A List Apart   •   December 8, 2009   •   SUMMARY: Feeding the Web. Our Web sites are important assets and curating them is an essential part of our overall organizational strategy. Balancing timely and timeless content, using analytics to better understand users' needs and managing the conversation flow are the building blocks for success in any business. Read on for more reasons not to skimp on Web site management when it's budget time.   • COMMENT: There's a lot of good sense in this essay that translates well for our environments as the author comes from a library/museum background. I think the most compelling thing said is not the design or curation advice but the admonition to establish a relationship with your audience. I was recently at the Digital Strategies for Heritage http://hangingtogether.org/?p=760 (DISH) conference in the Netherlands and there were two keynotes that nicely framed this topic. Review Simone Brummelhuis' keynote that explains the types of communities and Josh Greenberg's on how to use existing tools and staff to build those communities. Both are available on slideshare http://www.slideshare.net/DISH09. (Michalko) http://hangingtogether.org/?page_id=12

Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox   •   December 7, 2009   •   SUMMARY: "Designing for cavemen." That's how Nielsen describes his approach toward Web design that takes into account human limitations in short-term memory (for instance, the average human brain can hold only seven chunks of information at a time and these fade from memory within 20 seconds). Check out the article for some suggestions on how to create menus that are manageable (too short is almost as bad as too long) and create a common sense Web navigation strategy that makes the most of those precious 20 seconds.   •   COMMENT: It's worth reviewing that "Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two" < http://www.musanim.com/miller1956/ > paper (or at least the overviews that are readily available -- there was a nice Radio Lab piece < http://www.prx.org/pieces/30643#description > on it not so long ago). Seven is really the span for digits -- it's probably less for words. (Michalko) < http://hangingtogether.org/?page_id=12 >