Some Random Dude is a blog by P.J. Onori that covers design & technology in the broadest sense possible.

Recent Articles

Long-form writings on various subjects. (more...)

Some Random Dude Has Advertising (And Why That’s a Good Thing)

Posted on 6 July, 2010 7:16am | 3 comments.

This has been a long time coming, but Some Random Dude is now running advertisements. I am pleased to write that I have joined the InfluAds network as one of their community members. You have probably already noticed the difference on the site in the promotional area. I am still working out some details on the placement, but this is pretty much how the site will look for a while. I have written about my concerns with online advertising, even though I acknowledge its necessity. That said, I have been wanting to be a part of an ad network for almost the same amount of time. I feel I will have a much better understanding of advertising if I actually advertised on my site. Up until this point however, there wasn’t a sweet enough of a deal to get me to actually bite. I think this will actually be the one that works though. Read the rest of this post…

Click Here – The Story of Three Buttons

Posted on 28 June, 2010 7:07am | no comments.

I have been a little obsessive about my blog in the last couple months. I have not had the time to actually write on this site, but that has not stopped me from putting serious thought into it. To be honest, if I took all the time I spend looking through various analytics, I could likely squeeze out an article or two — but I have a feeling I am not alone in this situation. I wrote earlier that I have been spending a lot of effort and screen real-estate to get people to subscribe to my RSS feed. This site’s traffic is very bi-polar — for the last 4 months, it has either been at a snail’s pace or at a server-crushing, breakneck speed. I would prefer to have less of the ups and downs and have more of a reliable readership. After I began to track clicks on specific buttons, I realized just how poorly my click-rate was for my RSS links. This is where the story begins. Read the rest of this post…

More Iconic Updates

Posted on 15 June, 2010 6:37am | 3 comments.

While it may look like not too much is going on at this site, there’s actually a lot of very small things happening. I have not had the time to devote to a full article (although I have my next big article about 50% written) but I have been working on a refresh of the site as well as releasing a small update to Iconic. The last significant update was when I simultaneously wrote aboutusing embedded fonts for icons and added a font face to the Iconic download. As new icons come to mind or are recommended, I try to add to the set. I have had the chance to grow the collection by three new icons (one with two styles). Read the rest of this post…

Things I Have Learned About SRD So Far.

Posted on 25 May, 2010 6:07am | 1 comment.

I mentioned a while back that I would be writing on the process of improving this site. Up until this point, I have been making small, incremental changes throughout the site to see if they would impact key traffic metrics. My goal was to set up some A/B testing scenarios on my blog, but performing tests on anything but the most superficial of elements proved to be disruptive. I then decided to move to Plan B and implement custom event tracking with Google Analytics. In short, the results have not only been revealing, but unexpected. I always knew in a theoretical level how important deriving empirical data was in order to justify a design, but soon after I began to observe detailed click patters, that opinion became concrete. If I was writing my Golden Rules of Site Redesign article today, it may be a little different. Read the rest of this post…

Font-Embedding Icons: This Is a Big Deal

Posted on 4 May, 2010 10:20pm | 26 comments.

A little over a week ago, Wayne Helman posted an article proposing the use of @font-face for displaying icons. The article was well-received, but I was honestly expecting more excitement around this idea. From my view, this now seems like the way to set icons in a site. I feel strongly about the potential of this method, so I thought I would take the time to generate a font set for Iconic and to talk about why we should all be using this method for displaying icons. Read the rest of this post…

Life+Work Stream

Media/content from myself and others. (more...)

Fun work with clean lines by Celeste Prevost. via ffffound

7:30am, 25-08-2010 | no comments.

Fun work with clean lines by Celeste Prevost. via ffffound

Frazzle by Jo Wilson is a fun little Processing project which…

7:30am, 25-08-2010 | no comments.

Frazzle by Jo Wilson is a fun little Processing project which interactively creates unique line forms.

An unbelievable collection of work by Toko. via ffffound

7:30am, 25-08-2010 | no comments.

An unbelievable collection of work by Toko. via ffffound

Great print work by minkee. via designworklife

7:30am, 25-08-2010 | no comments.

Great print work by minkee. via designworklife

An interesting clock built with Processing by Sandro Brito

7:10am, 25-08-2010 | no comments.

An interesting clock built with Processing by Sandro Brito

Snippets

Thoughts and findings. (more...)

NYTimes: USA Today Plans Overhaul to Emphasize Mobile Devices
http://nyti.ms/bB494S

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Apple's Attention to Detail – http://bit.ly/9XiXxA

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RT @DanHarrelson: Whoa, tabs in Finder http://bit.ly/4ryuGM (via @pboersma)

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How Choice Impairs Your Visitors http://bit.ly/cs0LrL

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Google Maps without the map http://bit.ly/drwfjC

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Microsoft's physically-innovative touch mouse changes shape http://bit.ly/aAFvnJ

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The web's symbiotic link to Brett Favre's career http://bit.ly/d7UrFu

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Yaniv Berg's unusual DSLR concept form factor http://bit.ly/bvVvwA

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Pad Pressed http://bit.ly/9jegma

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Placehold.it http://bit.ly/chwETD

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