Thinking

There have been lots of oohs and aahs here at Clearleft HQ as we’ve watched the creation of various rather spectacular, beautifully designed Fontdeck goodies. These have been made to form gift boxes which have been sent to a handful of folk we admire - and now there’s a chance for some lucky souls to win the remaining three, very limited edition, boxes. For the chance to get your mitts on one, check out the Fontdeck blog for full details. And of course, if you haven’t already hopped along to the Fontdeck site, be sure to check it out - it’s an entirely elegant one stop shop for webfonts!

Also, for those of you tickled by web typography, don’t forget to snap up one of the few remaining tickets for Ampersand, which takes place here in Brighton next week!

We’ve spent the past few months working with various local community groups, arts institutions and conference producers to arrange what we believe is going to be the biggest festival of digital culture in Europe. Backed by our friends at the Arts Council, the Brighton Digital Festival will run throughout the month of September and involve around 30 events; from art exhibits and community meet-ups, through to international conferences and events.

Kicking off the festival on the 2nd September will be our very own dConstruct conference, followed by Brighton’s first Maker Faire. So if you’re in town for the conference, make sure you stick around. Following hot on our heels is the new Update conference, while mid month we see the return of the ever popular Flash on the Beach. Finishing the season we have Improving Reality, a brand new conference focussing on digital arts.

As well as the big conferences, we’re going to see a load of smaller talks and community events happening during the month of September. We’ve also got some interesting digital art exhibitions and installations planned, including “A Machine to See With” from local art collective Blast Theory.

We’re still looking for more events, so if you’ve got an idea for something you’d like to run, please drop us a line.

Goodness, it’s nearly time for this year’s dConstruct! Tickets will be going on sale at 11am on July 5th, so be sure to make a note of that - we’re expecting, as usual, that they’ll sell out rather swiftly, so snap yours up before they’re gone. We’ve another really splendid line up, including Don Norman, Frank Chimero, Craig Mod and Kelly Goto, which we’re very excited about. Keep an eye out for full details which will be announced in the coming weeks.

After a month of gadding about appearing at conferences, and clocking up a rather impressive amount of air miles, we finally have a full compliment of Clearlefties back at HQ. Rich, James Box and Cennydd all spoke at SXSW, Jeremy appeared at Drupalcon in Chicago and An Event Apart in Seattle, and Cennydd was the closing plenary speaker at the IA Summit in Denver. Returning to Blighty, Andy and Harry both spoke at Brighton SEO. Next up, Jeremy will gad forth to Amsterdam for Mobilism, and Andy and Cennydd will both be at the IA Konferenz in Munich, where Andy will be the closing keynote speaker.

As if all that weren’t exciting enough, UX London takes place next week! We’re really looking forward to spending three inspiring days with a great group of UX folk. Yet again it’s completely sold out, but if you’ve already nabbed a ticket we’ll see you there! And for more inspirational goodness, don’t forget to snap up a ticket for Ampersand, our new web typography conference, which takes place here in sunny Brighton on June 17th.

We received a huge number of submissions for our UX London student bursary - and what a varied and creative bunch they were! Of course it was tricky picking our favourites, but three particularly imaginative entries really stood out. And so - drumroll, please! - the winners are: Jenn Bagehorn, Damian Gribben and Kate Ivey-Williams. We had asked entrants to tell us why attending UX London would be useful to them and their future career, to which Jenn sent her very impressive portfolio of design ideas, Damian created a spectacularly splendid website, and Kate wowed us with a wonderful animated video. We look forward to welcoming them to UX London - and to seeing what they do next!

Tickets for Ampersand, our new typography conference, go on sale at noon today. We’re very excited about the event, which promises to be an inspiring day for web designers and type enthusiasts. Ampersand represents the overlapping worlds of type design, web design and software, and is a must for anyone working with words on the web. The conference will take place at the Brighton Dome Corn Exchange on June 17th.

We’re very pleased to announce Adobe as Premier Sponsors of UX London. They’ll be joining us in London next April, and we look forward to seeing them there for what promises to be another fantastic event. There are still additional sponsorship places if you’d like to be part of the super UX festivities. And don’t forget to register if you haven’t already - the current ticket price is only available for a limited time!

It’s all go in the rather elegant world of Fontdeck. The webfont service was a highly commended entry for Most Innovative New Technology in Econsultancy’s Innovation Awards, which we’re thrilled about. And of course that follows hot on the heels of its recent win at the BIMAs. Illustrating just how impressive the fonts on offer can look, you can now see a gallery of Fontdeck served sites. Take a peek and see how a little Fontdeck typography can inspire your site.

We’ve rolled out the welcome mat again for our new User Experience Designer, Harry Brignull. Harry is a veteran design researcher who has previously worked at Flow, Madgex and Amberlight. In addition to his splendid work, Harry spreads the UX word by helping to run the thriving UX Brighton events, and curating the famous Dark Patterns wiki. We’re delighted that he’s now part of the Clearleft team.

Back in November we took part in a World Usability Day promotion, donating 100% of Silverback app sales to the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International. In addition to our own sales, our friends at Optimal Workshop included Silverback in their World Usability Day bundle, and we’re thrilled to say we’ve reached a combined total of $8,500!

The hard-working folk at the Fossey Fund are thrilled too. President and CEO Clare Richardson said: “The Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund protects and monitors silverback gorillas and their groups every day in Africa, so it is especially wonderful to add the support of Clearleft, Optimal Workshop and Silverback software buyers to our efforts. This donation will help us continue our daily efforts to save this important endangered species, including the all-important silverbacks, who are known for their strength and leadership in guiding the other gorillas.”

At Clearleft we’re continuing to support the gorillas in donating 10% of Silverback profits to the Fossey Fund. They currently need help in raising money to build a fence at their gorilla rehabilitation centre - a costly project, but essential for the well-being of the orphan gorillas. To make a donation, or for more information, check out the Fossey Fund website. You can also follow them on Twitter.

UX London, now in its third year, has always been popular with those already working in the industry. We bring industry leaders such as Don Norman, Jared Spool, Alan Cooper, and Jesse James Garrett to London to share their wisdom and passion. We do this by combining inspiration talks with practical, hands-on workshops that give attendees skills they can use every day, and share with their colleagues and clients.

But we know that three day conferences aren’t cheap, and are often unaffordable for students. We really care about the future of interaction design and helping the next generation of talent is an excellent way of ensuring that it’s in safe hands. In previous years we’ve done this by using student volunteers to help out at the event, but we want to do more. This year, we’re offering three students a free conference pass, worth £995. If you’re interested, send us either an email or video explaining why coming to UX London would be useful to you and your future career. Please include your contact details, what course you’re on and where you’re studying. We’ll choose the three we find the most inspiring. Please send your entries in to sophie@clearleft.com by Friday 25 February.

Check out Fontdeck’s very merry typographic advent calendar - or rather, Adfont Calendar! There you’ll find a free webfont available every day in December.

Since its launch a few days ago, the Adfont Calendar has gone viral on Twitter, with thousands of tweets resulting in tens of thousands of visitors snapping up the fonts.

If you haven’t yet booked your ticket for UX London, you really must get your skates on! The reduced Standard rate is only available until January 28th, so be sure to snap one up before then. You can check out the speakers and programme to see what splendid and enlightening UX wonders we’ve lined up for you this year. As ever, it promises to be a fantastic three days, packed with the inspirational expertise UX London is famous for. See you there!

We were mighty proud for Fontdeck to be shortlisted for no fewer than three prestigious BIMA awards this year. Fontdeck’s nominations were for Best Web App, and special awardsfor Usability & Accessibility, and Innovation.

And at the awards ceremony, we couldn’t have been more thrilled when Fontdeck was announced winner of Best Web App (and it’s a fetching looking award too!), so thank you, BIMA.

Drumroll, please! We’re delighted to announce the arrival of our new interface designer, Michelle O’Loughlin. After two years working in New Zealand, Michelle recently returned to Blighty and has now found her way to Brighton, and (luckily for us) Clearleft Towers. She has over ten years’ experience, designing for an impressive medley of clients - and of course we’re looking forward to her bringing her design wizardry to our upcoming projects.

Congratulations to our very own Cennydd Bowles, who’s been announced as the Closing Plenary Speaker at the IA Summit 2011. He’s the first international speaker to be bestowed with this honour, which comes after impressing folk at many recent events, including this year’s IA Summit, along with SXSW, UX London and SHiFT. Of course, we’re mighty proud that his UX wisdom is getting such recognition!

If you’ve not already snapped up a copy of Cennydd and James Box’s book, Undercover User Experience Design, until 21/11 the PDF format is available for just $9.99!