BrainFuel

The web team for Southwest.com deserves praise. Look how beautiful and usable their web site is! It’s amazing. Especially when you begin to compare it to the American Airlines web site (or most of the other airlines, for that matter).

“We have a ‘strategic’ plan. It’s called doing things.” — Herb Kelleher, founder Southwest Airlines

Maybe that’s their secret. They do things.

But in all honesty, their web site keeps getting better. Three years ago they started down this path towards having a nice site, and they’ve been refining ever since.

I just finished reading the Elevator Button Problem. A short story about how even something as simple as the elevator button needs to be designed.

Even crazier, the article mentions a Paternoster. A sort of elevator that never stops. Watch this video for a demonstration. It does not look safe!

Inspired by a post on Hacker News.

Useful for identifying the particular parts of a letter.

Text set in lower case is more legible than text set all in upper case (capitals), presumably because lower case letter structures and word shapes are more distinctive. — The Wikipedia article on Typography

I don’t ever eat McDonalds, but tonight I ran across their web site and have to say it’s really nice. I love the navigation bar, and the intuitive roll out menus. That, and the amazing photography almost make it look healthy. Hah, not even close.

I stumbled across this beautiful motorcycle this morning. The 1928 Sunbeam Model 90.

The Hawaii Convention & Visitors Bureau has produced an amazing travel guide for Hawaii called GoHawaii.com. I’m considering a trip there this fall, and this site has been very helpful for learning about the state. Where to go, and what to see. Kudos to them for the nice site.

Wolfram Alpha is unlike any other search engine. Because of this, searches you would normally do on another standard search engine don’t always work. They’ve got a really nice example that suggests how to search, and gives you a way to see how it works. Nice job!