Matsu’s World: The One Less Traveled

I watched Brian William’s interview of President Bush (George W.) on NBC the other day. For the most part the President seemed to give decent responses to Mr. William’s questions. But, one response made me stop what I was doing and actually look at the TV to see if maybe Saturday Night Live or some other comedy show had interrupted the serious news interview.

What did the President say that caught my attention? He said, “The key for me is to keep expectations low.”

That’s not what I would normally expect from the ruler a country like the United States, but I guess that works for him. You can read a news article about that interview here.

This is a follow-up to this post about the terrible airplane crash that happened a few hours ago.

The airplane manufacturers’ web site has the following specs for the distance required for takeoff and landing of a Bombadier CRJ200:

Based on this information, the plane requires 5,800 feet (1,768 meters) to get off the ground. Given that, the length of the runway used at Bluegrass Field Airport becomes an important factor.

According to this web site, there are two runways at the airport, one that’s the main runway is very long, and then a shorter runway. Runway 26 is the shorter runway and the one that was reportedly used by Delta Comair Flight 5191. The length of runway 26 is 3,500 feet. Significantly less than what the manufacturer recommends for the plane.

This morning, at 6:00am, a tragic airplane accident took place here in Lexington, Kentucky USA. There are not a lot of details, but it has been reported that most of the 47 passengers and 3 crew members of the Delta Comair flight did not survive. I have heard one report that one person may have survived.

The plane was a Canadian made Bombardier CRJ-200.

CNN news story about this accident can be found here.

Yesterday and today I attended meetings about institutional branding and building a brand. I learned a lot. In fact, my mind is still chewing on many of the things I heard and learned. I also learned about several books that are new to me but were recommended to the audience to read. I’ll post information about them as I read them.

To help understand branding, the guest speaker equated it to reputation. Building a reputation is language that’s easier for me to understand and digest. As the speaker said, when someone hears or sees your company name, what they think about you, or the reputation you have built, is your brand. Establishing it or changing it can take decades.

I’ll share more on what I learned today about branding and marketing in a future post.

The past couple of days I have been asking people what they see in a good web site. What is it they look for and what is it they consider important for a web site they like and they consider better than most other web sites. As you may imagine, people have difficulty quantifying what they like when it comes to web design or layout and overall functionality.

When I ask myself that question I first think, what else is there that is equivalent to a web site? The primary purpose of a web site is to provide information. Yet, most everyone would agree that the look (aesthetics) are very important as well. So, it can be a form of art. And, if not considered ‘true art’ then at least artistic design.

What else is there in our everyday lives that is a mix of information (data) and art (graphics)? After pondering that question (briefly) it hit me, a map! Yes, web sites are like road maps (but not like an onion).

Let’s consider the similar characteristics of road maps and web sites. First, a road map must be accurate to be useful. The same is true of web sites. We seek to provide accurate information. And, like roads, we can run into dead ends, which on web sites we call broken links.

Roads, like web sites, are constantly changing. And, new roads are being built all of the time, just like web pages and web sites. Therefore, current information is important for maps. The same is true of web sites.

What about standards? Both require adherence to standards in order to be worthwhile. If a map doesn’t adhere to standard units of measurements (such as miles or kilometers) then it can be less than useful. The same is true of web sites.

I have not figured out the web equivalent of the legend on a map (so help me out here). But, if you think about it, you will find there are several other similarities between web sites and maps.