CRAWLING THE WEB

with Kelly J. Calton



CLICKING NOT SCROLLING...

     People do not like to scroll. They do not like pages that will give them
carpal tunnel just while trying to find a link. The best advice I could ever
give about web page design? Section your site into different pages if a ton
of scrolling is involved. People would rather click then scroll.

    On the other hand, if you have a page that is a MUST to all be on one
page, I recommend adding bookmarks. A bookmark is a link within a page. An
example of bookmarks is on the Midwest BEAT Magazine's "Local Band Listing".
It would have been annoying to have to click on every band. I made it all one
page with letters of the alphabet at the top, which are clickable, so people
can cruise to the band they are looking for easily. After each alphabetic
section of bands I also have a "back to top" link. This takes them back to
the letters of the alphabet at the top of the page, virtually eliminating
scrolling.

 Check out this page at: http://www.midwestbeat. com/list.html   Above all,
always remember this: your site should be easy to navigate. Someone looking
to see where you are playing that night does not want to scroll forever and
go on a scavenger hunt to find your gig dates. If they do not see what they
want right away, another site is just a click away. They say a web site has 5
seconds to grab someone's attention. You better make those five seconds count!

PROGRAMS...

    Microsoft Front Page 2000 ~ This program is a nightmare for people like
me that own web design businesses. I laughed when all these programs to make
web sites first started coming out. The 2000 version has made me stop
laughing. I begrudgingly admit that this program can enable someone to make a
decent web site, without any HTML knowledge.

    One of the problems these types of programs were lacking before was
support for things like forms, DHTML, and Java. Front Page makes it easy to
put up things like message boards, email feedback forms, and thumbnails of
pictures. I have even started using front page for my picture pages where I
need thumbnails. It has made my life much easier.

    There is a drawback to Front Page (thank god!). Your web site has to be
on a server that has support for Front Page extensions. Also, if you cannot
make your own graphics, your site has the possibility of looking like a
million other people's sites that used the program, and used the supplied
graphics.

GAMING...

    The Sims ~ I recently took the game The Sims out for a test drive. I will
warn you right now, it is very addicting. The game looked kind of stupid to
me at first. The premises of the game are that you have a neighborhood, place
people in houses, and run their lives. You can choice their looks, what
career path they will follow, their personality traits, who they want to
date, pretty much everything. You can fill a neighborhood up with people
exactly like you, your family, and friends.

    I was a bit suspicious if this could actually be done. Let me tell you
what, they come damn close to everything I said in that last paragraph. The
game is never ending. Say you are bored with a family. All you have to do is
simply evict them and create a new family to move in. Their web site
www.thesims.com can even custom make faces for your characters, so that they
match the real life people you are creating. Scary, huh? You can choose the
life of a criminal, to a political giant, to an astronaut. I highly recommend
this game, but don't say I didn't warn you about the addiction that follows.

    Heat.net ~ Do you like to play games on-line? Check out www.heat.net. You
can play a multitude of games on this site. Everything from Diablo to
Baldur's Gate to Quake (my personal favorite). There is also a chat feature
enabled while you are playing your game. People always ask me, "Are you sure
you're a chick?" while I am kicking their ass at Quake. Many of the games are
free to play on this site, but there are advantages to becoming a member.
FREE SOFTWARE!

    Yes, that's right. They will pay you by the hours you play in all
different kinds of software and games. If you game a lot on the internet you
will more then make up the small fee required to be a member.

COOL SITES...

   Do you ever wonder what those people from your old high school are doing
these days? Check out www.highschoolalumni.com/ There are many sites popping
up with this type of theme, but this is a really decent site, and it is also
free. I was emailed the site to check out by a Midwest BEAT Magazine reader
(thanks Holly!), and I really enjoyed it. Especially when I saw this one girl
that was a total snob and talked about how she was going to be rich and
famous - constanttly - was now a stay at home mom with 5 kids. I laughed so
hard I almost fell off of my computer chair. Not that there is anything wrong
with being a stay at home mom, but being a stay at home mom with five kids is
my personal version of hell. So hey, even if you didn't like the people you
went to school with you can still derive some evil pleasure from this site!

    Since I seem to be in a nostalgic this month, I'll add another site from
my high school years. Do you Miss Pacman? How about Space Invaders, Frogger,
or Centipede? Then visit http://www.classicgaming.com/ to get your fix on all
those old Atari and Coleco vision games from the '80s. You can download them
free right to your computer.

BAND SITE OF THE MONTH...

    First of all I would like to thank all of you for your great response to
this portion of my article. I would love to put every one of you up here. But
of course, we can only do one per month!  So, this month I've chosen the site
for South Side band, Fatal Order. Their site has just been redone, and it
looks incredible! It has great graphics, and it loads fast...and that's
important!  I love the radio dial concept. Very original guys! Keep up the
great work! Check them out at www.fatalorder.com

MIDWESTBEAT.COM...

    The local showcase for music is still in the works at
www.midwestbeat.com. I would like to thank all the bands that have emailed me
their music so far! I am working on the format for the site now, and it will
be up soon! Our web site is hit by people all over the world, so this is a
great opportunity to get our local music to ears all over the globe! It's a
great way to expand your audience. All who do not have net ready music email
me at: kel@outtasiteweb.com and I can help you!
 
   Have you visited our chat room yet? Live events with celebrities are in
the works. Does your band have a strong web following? If your band would
like to schedule a live event in our chat room, email me and I will post it
at once! It's a great way to stay in touch with your fans and get feedback
that can be crucial to your bands success!

    That's it for this month! If you have a cool site you would like to see
listed here, email it to me!  Also, keep those websites coming bands!  You
may be listed here next month!     

    Happy surfing!