Posted by Suw and Kevin

• The myth of the page fold: evidence from user testing | cxpartners
  Kevin: I've sat in on user testing of a site that I work on, and it's a revelation. CX Partners blows away the idea that users don't look at content 'below the scroll', the digital equivalent of the fold on a newspaper front page. The forensic demolition of this myth is stunning to read. "As web professionals, we all know that the concept of the page fold being an impenetrable barrier for users is a myth. Over the last 6 years we’ve watched over 800 user testing sessions between us and on only 3 occasions have we seen the page fold as a barrier to users getting to the content they want." Excellent stuff.
  (tags: usability webdesign online research pagefold design)
• As Expansion Begins, TPM Logs Fourth Consecutive Month of Record Traffic | Talking Points Memo
  Kevin: It's not impossible for news organisations to make money on the web. Talking Points Memo is seeing audiences skyrocket and revenues follow. "TPM has always had a deeply engaged and loyal audience. They are at the center of how we report the news everyday . But now they're using social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and Digg to share our reporting with new readers. And the new readers are sticking around. Over the same period that unique readers went up more than 50%, direct visits to our homepage went up almost 25%. That's new readers becoming regular readers. And they are turning out to be just as engaged as those who have been with us for years."
  (tags: talkingpointsmemo journalism digital economics businessmodels)
• Xark!: New media virtual interview No. 2
  Kevin: Interview with Chip Oglesby Online Producer for The State Media Company, thestate.com, in South Carolina has some interesting observations about how to move from print to the web. He says: "Unless your top leaders are actually accountable for the success of your Web efforts, they're going to be sabotaging or at least undermining them. It's just too easy for them to give the Web lip service, and then stick to doing the same old thing." I found his comments about the semantic web even more interesting saying that structured data and machine readable formats can't be an afterthought. Agreed when he said: "…a fact without a context is simply noise."
  (tags: economics journalism mobile semanticweb data integration)