That’s right folks, we’ve just got done fixing all of our sites to render properly in IE7 while still maintaining 100% valid (X)HTML and CSS, and they’re dropping the latest IE bomb on us, by the end of 2008, according to Bill Veghte, who heads up Microsoft’s Windows and online services division.

But just how big will this bomb be, and how much will it ruin some websites? According to Microsoft, IE8 is rumored to be 100% standards compliant. As much of the development world knows, IE7 was also rumored to be 100% compliant, however it seems that…well, somebody didn’t know a whole lot about standards, as we can see in almost all valid websites, there are CSS hacks and tricks that are simply necessary for IE7. No worries though, according to Microsoft, there will be a “render using IE7 engine” option for the new version of Internet Explorer.

Actually, this isn’t an “option” per se, this is something that web developers would have to do themselves. There will be a special “tag” that you can add to the top of all your websites, that will tell IE8 to render in IE7 mode. Microsoft was concerned about their standards compliant browser “breaking the web”, and their concerns have been seen in their first beta release in March. So they added the ability for developers to work around this. How will this tag be seen by the W3C is yet to be known. Will it break the validity of your site? Let’s hope not. But hey, if you’re a developer, and your site is coded correctly, and 100% valid, then it should work in IE8 without this tag, and simply need the usual IE6 and IE7 hacks, right? Boy I sure hope so.

We will look at the new security features rumored to be coming with IE8 in a later post!

Install a little photo program to show off pictures of your dog on Facebook, and you might find you’re really spreading an ad.

Time Warner Inc.’s AOL said Wednesday it was integrating technology from its newly acquired Goowy Media Inc. to help advertisers pitch their products and services at social-networking sites, which have struggled to generate revenue despite heavy traffic.

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A little birdie has offered up some major dirt on Google’s rumored acquisition of Digg. Sources told TechCrunch that the internet giant and the user-led social content website are in final negotiations with an acquisition price of around $200 million.

Today Google finally released their version (expanded, enhanced, better, Googlilized- you get the picture) of Wikipedia called Knol. Today we posted our first article for our charity here.

What is Knol exactly?

Knol is a Google project which includes single author articles on topics ranging from “scientific concepts, to medical information, from geographical and historical, to entertainment, from product information, to how-to-fix-it instructions.”, according to Google. It was announced on December 13, 2007, and was opened in beta to the public today, July 23, 2008. Knol pages are “meant to be the first thing someone who searches for this topic for the first time will want to read”, according to Udi Manber, a Vice President of Engineering at Google. The term knol, named after a “unit of knowledge”, refers to both the project and an article in the project. Several experts see Knol as Google’s attempt to compete with Wikipedia.

Right now (since it was just released today) there is indeed speculation on how well it will be received and how well these free user-based articles will rank in Google’s search results. You can be sure that we will be watching this closely.

As always, feel free to let us know if you have questions or want a written, optimized Knol (sounds like a new club drug) for your company or organization.

New research from OTX and The Intelligence Group studies teens’ online behavior, finding that teens are spending an average of 11.5 hours per week online, doing everything from instant messaging and visiting social networking sites to shopping and listening to music, but dispels myths that this group wants to do everything online. The study did find that 24% of teens are spending more than 15 hours a week online.

Read more at Meridian Crest - Teens Social Media Survey and Demographics

Cool. We got the invite. Been waiting to see if anyone would be able to make this happen. Now all we have to do is see how our testing will come out here with TM and a few clients. Behavioral targeting in search engine marketing is nothing new, but has never really been readily available. (more…)

I was under the impression that most email marketers were well aware of the advantages of including HTML text - also known as system text - as opposed to graphical text in their messages. But I am still frequently surprised to see emails in my inbox from well-established players that rely almost exclusively on images to convey the main point of the message.

Long gone are the early days of HTML email marketing, when we could just drop one big graphic in our files with an image map defining the different areas the graphic would link to. Over the years, as a range of email readers proliferated with varying support for graphics, and spammers abused the support of imagery, the rules of using graphics in HTML emails have changed considerably.

Want to know more?

Cruise on over to my personal blog, Meridian Crest and I’ll explain the 4 most important tips for getting your email message delivered and opened by your readers.

7 Sure-Fire Tips to Help with HTML Email Marketing

Most of the staff spends a ton of time online allday. That is what we do. Sifting through sites on various topics about web design, tons of SEO channels and of course- we “tweet” all day long too.

In the midst of doing some surfing and research our Project Manager, Dean, found a site that discussed the new Trademark website design and the misuse of text and images in CSS. He clearly called us out and posted information that was inaccurate. (more…)

My father, a woodworker and freelance carpenter, has a common saying whenever approaching a new job, “Pretty costs extra lady.”  While we at TM certainly believe in “Value Added” and coloring outside of the lines for our client’s projects, there is a common tendency by the clientele in our industry to want more than they can afford or to be amazed by the cost when they want to build the next/better MySpace or Craigslist.  We have seen and heard many great ideas come through our doors from prospective clients, but we have (seriously) heard potential clients approach us with comments such as “I want to build something like MySpace and if you do the work, I’ll make you my partner.” or “I want to build something like Craigslist, but only for jobs!  I’ve got $500.” (more…)

These days there are a great variety of people using the internet, instant messenger, e-mail, and any of the 9 quadrillion times 40 quintillion squared different social marketing websites. People ranging in every aspect of life, age, race, religion, intelligence, etc. Today we’ll be talking about internet etiquette, or more notably, what not to do on the internet. (more…)