Standard Web Standards will be on an indefinite hiatus starting today. I’ve mentioned in another blog of mine that I plan to focus on new and different things this 2010 and writing actively in this blog is one of the things I plan to do less of.
I believe that the Web Standards war has been won already. The war I’m referring to is the adoption of proper technologies on the presentation and markup of web pages. I’m convinced that web professionals today see proper XHTML & HTML is a must and designing websites with CSS is now the norm. A few years back, it was a huge plus to design along those lines; now it’s the way things are. While this blog ventured into User Experience, Usability, and Internet Matketing themes more, the lessening content about web standards is perhaps an indicator that the Web Standards war is all but over.
With an admission that the Web Standards war of the last decade is finished, I believe that this blog has accomplished its major mission– I’d like to believe that this blog has been made a little dent in changing web designers’ minds about web standards.
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What’s next for me? I plan consolidating my blogging activity this year. My areas of focus are Screensucked (my movie reviews blog) and Big Lakers Fan. If you notice, I’m putting my attention on lighter topics and entertainment, which I find extremely easy to write for. My writing about the web will now be moved to BloggingPro (which covers blogging topics) for the time being.
My other area of focus will be my community and evangelism work. Since I’m the Mozilla Philippines Community Leader, expect more updates on that site, especially about Mozilla’s work on open web standards. If you ask me, most of the web standards stuff will be appearing there. I also started to be the Twitter person of the Philippine Web Designers Organization (PWDO). 
On the usability and user experience front, I’m doing a lot if it right now that writing about it may be fatiguing. I may come up with a site on this exclusively in the future.
I owe a lot to this blog that I can’t find it in me to shut it down completely. Who knows? When the next web standards crisis arises, this blog will make a comeback. 
Friendster just launched a new look and feel that makes it look more like a site that belongs to the new decade. But is it enough?
Friendster’s steady decline decline and getting leapfrogged by competitors MySpace and Facebook are well-documented and this latest move can be seen as a way to increase its value since there are talks that Friendster is about to be acquired by an Asian firm.
Now, what about the redesign?
The new design sports a 3-column template, changed from a 2-column design. From my perspective, this decision was sparked by better advertisement placement. The new design is able to place a large rectangle ad in a more prominent position in the right-side column. This change seems to be a nod to Facebook’s 3-column layout.
Another thing worth noting is the addition of the “Activity Stream,” or the list of updates presented in reverse chronological order. This feature is quite common in major social networking sites (Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.) but it feels more like the one in Multiply.
Visiting the other sections of the site, there’s little departure from the original design as the photos, friends, and profile areas looks very much alike the old design. The addition of an expanded games section may be hint to where Friendster is going.
As the grand-daddy of social networking sites, Friendster is trying to play catch up with Facebook in terms of the look & feel and features. But given Friendster’s prominence is South East Asia, it remains to be seen how the folks from the Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, and Malaysia would react to the redesign.
Chalk one up for Web Standards.
Google has decided to retire Google Gears and is moving forward with HTML5. This isn’t really exciting news for the everyday web user but for the standardistas out there (*chirp* *chirp*), this is exciting news. Heck, HTML5 is still not even done a formal specification! With this development Gears has almost fulfilled its intended use– to be the stop gap to Google’s needs for offline storage and a few other API’s before HTML5 could deliver.
With Google Chrome and perhaps the Google Chrome OS, Google may be priming HTML5 into the forefront sooner than expected. (Some folks estimate HTML5 will hit critical mass at around 2015).
So why is HTML5 getting this much traction this early? Well, if you ask me, it’s because the users’ expectations of the web is increasing by the day and the development of the spec is lagging far behind. This need has given the browser makers the impetus to go ahead and implement bits and pieces of HTML5. Now, Google is banking on the available components of HTML5 will be able to deliver their intended web experience.
HTML5 may be far from finished, but Google thinks it’s already good enough.
It’s Mini-Web Design Conference season once again!
The Philippine Web Designers Organization (PWDO) will be having its fifth Mini-Web Design Conference, the first after the major Form Function & Class web design conference. The event will be held at the De La Salle – College of Saint Benilde (DLS-CSB) in Manila on November 14, 2009.
The event is spearheaded by applicants of incoming members of the PWDO with the help of the Association of Information Management of DLS-CSB.
It was over a year ago when we organized the very first Mini-Web Design Conference and I think it’s a great venue for web folks to network and learn a thing or two.
See you all there!
Maybe we can have more in the future. 
But nonetheless, no one went home empty handed as we gave everyone little Firefox goodies.
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