draw a line under your time by being proactive with these tips.

• Discuss work hours at the start of a relationship. Specify your hours of availability and your flexibility. Set guidelines for special projects and emergencies that require out-of-hours work. These guidelines could include number of days or hours of advance notice for after hours work, list higher rates and how to handle emergencies. Get all of this down in a simple contract template that you can re-use.
• Keep separate phone lines. Web workers should have separate phone numbers for home and business. It’s not professional to use one line for both, especially as there are plenty of telephony options available that can make it possible without a big expense.
• Find a voicemail tool with features you need. Some voicemail providers offer features that give you more control over how the service handles your calls.
• Let calls go to voicemail. Your client may be calling to share a thought without expecting you to answer. Let voicemail take the message and then check to see what the client has to say. Answering every time gives the impression you’re “always on.”
• Turn off the phone. The phone should be there for your convenience. Despite this, some people struggle to ignore a ringing phone.
• Set email guidelines. Tell your clients when they can expect an email response. You can set a rule that you reply within two hours during working hours and then a different rule for after hours and weekends.
• Post your business hours. List your hours on your web site and in your voice mail, or indicate the best time to reach you. Prospective clients will respect your hours if they see your schedule before hiring you.
• Turn off instant messaging, Facebook chat and similar tools. If clients contact you by instant messaging (IM) or on other platforms such as Skype, remember to switch your status to “away” as needed — or turn off the service.
• Be proactive and present. Some clients don’t think to ask if you’re available for after-hours work. Rather than waiting for it to happen, tell the client that you’re flexible and would appreciate advance notice if something comes up. “If a client feels taken care of, he or she may hesitate before picking up the phone on weekends or after hours,” says Michelle I. Zavala.

Some people believe “always on” is the way to stay ahead of competitors, but it can harm your health and work quality. “How can you give your best to a client if they’re calling you, say, in the middle of the night and you’re asleep?” asks Teresa Nolan Barensfeld. “Another point is that your clients won’t see you as a professional if you don’t set any boundaries about your availability.”

Some freelancers say they compromise with after-hours work by taking time off during the day. You may run into clients who need 24/7 support. Steer away from such a set-up by asking questions and understanding their expectations. “Not everyone needs to set these boundaries for themselves and not every business model allows them. However, I have found that I am far more productive if I have a clear distinction between my office hours and the time I spend with my family,” says Laura Sultan.

How do you manage after-hours work?

Photo by stock.xchng user Hans Thoursie.

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