This is unbelievable - a court in Texas…Dallas no less ruled against a website operator for linking to a ‘audio webcast’ from his own site. It’s stating that the site is liable for copyright infringement and that the site owner had no permission to link to it.

The site owner did not host the ‘audio webcast’ on his own site, he only linked to it. I’m not sure what’s going through this judge’s mind when he made the ruling, maybe he was just too hungry for lunch and didn’t want to really think too much about it or may it’s true with what most people are saying. He may not understand the internet.

The site owner obviously didn’t intentionally let people think that it’s his clip or he didn’t use frames to make it look like it was on his site. On the other side of the argument is that by deep linking, user may by pass advertising that would have been seem if entered through the homepage and any other pages you may need to click on before getting to that webcast, but golly…shouldn’t they ban guns instead?

Anyhow, you can’t see anything on the site Supercrosslive.com anymore since they had to take it off, and I can’t see much on SFX site (if it’s the correct one, it just has errors on most pages) but it could have been that they were linking directly to a source file. So say if you were to take someone source .mov or .gif and instead of linking to their page with the content on it, you link to to the source. Well, even if that’s the case, there are things you can do using server settings to protect that OR you can put interstitials in the clip itself if you are truely wanting advertising dollars. The thing is is this really banning all deep linking? That just creates user unfriendly situations on the web. If everyone had to only link to the homepage, can you imagine that you have to then look for the page that someone might be referring to that is deeply linked? What about google search result. If google were to display a page that’s deep linked, which is of course most of the time, then does google run the risk of deep linking? Up to a certain point, it’s the site owner that should control what people can and cannot have access to.

Some people have asked what’s the best FTP program to use. It all depends on what you need to do.

The FTP program I like to use for the MAC is from Panic called Transmit. It does everything from synchronization to the ability to set permission on remote files. The thing I like most about it is that it’s just plain simple to use. You can also add Transmit to your dashboard and drag and drop your files that way.

As for the PC, I have used CuteFTP in the past. Current version is CuteFTP 8 and you can download a version to try before you buy. I can’t remember much about it since it’s been a long time since I’ve needed to use the PC for file transfer, but I do remember it was easy to use as well.

So as a designer or aspiring designer, you may find it fun to enter into some competitions. Some competitions are only for students and other are for anyone who wants to enter. There is a site that has a list of competitions sorted by dealines or categories. Though there isn’t a category for web design, there are things related to it such as Graphic Design. The site is Graphic Competitions and it’s the Worldwide Graphic Competitions Directory.

You can also find other ongoing list of competition by going to Core77. This site is more for industrial design, but sometime do have competitions listed for graphic designers.

Of course HOW Design magazine sponsor competitions anually. You can sign up for competitions updates on the HOWdesign.com website.

There are many more of these sites and we’ll slowly add it to the Web Designer Resources Awards + Comptitions category of the directory for reference.

You can now create shadows using CSS2. I’ve been seeing this done quiet often. I guess you really have to do it well or it can look pretty tacky.

You can get a quick guide on how to create this on w3.org. Just don’t over use it!

Are youSEEINGtHinGs?

No, not you ! Well, maybe you do, but I wasn’t directing this at you. ImgRed.com is a new site that offers image redirection. So when you have blogs and anywhere else that has popular images, people sometime get lazy and they just hotlink to your image. What’s hotlinking? ok, if you don’t know that…then…well look here.

So if you prepend http://imgred.com in front of the URL in the image tag, then it will call up the service to grad the image and it stores it on there end. After that, everytime someone access the image, it will serve it from ImgRed.com. You can read more about it here.

It’s very tempting to use this service, but for me, the only problem is that the domain is only registered for 1 year. Well, what happens if they stop having this service? All the images will have a missing link ! Well, no - I was wrong to think that. Just read the FAQ. This was the brilliant idea of Ed Resnick, who is a programmer in San Diego, CA.

Yes, it’s true. iEverything Apple or iLove everything Apple. When I started in this industry, I had to decided on getting a computer and this was way back. Wow, it was way way back now that I think about it. The decision was PC or Mac? To be honest back in the days when you just started in college, it’s hard to be able to afford a Mac. So, shamelessly I did end up with a PC. As my husband calls it - “Piece of Crap”. Sorry PC users =) Well, we still have PCs around, but it’s more for testing and collecting dust. My husband does use his to play 3D games sometimes though.

Anyway thinking back, I don’t know what I was thinking. Well, it wasn’t really thinking, it was my parents saying that the MAC was too expensive. Of course since they were paying for it then, I had to go with their budget. Prices for a Mac is somewhat still high, but you have more option now.

For people starting in this industry now - YOU HAVE TO GET A MAC!! After I started to make my own money, I was able to get my own MAC. I’ve had probably 5 already, from desktops to laptops. I now only have the laptop and I just can’t live without it. The user experience and visuals on a MAC just can’t be compared. Even the way it look on the exterior and the weight of it beats out the PC. Plus, now you can run PC software on the Mac, so there should be any doubt of what computer to use.

If you are thinking of getting a Mac, the new Mac Pro with 8-core Xeon workstation is here. Supper fast, up to 3.0GHz. I would get one if I can sit at one place and work, but I really enjoy the freedom of having a laptop right now.

Apple just comes out the the coolest and sleekest looking things. iPhone, iPod, iAirport (I wonder why they didn’t “i” that one), iTune, and the list goes on and on. So, yeah iEverything Apple!

Web design stuff is a place for people to find high quality design firms + designers, and for designers to find resources.

Feel free to suggest design firms and good designer resources that will help others. Some of the sites are sites I’ve always enjoyed in the web design industry. A lot of them are very inspirational and are ones I always remember since I started in this industry. Other resources include things that will help someone young (or old) who might be interested in the business. There are resources to show what others are doing that’s unique and new and other must have things for this industry, such as hosting.

Since web design has moved in different directions in some cases, it helps to know what’s new in the industry. Sometimes, it’s not even about design anymore, it’s about technology, innovation, and creative marketing.

If you are in the design industry and would like to write blogs here. You are welcome to send an email and show some of your work and blog writing style and an account can be set up for you!

Anyway, hope you’ll enjoy this site!