If you didn’t know how old you were, how old would you be?
I like questions like this. (A related one is, If you didn’t know what day it was, what day would it be?)
The idea is that, if you didn’t have the facts in a given situation (or relied on the opinions of others), what would your interpretation of that situation be based only on your gut feeling and personal experience?
The reason I’ve been thinking about this question is because, if I didn’t know (through the media) that times were tough economically, would I know it based on how my freelance business is going? And the answer is no. I’m about as busy as I can be at the moment.
That’s not to dismiss the true suffering people are going through in certain areas. But there is a lot to be said for creating a career where there’s generally always some sort of need for your services, and where you have more control over the decisions that create success.
Sites you should know about
I’ve always had an appreciation for people who freely share some of their knowledge and experiences with others in their field.
Two blogs I’ve stumbled across recently are:
Direct Creative Blog – http://www.directcreative.com/blog/
ProFreelancing Blog – http://profreelancing.com/
Both are worthy of being added to your bookmarks.
Is the (design) world telling me something?
In the space of a couple of days, I’ve been talking to separate people about new ways to present material online that go beyond presenting that same material as PDFs.
This isn’t new, just interesting that it has come up so often in recent days and may soon affect how I do some layout projects.
Sites like BlueToad and WebIOB offer reading experiences that, when used properly, can make reading material online more interesting and interactive. At the same time, it might help with some security issues that direct marketers have with PDFs they sell that can be easily passed around to people who didn’t buy them.
There’s a lot more that can be said on this topic. But my point is that, as a designer, you’ve always got to be ready to see how these technologies will affect what you do. Not to mention being tuned into what people are talking and thinking about in terms of different ways to present content.
To me, that’s part of the excitement of this career… there’s always something new to learn which means you’ll rarely be bored.