“Think different.”

This — as many of us know — is the long held motto of the technological colossus, Apple.

The passing of Steve Jobs has had a profound effect on all of us, and it is truly remarkable how sweeping of a response there has been to such a sad event. Looking through the social media and news feeds, it has been jam-packed with praise and commemoration. I would love to see the trending statistics of Twitter and Facebook, because I bet it would be awe-inspiring to see the sheer amount of discussion about the differences he has made in all of our lives.

To me, this is what the Steve Jobs difference means. He tried to make the world a better place by helping people unite with technology. His vision changed the world, quite literally. He has been compared to being the Henry Ford and Thomas Edison of our time, and I believe rightfully so. He took the world and made it his own, changing the way we all think, learn, grow and interact.

I remember the first computer I ever wanted was an Apple IIgs, even though I ended up with a Compaq PC.  We had them in my middle school, and I would always spend extra time messing around with them. Trying to figure out Apple BASIC as a kid was rather interesting, and it was one of the reasons that I eventually was lead into learning C/C++ and then on to web development.

My first multi-player gaming experience was playing Marathon on a PowerPC in 1994 when it first came out, which quickly lead into finding Doom, one of my most beloved game series of all time.

Going forward…

If there is one thing that I have taken from this event, it is a feeling of hope.

Out of such tragedy always comes hope. Perhaps it is because we have no choice but to move on. Perhaps it is the undying and enduring human spirit. Perhaps it is all the good left behind by that person still resonating through us all. Or perhaps it’s all of that, and more.

We can not let our lives stand idly by and do nothing. We all should learn from the Steve Jobs difference, and use this gift he has so selflessly given all of us for our own great visions. We must do what it takes to make this world a better place. I believe this is what Steve Jobs really wanted for all people.

I, for one, will take heed to what it means to me. ZeroMethod is but an infant, and there are still many things to figure out, but this company from hereon will be focusing on trying to make this world a better and different place by helping people through the power and influence of technology. We do not expect to be as great as Steve Jobs or Apple, but we can always strive to one day be a company that makes a difference.

“Don’t be trapped by dogma–which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.” ~Steve Jobs

For the life of me,

I couldn’t come up with a decent title for this article that captured the true idea of my role at ZeroMethod.

I do at least a little bit of everything. It comes with the territory of starting up a business, and is something that everyone should expect to do when they start out on their ventures. For all intents and purposes, my responsibilities cover:

• Lead visionary of company direction
• Director of internal company operations (including: legal process and financial control)
• Director of all design process
• Assistant web developer
• Assistant systems engineer
• Assistant public relations agent

Before we go any further, please understand that I am not bragging.

This article—and many more to come—is intended for the web designer or developer whom is looking to take the deep plunge and start their own business. I feel it is important to point out the above facets as an insight to those who are just beginning their ventures into the realm of freelance web design and development. Whether someone is looking to become a freelance web designer and/or developer, or they are looking to start their own web design and development company, those responsibilities above are but a glimpse of the things with which to be concerned.

What good does writing about myself do?

All too often, I have found myself talking to myself, trying to work it out inside my head what direction should be taken and how things should operate at ZeroMethod. It’s not easy to always know what direction is the right one. I can research my heart out, but the research is almost never going to point me to the exact thing I am seeking, and in the end it takes some amount of intuition to settle on and move forward with anything. Unfortunately, intuition is not something that just falls into someone’s lap, and there is no validation behind decisions based on intuition until some kind of substantial evidence can be observed.

As someone who has also struggled with uncertainty, I would like to share my typical day. My hope is that by writing this I will shed some light on what one individual’s lifestyle is like as a web designer and developer growing their own business, so that someone out there on an adventure of their own can perhaps gain a little bit of the ever-precious validation needed to strengthen one’s confidence. Personally, if I could have found articles more like the one I’m writing, I would have saved myself a lot of doubt in the beginning of my adventure. I hope you–the reader–finds this article as useful as I would have found it to be when I was starting out.

Every work day…

They always begin with me climbing out of bed, of course! The right amount of rest is crucial to any good work day. I am usually awake by 8 AM…

Read More on ChaosReactor.com ›

Into The Future…

How would one communicate an idea into the future? What kind of design process does one go through to convey an idea past the rise and fall of societies? The following articles really got me thinking about those concepts:

• This Place is Not a Place of Honor
• Atomic Priesthoods, Thorn Landscapes, and Munchian Pictograms
• How to tell future generations about nuclear waste
• Expert Judgement on Markers to Deter Inadvertent Human Intrusion into the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant

Specifically, these writings discuss potential methods of marking nuclear waste disposal sites, to ensure Earth’s future inhabitants understand the threat and stay away. A timeless, universal “WARNING” sign, if you will. Portraying this kind of message to others living in our time period is relatively easy, but no culture has ever attempted to design a symbol that would remain intelligible for the next 10,000 years.

Worth More Than All Words

Attempting to clearly designate a danger zone to individuals living 10,000 years in the future is certainly a tall order. As the relevance of language and symbols erode quickly over time, the effort becomes even more complicated: we cannot simply communicate danger, we must also communicate our logic to explain exactly why the area is dangerous. We humans tend to ignore information without reasons to support belief.

Sandia National Laboratories consulted a multi-disciplinary panel of outside experts to determine viable options. The individuals involved in the study came from diverse backgrounds: physics, law, economics, risk management, materials science, and linguistics. The group decided that the message should communicate the following:

• This place is a message, and part of a system of messages. Pay attention to it!
• Sending this message was important to us. We considered ourselves to be a powerful culture.
• This place is not a place of honor. No highly esteemed deed is commemorated here. Nothing valued is here.
• What is here is dangerous and repulsive to us. This message is a warning about danger.
• The danger is in the center of this location, is of a particular size and shape, and is below us.
• The danger is still present, in your time, as it was in ours.
• The danger is to the body, and it can kill.
• The form of the danger is an emanation of energy.
• The danger is unleashed only if you substantially disturb this place. This place is best shunned.

For more detailed information regarding this specific topic, I would recommend reading the articles referenced at the beginning of this post.

I’m a fan of critical thought exercises, so I’d like to ask: If you were to design an idea to send into the future, what would it be, and how would you do it?

The Power To Create

With the advent of HTML5 and CSS3, the Internet has truly blossomed into an environment that fosters now more than ever the ability for artistic expression, challenging all web designers alike to step up their game and become more than just a Photoshop jockey. Thanks to the hard work of many people including those at W3C, we designers now possess the tools and support we always needed to effectively make the web a beautiful place.

Busting Up Tradition

Every day, an increasing amount of websites and rich Internet applications are being released into the wild. Some of these productions are designed far outside the boundaries of what the web has traditionally been, and my prediction is that this behavior will only increase exponentially as designers explore the possibilities of current web technologies and continue to receive more support to build their own expressive works. If there is a good time to start breaking yourself of any traditional web design technique you’ve rutted into, it’s right now.

Design is the foundation of all the arts. -Paul Rand

The man considered to be the father of modern graphics design, Paul Rand, knew that at the heart of all artwork is design. So then, what is artwork? Is it drawing? Painting? Illustration? Vector graphics? Web interfaces? 3D models? &emdash; The answer is all of the above, and more. Everything creative you ever do has a design behind it, no matter how simple or complex. With this in mind, would it not be appropriate to say that the uniqueness of your artwork operates off the principle of breaking apart traditional design and reforming it into an evolved state?

How Does It Taste?

Design is a lot like making a meal, actually. You could follow the instructions and do what others are doing to make something that tastes like the standard. Or, you can start exploring different herbs, spices and other ingredients, taste-testing it along the way so you get it perfect to your liking, thereby designing your meal to be your very own unique concoction that others will surely enjoy more than the recipe on the box!

In the same way, when you design a graphical or illustrative piece, you could look at what others have done and create designs using those same techniques to make something that is considered up to standards, or you can combine standard techniques with some sheer creative exploration, feeling things out as you go along and pushing beyond what others have done, exploring for better ways to express and interact.

Importance Of Diversity

An entire article could be written about the importance of good design, and has been on many occasions (Google found about 38.5 million results), so there is little need to defend it. However, good design diversity is something that I believe needs more attention. I can go to any one of a bundle of theme websites and get a good design, but it will just be a design that potentially many others already have in use. It doesn’t reflect my unique creativity that has been built up from my own personal experimentation and exploration. It’s not that the designers didn’t do a good job. Quite the contrary! Those designers worked hard created their designs to their own personal tastes. However, it isn’t a design with my personality. Remember, a unique design always makes more of an impression than one that’s been used on other websites. If you’d prefer a design that exhibits your own personality, let us help you out!

Extinction, or Evolution?

While there’s no denying that mobile devices are gaining power and popularity, the argument that the PC is going extinct seems too near-sighted. Smaller and more efficient devices have stormed the market, allowing consumers to migrate certain activities from their PCs to mobile devices. There’s no doubt that this is an excellent development, but the immense amount of marketing hype has influenced some consumers into thinking that mobile is the be-all, end-all of computing. The desktop PC is still going strong, and is here to evolve.

Price, Power, Portability

Our technological landscape is beautifully diverse. The current computing gamut could be summarized as follows: desktops, laptops, netbooks, and mobile devices. No single device category has what it takes to completely convert users of other technologies. As with everything in life, compromises must be made; it’s an issue of give-and-take. Desktop computers offer a huge range of flexibility, modification options and value at the cost of sacrificing portability. Price and power, relative to desktop machines, are directly proportional to each other: pay more, get more.

The largest real threat to the desktop tower is not mobile devices at all, but the laptop. Newer laptop computers offer power on-par with desktop machines, although they can be significantly more expensive. Heating issues become more prominent as more powerful components are thrown into the mix, which affects the mobility of the device. Smaller devices such as netbooks are great for more simple tasks, but lack the hardware to handle things like graphics editing or heavy gaming. This effectively relegates the role of the netbook to handling tasks such as communications, spreadsheets, and Internet browsing.

The Gaming & Mod Community

Hardcore gamers need ample power to play increasingly demanding and realistic games. Game designers and multimedia producers also require large amounts of power and storage to accomplish their goals. Extra screen real estate is another perk that desktop users enjoy.

Members of the mod community love to tinker with and customize their beloved rigs. The market that exists for PC mods clearly shows a healthy interest in the desktop PC. Laptops and mobile devices can only be customized internally, with cases or sleeves for protective purposes. Additionally, warranties on desktop PCs generally won’t be voided by making cosmetic or functional modifications to the housing.

People Like New Stuff

Whenever a new product with promise of revolution is released, lots of people are going to check it out. It’s just human nature to be curious. However, a mobile “conversion” should not be implied. It’s expected that consumers will be interested in hyped and heavily-promoted products. Short-sighted fanatics and reviews present skewed statistics showing a mass exodus from the desktop environment, but this simply isn’t the case.

So, What Now?

There’s no denying that technology is evolving exponentially. However, rather than extinction, the role of the desktop PC is being redistributed. Portable devices capable of replacing the desktop PC will eventually exist, however there will always be a need for the desktop due to its sheer competition on price and power.

A full year has passed.

In that year’s time we have changed a lot, as people and as a company. We have honed our skills and continued to search for personal success. We have grown closer as a team, working faster and more efficiently. Together, we have brought more focus and solidity to the idea that is ZeroMethod.

The release of this website marks a new beginning for ZeroMethod. The company has taken on a new direction. It has been restructured to essentially be a creation studio, focusing on making web-based productions for both clients and ourselves.

We are always looking for new clients, because we want them to have the awesome things that we can make. However, we are also now involved in our own research and design projects, allowing us to carry out the primary vision of our company.

As a company, we explore and seek out what is possible with the power of the Internet. In addition to helping out our clients by creating what they envision, our skills and abilities are also being applied toward our own creative ideas. Through that effort we work to build web-based products that are relevant, sustainable and easy to use.

Along with some foundational changes to ZeroMethod, we also have strengthened the company’s approach at social interactions. We aim to be the friendly company made up of a bunch of talented individuals who are genuinely interested in creating whatever awesome idea you’ve got for us. Why? Because that’s just who we are. Honest, genuine, talented people.

In our eyes, it’s not just about production. When a client asks for our expertise, we choose whether or not to accept that project, because when we make that choice we also make a commitment, to the client and to ourselves. When we take on a project, we expect to feature it under our own portfolio as a work of our art. In that sense, it reflects our skills, abilities, passions, strengths, morals and credibility all in one pretty little package. So, it is as important to us as it is to the client that the end product be nothing less than stellar.

The design I have created for the new ZeroMethod website is but a fraction of our talents, as this website is basically just a portfolio. Although, it is my hope that this design will at least be a display of what just one individual in this company is capable of producing.

Much is to come in the near future, and we are very excited to have released this website and be moving on to greater things. So, without further adieu, welcome to the new ZeroMethod, and thank you all for being infinitely patient!