The more objects attract user’s attention, the harder it is to concentrate on the vital ones.

That quote pretty much sums-up design principles in general, doesn’t it?

UX Planet has some great advice about website header design, which by the way can also apply to email headers as well.

Animated GIFs for your Mac, the web and your iPhone. Personally, I can’t live without GIPHY!

ImageOptim optimizes images — so they take up less disk space and load faster — by finding best compression parameters and by removing unnecessary comments and color profiles. It handles PNG, JPEG and GIF animations. It’s excellent for publishing images on the web (easily shrinks images “Saved for Web” in Photoshop). Simply drag’n’drop images or folders into the window! You can also drop files on ImageOptim’s Dock icon.

I love the simplicity of ImageOptim, and it’s a free app.

Let’s take Facebook for example

With the recently-released Ticker on the newsfeed page and the yet-to-be-released Timeline update to your Profile page, people are barking at the moon that their status updates are now out there for the world to see; thus invading their privacy. Well uh, I hate to tell you this but, THEY ALWAYS WERE. And isn’t that the whole point of a SOCIAL network?

Anything you type into that status update box gets shown to the whole world unless you set your privacy preferences not to, or use Facebook Lists to control who can see it. This hasn’t changed. The Ticker isn’t showing anything now that people weren’t seeing in the newsfeed before, they’re just seeing it in near real-time now. I’m not a fan of the ticker, I think it’s annoying. But by no means to I feel like my privacy has been invaded because the people I chose to see my status updates actually do see them.

The Timeline Profile page update seems to be catching the most heat. I’m not sure why, because it isn’t displaying anything that the current Profile Pages doesn’t, it’s just making it easier to zoom back & forth in your Facebook history. They’re simply saving people from having to scroll and click for an hour to go back five years to find that adorable poem you wrote for you kid that they remembered.

Now there are some minor tweeks that you will have to perform in order to get the privacy level you want out of Facebook, but let’s not be dramatic. It’s not that big of a deal. If you would say it to your momma, use the Public setting. If you don’t want your momma to see it, then create a List and shut up already.

If you’ve accepted friend requests from 800 people you’ve never met in your life, that’s you’re problem. The 15 people you actually know that follow you probably don’t care that you ditched work yesterday and went to the ballgame after you called-in sick. If you accepted a friend request from your boss and he saw it – then you clearly don’t know how to set up Facebook Lists, and lack a basic amount of common sense anyway.

Facebook isn’t alone

I recently saw numerous people complaining in the comments of an article on a tech site about how they felt violated because Google requires that you use your legal name as your username for Google+ (they even go so far as asking for proof if they don’t believe your legal name is “LarryPage Sucks” or “XYZ Company”). C’mon people. You have to offer your legal name every time you purchase something with credit card or check. Why is it that using your real name when signing up to be one of millions of users of a free service where (most likely) nobody knows who or where you are, all of a sudden bothers you?

Let’s be reasonable

Don’t get me wrong here, I don’t want to just hand out personal/private information to anyone who asks. But Facebook, Google, Twitter… they’re all offering a FREE service. And they’re doing it in exchange for some information about you so that they can sell that information and (heaven forbid) make a buck or two. Everyone over the age of 15 knows that this is how it works. If this information is a revelation to you, then you need to get off the Internet right now.

I mean seriously, what do you care if Facebook sells the fact that you like fly-fishing to Field & Stream magazine? Does this somehow put you in jeopardy? And if you’re concerned that someone can read through your Foursquare and Facebook check-ins to figure out when you’re not home, STOP CHECKING IN! I know your ego really wants to get the mayorship badge for the porn shop down the street, but that’s not Foursquare’s problem. We use these features because we WANT to use them, not because we’re forced to.

You have to offer your legal name every time you purchase something with credit card or check. Why is it that using your real name when signing up to be one of millions of users of a free service where (most likely) nobody knows who or where you are, all of a sudden bothers you?

Ok, so my arguments don’t sit well with you. That’s fine. I can respect that, and I don’t blame you. But for the love of God, terminate your account with whatever service in question, don’t sign-up for ANYTHING on the Internet, and shut the hell up already. And before you say it, I know Facebook keeps your information even after you cancel your account. But they don’t show it to anyone you know, and you really aren’t important enough to make it public for any nefarious purposes anyway. I guarantee you that, by and large, the world doesn’t care about anything you post on Facebook.

In the end, we all CHOOSE to use social networks, none of us are forced. Before you complain about privacy issues, think about what you’re signing up for before you actually do it, and understand how the network’s privacy settings work (no matter how complicated they may be). You need to use common sense when posting on social networks. If you wouldn’t be willing to share what you want to post with everyone you know, you probably shouldn’t post it online. Because complaining about it afterward is like complaining about the fact that you have to put gas in the car you just bought.

Most of the Foundries available in the WebINK service have made their fonts available for use in the Photoshop plug-in, and more are being added. The fonts are available in an easy to use Photoshop panel after signing-in to the service right in the panel.

To use the free Web Font Plug-in, you need to download and install the Suitcase Fusion font manager demo, and set up a free WebINK account. If you already own Suitcase Fusion, you can simply update the app. If you don’t want to use the Suitcase Fusion app to manage your fonts, the plug-in will continue to work after the demo expires.

When Apple first released Mac OS X a decade ago, Mac users had little choice in web browsers. There was Microsoft Explorer, and Netscape Navigator, and… well, that was it. Soon after we were treated to a few more options, but nothing like we have today.

With Safari shipping on every Mac, and the world-wide popularity of Mozilla’s Firefox, you would think there wouldn’t be much room for competition in the web browser market. But the options have actually never been better for Mac users.

Mozilla:

• Minefield – The nightly code update from Mozilla, Minefield is generally two versions ahead of Firefox, and can be somewhat unstable.
• Aurora – A mostly optimized version of Mozilla’s next-gen Firefox code, this version is bound to still have bugs, but also contains the latest and greatest.
• Firefox Beta – Mozilla has yet to release a public beta, but it’s coming soon and available from the same download page as Aurora.
• Firefox – The most flexible and powerful web browser on any platform. Extensions make this a tech-geek favorite.
• SeaMonkey – Netscape Communicator died years ago, but Mozilla continues to offer essentially the same app in SeaMonkey, which contains a browser (based on the code from Firefox), an advanced e-mail and newsgroup client, IRC chat client, and HTML editor.

Google:

• Chromium – The nightly code update from Google. If you want to see what Google has up their sleeve for Chrome and don’t mind bugs, give Chromium a try.
• Canary – The bleeding edge version of Google Chrome that contains the latest, somewhat stable, code of Chromium.
• Chrome (Developer) – Based on Canary code, this version contains only the most stable code and features. I’ve been using it for nearly a year and find it to be the best version of Google Chrome to use.
• Chrome (Beta) – Chrome Beta contains the optimized and final code for Google Chrome. This version may still contain bugs, but they’re likely to be minor.
• Chrome (Stable/Final) – The general public (final) version.

Apple:

• Webkit – The opensource version of Apple’s Safari browser – you can download the nightly build to experience the most up-to-date version of the next Safari.
• Safari – The standard shipping version of Apple’s web browser.

The Rest:

• Rockmelt – Backed by Marc Andreessen (founder of Netscape) and based on Google Chrome, Rockmelt builds a plethora of social media features right into the browser.
• OmniWeb – OmniWeb was once the most popular alternative browser for the Mac, with one of its biggest claims to fame being the ability to set site-specific preferences.
• Camino – Based on Mozilla’s Firefox codebase, Camino offers a slimmed-down and streamlined Firefox experience.
• Opera – Opera offers so many options for customization that it’s likely to make you dizzy. Opera also offers a download of the new beta version here.
• TenFourFox – For users of older PPC Macs or Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger who want the Firefox 4 experience without the expensive computer upgrade.
• iCab – Carrying over from the days of Mac OS 9, iCab is still around.

Flock is still floating around, but has been discontinued. And there are numerous other specialty browsers out there, but that’s the main collection for Mac users. If you’re willing to spend the time to try them, there are some great alternatives to Safari out there.

Microsoft has released a fairly extensive study of browser use on laptop computers and the effects on battery life. Not surprisingly, IE 9 comes out in the lead overall. As far as Mac browsers go, Firefox 4 takes the crown, followed by Chrome and Safari. Opera brings up the rear in the study.

I’m not sure about the usefulness of the information, as your use of the browser is only one aspect in terms of how long your MacBook’s battery lasts. And how many people use enough Watts of power just surfing the web? But the information provided is interesting nonetheless.

This past Monday I posted a link to a tutorial that would help you code your PSD mock-up into a fully functional HTML/CSS template. If you’re looking for a little PSD inspiration before coding, here’s a collection of 40 PSD web templates to get you started.