SND 2014 had many amazing speakers, touching on topics from the integrity of journalism to the challenges of redesigning websites.

The biggest lessons I learned from these sessions, though, all support one main theme: Put users at the forefront of your process.

Here's some of what I took away from the conference.

1) "Yes" is more…

John Niedermeyer

At SND 2014 in Frankfurt, Germany, I had the opportunity to sit down with…

Page of the day by Dustin…

About a year ago, I created this portfolio site for myself.

It was kind of a BFD to me, because it was the first time I coded anything, and retrospectively, it was the first time outside of Myspace that I really contemplated web design.

But it was awful. It was just a rough, scratch-pad type website that I let live for too long.

A few weeks ago, I completely redid…

Page by Walter Cortez.

Page by Amanda Soto. Photo Editor Anne…

MAD Magazine-style fold-in by Joe Moore. Illustration by Ward Sutton. Folded page below.…

Illustration by Peter Strain. Art direction & design by Dan Worthington.

Looking for a better way to post the page of the day, so that the previous versions are archived. Suggestions…

Design is an opportunity to continue telling the story

Plz like this…

• Cover model should look straight into the camera. Eye contact is important.
• When designing a cover you can play around, you can exaggerate, but you should remain within your concept and style and you should know what to exaggerate.
• Each cover needs one headline that will pop out. In size, in color, in attitude.
• The cover page should have a focus point. It can be a model in the image it can be a headline or a number, but something has to draw the…

Mis amigos me dijeron, "que onda se las vendiste o que?!", "Que como es posible y que…

So I've been coding my buns off lately.

I feel like I'm lost in coding Wonderland. I haven't encountered the Mad Hatter yet. Just CMS-es that eat CSS.

I'm definitely still not a code expert.

But in the last 24 hours, I've published this piece, created new ad spots for my student paper's website and worked on…

We all just want to make the Internet a better place, right?

So that's what a group of coders, designers and thinkers set out to do March 19-22.

At the first #SNDmakes, four teams set out to find solutions to problems users encounter when viewing content with current article forms.

And it. Was. Awesome.

As a student, I was able…

La copa mundial de carreras de caballos tuvo lugar en Dubai el pasado 29 de marzo. Por tal motivo me resultó interesante proponer un tema sobre ese mundo y lo que hay detrás de los jugosos premios. Siempre hablar de dinero en cualquiera de sus ámbitos será un gancho para atraer…

It's been a crazy two weeks.

I've been participating in a class at Ball State called "BSU at the Games." In it, more than 40 students act as a media group creating content for the Olympics.

Most participants went to Sochi, but seven of us voyaged to the land that I love, Chicago, to make graphics for the Tribune.

ON A SMALL SCALE

We are primarily visual…