TheWayoftheWeb

If you’re on the following (subjective) list of Web 2.0 Rockstars which I’m compiling with my colleague David Cushman for publication on Ditto.net, or you know one of the nominees, then could you email me a portrait photo? If not, you might find yourself represented by a blank space, a hastily-drawn cartoon, or similar!

The list itself will open for voting very shortly, once the images have all been uploaded:

• Chris Anderson (The Long Tail)
• Tom Anderson (Myspace)
• David Armano (Logic + Emotion)
• Mike Arrington (techcrunch)
• Rick Astley
• David Bausola (Zero Influence)
• Veronica Bellmont (tekzilla host)
• Josh Bernoff (Groundswell)
• Danah Boyd
• Stowe Boyd (message)
• Sergey Brin (google)
• Jason Calacanis (Mahalo)
• Marc Canter (Broadband Mechanics)
• Steve Chen (youtube)
• Amanda Congdon
• Corvida (SheGeeks)
• Cory Doctorow (Author and BoingBoing)
• Bill Gates (Microsoft)
• Seth Godin
• Louis Gray (early adopter blog)
• David Heinemeier Hansson: Creator of Ruby on Rails web application framework.
• Ariana Huffington
• Chad Hurley (youtube)
• Shel Israel (global neighbourhoods)
• Joseph Jaffe (jaffejuice)
• Jeff Jarvis (buzzmachine)
• Steve Jobs (apple)
• Scott Karp (publising2.0)
• Guy Kawasaki
• Marshall Kirkpatrick (readwriteweb, consultant)
• Leo Laporte
• Loic LeMeur (Seesmic, Twhirl)
• Lolcats
• Jared Lukes: Interactive Director at Catalyst Studios
• Heather Luttrell (indieclick)
• Alan Moore (Communities Dominate Brands)
• Jonathan Macdonald
• Hugh Macleod (Gaping Void)
• Dave McClure
• Matthew Mullenweg (wordpress)
• Barack Obama (he’s everywhere 2.0 is)
• Tim O’Reilly
• Jeremiah Owyang (Forrester analyst)
• Ivan Pope (Mr Widget)
• Larry Page (google)
• Sarah Perez (readwriteweb)
• JP Rangaswami (Confused of Calcutta)
• Howard Rheingold (Smartmobs)
• Trent Reznor (NiN)
• Darren Rowse (ProBlogger)
• Steve Rubel (micropersuasion)
• Robert Scoble (tech geek blogger)
• Doc Searls (Cluetrain Manifesto, Project VRM)
• Euan Semple (The Obvious, ex-Beeb Social computing consultant)
• Clay Shirkey (Here Comes Everybody)
• Kathy Sierra
• Shiv Singh Razor Fish
• Brian Solis (PR2.0)
• Biz Stone (twitter/blogger etc)
• Don Tapscott (Wikinomics)
• Alana Taylor (mashable)
• Ev Williams (twitter)
• Jimmy Wales (wikipedia)
• Adrian Watkins (Fox Interactive)
• David Weinberger (Cluetrain, Everything is Miscellaneous)
• Fred Wilson (a VC)
• Dave Winer
• Jerry Yang (yahoo)
• Tony @zappos
• Mark Zuckerberg (facebook)

That’s as close to the final list as possible - although if there’s a glaring omission and you can make a case for it and email me a picture asap, there’s still a chance for inclusion. Email the pictures to daniel dot thornton at bauerconsumer.co.uk and please be aware they’ll be appearing as a list on ditto.net.

My interest in web design is generally based on usability and accessibility, due to the fact I’m not the most artistic person in the world. I can appreciate attractive designs, but there are far better people than me in the world at creating them.

But something has struck me that I think could be a good rule for web architecture and design, based on my own experience of website redesigns, and trying to cram an awful lot of information onto a homepage in the fear that if it doesn’t appear, no-one will ever see it or find it. So here it is:

If you’re forcing homepage contents on your users keep it simple. If you want it to be cluttered, let your users pick how they organise it - or what it on it.

This is backed up by a few examples. For instance, Google is the oft-quoted archetypal example of a very simple homepage. And one that could make more money for the company if it was covered in banner ads - but that would wreck the essence of it’s success.

Meanwhile users can be overwhelmed by busy homepages - but when was the last time you saw an empty Facebook or Myspace profile, or an empty Netvibes page? Users are happy to have a cluttered page, as long as they’ve been able to create and organise the clutter - just the same as people are happy to work at a cluttered desk if they’ve worked out the clutter themselves.

The recent BBC homepage redesign is a good example of moving in this direction -without hopefully overwhelming too many users. Personally I was disappointed it’s still a walled silo of BBC content only - but it’s a start.