Users of Apple’s new iPod Video can download Disney TV content from the iTunes store. Programmes including Desperate Housewives and Lost will be available for $1.99 an episode.

The BBC wants to increase the licence fee by 2.3% above inflation from 2007 to boost its programmes and digital services.

The US has lost the support of the European Union as the divisive battle over who runs the internet runs towards a showdown at a UN summit in Tunisia next month. If unresolved, it could result in the internet becoming fragmented, if the US makes good on its threat to ‘go it alone’.

The UK singles music chart has been revitalised thanks to downloaded music. Downloads now account for 60% of singles sales compared to 4% in 2004. Nearly 17 million tracks have been sold this year.

The web has grown more in 2005 than it did at the height of the dotcom boom, according to monitoring company Netcraft. More than 17 million sites have appeared in the year to October compared with 16 million in 2000 – the height of the boom.

Credit card fraud is reported to be down 29% year-on-year in 2005, thanks to the chip and pin system.

Apple quadrupled its quarterly profits after selling 6.5 million iPods in the last three months. However, shares fell by 10% as the sales figures actually fell short of expectations.

Two hackers have been jailed for their part in creating the T-K Worm virus that infected thousands of computers worldwide. Andrew Harvey received six months and Jordan Bradley was jailed for three months.

Future Publishing has launched GadgetCandy.com, a spin-off from T3 magazine, but aimed primarily at women, 'because girls love gadgets too'.

The BBC has admitted buying the bbc.com domain name from Boston Business Computing in 1999 for £212,000 following a request for information under the Freedom of Information Act. It is yet to use the URL.

Trinity Mirror has bought HotGroup for £50.5m, adding to its network of recruitment sites which already include workthing.com, planetrecruit, jobsfinancial and hotrecruit.

The number of adults banking online will increase tenfold in the next decade according to research by Internet bank Cahoot.

The Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) has said UK online advertising values could surpass £1bn in 2005, driven by take-up of broadband internet connections.

Cable operators NTL and Telewest have confirmed their £6bn merger, creating a TV platform with the force to take on Sky and Freeview.

Following the loss of several major contracts, Kate Moss has been offered £5m to become the face of online gambling web site nine.com.

As part of its 7th birthday celebrations, Google has announced an expansion of its search engine that is 1,000 times the size of its original index, making it three times larger than rivals.

Apple’s new iPod nano has been beset with complaints about damaged screens and that it is prone to scratching. Apple say that the problems relate to one faulty batch only.

The latest version of the Opera browser, version 8.5 is now available for free, without ads. Previously users had to buy a copy or put up with advertising.

Welcome to esquared from experience engine

After an extended summer lay-off, we are pleased to bring you a bumper issue of Esquared. We are sorry that there has been such a long delay since the last issue, but here at ee towers we have been extremely busy. We have won some fantastic new clients who include UHY Hacker Young, BRS and NCFE National Awarding Body and have been busy on new developments for our existing clients, highlights of which are a major online advertising campaign for William Ransom and two new web sites for the Xchangeteam group. Thanks for your patience and we promise to improve the frequency of the newsletter in future!

Jakob Nielsen announces top web design mistakes of 2005

Jakob Nielsen, the Internet usability guru has announced his top 10 web design mistakes of 2005. The list was compiled following consultation with the readers of his usability newsletter who were asked to rank the most irritating usability problems. Below is the top 10 which we've paraphrased from the full report that's at useit.

No.1. Poor legibility

The number one problem, which received nearly twice as many votes as the number two problem was for bad fonts. Users must be able to read the text on your web site, or at least be offered the opportunity of increasing its size. One third of respondents also complained about poor contrast between the text and its background.

No.2. Non-standard linking

Links must be obvious. Try to use coloured, underlined text only to denote a link. Never use italics for a link or underline a non-linked piece of text. It's also an idea to flag whether the link is internal or is a link to an external web site. Finally, don’t open every new link in a new browser window.

No.3. Unnecessary use of Flash

Even though splash screens and Flash introductions are nearly extinct, they do occasionally rear their ugly heads. However, Flash really should be used to enhance a web page and to provide features that are unavailable with a static page. On no account should it be used to ‘jazz up’ a page. And never, ever use Flash for navigation. People prefer predictable navigation and static menus.

No.4. Content that’s not written for the web

Good web content should be short, easily scanned by the eye and to the point. Web site users use a web site to achieve a goal, not to be marketed to. So good content must answer visitors’ questions and use common language. This also helps with search engine optimisation as you use your visitor’s terms rather than your company’s jargon.

No.5. Poor search

Providing an effective site search facility is very important. It provides visitors with direct access to information and also helps them if they get stuck using the navigation. The best web sites offer a simple search box on every page and don't rely on advanced search forms, which can be confusing for the visitor.

No.6. Incompatibility with other browsers

Although Internet Explorer remains the dominant browser, Firefox is making inroads on its share of the market. Also, never forget that several people actually use Apple or Linux based computers and will use the Safari browser. Simply put, if you ignore other browsers, you are ignoring a significant number of customers.

No.7. Difficult forms

Many people complained about web site forms. In general, the feeling was that too many forms were arduous and complex to complete. To improve forms, site owners should try to ask as little as possible to increase response and usage rates. Try and cut down the number of questions asked and options given. Don’t make fields mandatory unless they truly are. Allow flexible input of phone and credit card numbers. And where errors do occur, make the error message descriptive – don’t just say that a response is invalid - tell the user why.

No.8. Lack of contact information

This was a large confidence factor issue. Where a company does not display a postal address, visitors were less likely to buy something from the web site or to provide personal information. Another good idea is to provide geographic infomation on the homepage, especially if you use a .com web address, otherwise visitors may assume that you are a US based web site.

No.9. Layouts that you cannot adjust

These complaints fell into two main areas: on large monitors, web sites can be difficult to use if they don’t resize the window and on small monitors it leads to too much horizontal scrolling. The second area was that the right hand side of the page can be cut off when printing. This was especially true of US web sites that assume a different page width to the standard European A4. A straight forward fix for this – although one that is seldom used - is to use different page templates for print.

10. Pop-up windows

The final complaint in the top 10 was the use of pop-up windows. These annoy users for several reasons. The main complaint is that it takes you out of the web site for no good reason. Allied to this is that a user can often lose the window in cases where every link pops up a fresh window. The latest Firefox browser now blocks pop-up windows automatically and Windows XP users with service pack 2 also now have pop-ups blocked by default. This means that many users will simply not be able to use your web site.

In summary, the top 10 user bug bears can be eliminated by ensuring that your web site provides your visitors with text they can read, content that answers their questions, navigation that helps them find what they want, easy to use forms and no bugs, typos or broken links. Put this way, it all makes perfect sense.

Pre-registration for .eu domains is now available

.eu domains are expected to go live in 2006 and pre-registrations are now being taken. A pre-registration gives you a place in the queue for domains after the initial sunrise period where trademark holders can apply for their domains. After that time the domains are allocated on a first come, first served basis, so it’s advisable to plan ahead and make a pre-registration.

.travel domains are given clearance for take-off

Still on the subject of domains, a new top-level domain dedicated to travel business-related web sites, .travel, has been approved by ICANN. Travel industry groups have been working to identify businesses eligible for registering a .travel domain, and most of the sites using .travel in their domain names will be commercial ventures. It’s expected that individuals or non-commercial ventures will be excluded.

Recruiting for the .jobs domain

A new domain specifically for use by a company’s employment or HR department has been approved by ICANN. The .jobs domain will allow companies to have a dedicated jobs website at an address such as experience-engine.jobs, rather than potential employees having to search through the standard company website for the relevant page. The domain is currently in its Open Registration period where domains are allocated on a first come, first served basis.

experience engine can help you with your domain name strategy, just contact us using the details below or e-mail tony@experience-engine.co.uk

Blatant plug:

We mentioned that we've been busy earlier: the fruits of our summer labours can be seen at www.uhy-uk.com, www.davisxchangeteam.com, www.bdgxchangeteam.com, www.snufflebabe.com and you may spot a banner advert or two over at http://messageboards.ivillage.co.uk/iv-ukpbweaning.

Only on the web:

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http://www.sewdorky.com/

About:

Esquared is a regular digest of news, opinion and developments within interactive communications which we find interesting and hope you will too. If you want more information about anything that we mention, or have any comments, please call us on 01992 500990 or e-mail esquared@experience-engine.co.uk.