Rehoboth Night Life launched!
Monday, December 19th, 2011
Red Sky is pleased to announce the launch of a new website, rehobothnightlife.com. The new website includes categorized business listings relevant to enjoying the night in the Rehoboth Beach area, including restaurants, hotels and lodging, entertainment, and bars.
Each business in the selected category is displayed visually on a Google map, making it easy for visitors to the area as well as residents to find nearby night spots and happenings. Each business includes a page of information along with phone numbers and links to the business’s websites, Facebook pages, and Twitter feeds, where available.
A sister site, lewesnightlife.com has also been launched, focusing on the Lewes, Delaware area.
New features are being continually added such as integration with Facebook and other social networking sites as well as the ability for visitors to the site to post comments and reviews.
Local businesses have the opportunity to advertise on the sites and to log in and manage their business’s listings.
Visit rehobothnightlife.com or lewesnightlife.com tonight!
Balancing Form and Function
Tuesday, October 18th, 2011
“Form follows function – that has been misunderstood. Form and function should be one, joined in a spiritual union.” ~ Frank Lloyd Wright – Architect
The web is new and innovative and different from any past human endeavor. This is true in some respects. The Internet is bridging gaps, creating new channels, opening new opportunities. But in other respects, it’s not really true at all. It is simply a new medium. Before the Internet, television changed the world; before television, radio; before radio, the telegraph. And so on. People change, societies evolve, the world gets faster, but people, the essence of people, who we are and what we want, remains largely unchanged. Throughout history people want their needs and wants fulfilled. Styles change, preferences move, language evolves, but people remain the same.
And the Internet is simply an extension of people. A medium, a set of tools and agreements allowing people and businesses and groups to communicate, interact, learn, and transact.
So your web presence is simply an extension of who you are. Or at least, it ought be.
Blogs, social networking posts and pages, and personal websites reflect the people that create them. And business websites reflect the businesses that create or operate them.
Is your website a reflection of you and your company? Does it accurately portray your company’s products and services and market and values? If not, it simply won’t work. Visitors to your website continue to grow more savvy and discriminating. It’s very easy to click the back button and move on to the next search result on Google.
What is your company, at its essence? What need do you fulfill in the marketplace? What specific solutions can you provide to potential customers or clients? These are the core questions. Does your current website answer them accurately? This is function. This is who you are. And from function flows form. And form introduces function.
It’s difficult to explain what makes a website optimal. It’s a mix of compellingness, usefulness, attractiveness, and authenticity. We know it when we see it. It’s Google. It’s Facebook. It’s a thousand other successful websites. It’s where form and function mix in subtle harmony.
Thanks for reading,
Steve
The Red Sky’s the limit!
Tuesday, October 11th, 2011
It started as a gentle mention of an idea. That perhaps Beth and I could create a website company together. It germinated for a few weeks. We talked about other business possibilities, a restaurant/bar, windmills, a publishing company. But in the end, building and managing great websites just sense. I’ve been a computer geek for twenty-five years. Electronics first, then computer networking, then programming.
In 1993 the Internet began to come alive with first the Mosaic browser, then Netscape Navigator. And I was hooked. I was working for CE Computers at the time, a computer networking company with offices in Georgetown and Salisbury. I’d started as sales rep. Then I moved to a more technical position and earned my CNE (Certified Novell Engineer). We grew the company from three when I started to over twenty, most of whom I managed as Vice President. We spun off a new company, CE Net, in 1996. I was President and co-founder. You can take a peek at the old website on the Wayback Machine. A few years later we sold the company to Delaware.net. I worked there for a while, then at Inclind, then was self-employed for the last couple years doing freelance projects.
Enough background. Back to the present…
So we decided, Beth and I, that this was indeed a good idea. And everything came together. We were sitting in the very cool new bar in Rehoboth, Big Chill Surf Cantina. And the sky was red, a gorgeous sunset. Red sky at night, sailor’s delight, says the old saying. And a few days later, brainstorming about a new name for a new company, Red Sky emerged as the clear winner.
We both tend to believe that there aren’t any constraints in this life. So we’re pretty confident this is all going to work out well. The Red Sky is indeed the limit.