Update 14.05.2014: Unfortunately, conference tickets are sold out, but a few conference+workshop tickets are still available.

Some things just don’t change: SmashingConf Freiburg is taking place again this year, on September 15th-16th 2014, in our lovely hometown Freiburg, Germany. Two days, one track, 18 brilliant speakers and 300 fantastic attendees, sharing practical insights into their craft. And the best bit: lots of networking with good ol’ German beers in beer gardens, at the very foot of the legendary Black Forest. Tickets are now on sale.

SmashingConf 2014: “This Is How We Did It”

The main focus of Smashing Conferences has always been hands-on insights and actionable takeaways — things that have actually worked in practice, and the design/development process behind them, including mistakes, failures, critical decisions and eventually successes.

We do not care about volatile trends, but we do care about interesting problems and smart solutions to them though. The goal is that everybody — speakers, attendees and people watching the videos later — will learn new techniques and approaches that can be applied in their next projects right away.

This year, the Smashing Conference flags will be blowing in the wind from a Historic Merchant Hall, yet again. (Image credit)

The conference in Freiburg isn’t going to be an exception: we’ve encouraged speakers to share real-life lessons from their projects, and explain in detail “how they built it”, with all the elegant and dirty decisions made along the way. And since everything is better with beers, this time we’d like to encourage attendees to share their experience publicly as well, at the Jam Session warm-up party on Sunday before the conference.

First Speakers

We’ve invited speakers who passionately care about their craft and aren’t afraid of pushing boundaries. We’re happy to welcome the first confirmed speakers:

Among the first confirmed speakers at the SmashingConf Freiburg are Marcin Wichary and Sara Wachter-Boettcher.

• Marcin Wichary
  UX Designer • Google, Medium.com
• Sara Wachter-Boettcher
  Content Strategist • A List Apart
• Jason Grigsby
  Mobile Strategist • Cloud Four
• Matt Andrews
  Front-End Developer • Financial Times
• Phil Hawksworth
  Front-End Developer • R/GA
• Josh Emerson
  Front-End Developer • Clearleft, Zoobox
• Mathias Bynens
  JavaScript Magician • Opera
• Jasper Kaizer
  Front-end Engineer • Rembrandt Museum
• Peter Smart
  UX Designer • British Airways
• Patty Toland
  Technical Strategist • Filament Group
• Christopher Murphy
  Writer, designer, educator • Web Standardista
• The Mystery Speaker
  (Somebody you probably know.)

Taking notes the old-fashioned way. (Image credit)

Workshops

We are also happy to announce 4 full-day workshops that will take place on Wednesday, September 17th, after the two main conference days:

• “RWD Meets The Real World” with Jason Grigsby
  Jason will get into the nitty gritty of how to strategically convert a “desktop” design to a responsible, responsive layout,
• “Mobile Content Strategy” with Sara Wachter-Boettcher
  Sara will be exploring how to master mobile content mayhem,
• “Making It Work Offline” with Matthew Andrews
  Matthew will be covering localStorage, ServiceWorker, Appcache and other offline options on the Web today,
• “RWD: Clever Tips and Tricks” with Vitaly Friedman
  Yours truly will be presenting smart techniques and strategies for responsible responsive Web design.

And as usual, if you book a Conference Ticket + Workshop ticket, you save €75 off the regular price. So what are you waiting for?

Attendees Jam Session

If you’d like to give an insightful 20-min talk at the event, please contact us at vitaly@smashingconf.com with a description of the talk and we’ll get back to you. Obviously, we won’t accept any promotional talks. The more practical your talk will be, the better.

Date, Location, Prices

The conference will take place on 15–16th of September 2014 in the Historic Merchant Hall in our lovely home town Freiburg, Germany. We have only 300 seats, so the number of tickets is very limited. Also, we’ve blocked every single hotel in town for you — you can select your hotel at the SmashingConf 2014 Location page (“Smashing Conference” is the magic word for hotel booking!).

You can enjoy the well-known “Münsterwurst” opposite the conference venue, also known as a “lange Rote”. Of course, there are also vegetarian tofu sausages available. (Image credit)

AirBnB could be a good option as well, but be fast — there aren’t many rooms available. Freiburg is known for being a vacation place, so perhaps you’d like to combine the conference with a relaxing family vacation in the skirts of the Black Forest? We’ve prepared some information about the location of Freiburg, so you don’t get lost in the suburbs of the Southern Germany while travelling here. Now if that isn’t an experience of a life-time, what is? (No, seriously, you will enjoy it!).

The price per ticket is €379 (incl. VAT) but we have 35 early-bird tickets had 35 early-bird tickets as well (sold out within 5 mins). A workshop ticket costs €349. Make sure to actually consider booking a workshop as well — if you buy both a conf ticket and a workshop, you save €75 off the price right away.

Sponsors, Dear Sponsors

We keep the ticket prices affordable for everyone, and we’re happy to welcome sponsors to help us make the conference smashing in every possible way. If you’re interested in sponsoring the event, please contact Cat (yes, it’s actually Cat—not the Smashing Cat, though!) at cat [@] smashingconf [dot] com. We love our sponsors, and you make the event possible, and we’d be honoured to have you involved!

Sometimes unusual things happen at Smashing Conferences. You should be prepared for a few surprises as well—and the best bit: as sponsor, you can be a part of it! (Image credit)

Questions?

We want Smashing Conference to be a valuable experience, but most importantly a friendly community event with lots of delightful surprises along the way. So if you are already expecting a few surprises here and there, you definitely should—we’ve got a few special mysteries coming up your way. Do you happen to like cats? ;-) Pssst, no spoilers!

Follow us at @smashingconf and get more details on the SmashingConf 2014 website. Also, more speakers will be announced soon, so get ready to be smashed with a few exciting surprises and announcements!

In September, apples will start falling from trees in Freiburg; we won’t be smashing you with apples, but you’ll learn quite a few inspiring ideas and techniques at the SmashingConf Freiburg.

Questions? Shoot us an email anytime at hello@smashingconf.com — we’d love to assist you in every possible way and would be humbled and happy to welcome you in our lovely home town Freiburg this September!

Auf Wiedersehen!

The post When Apples Fall From Trees: SmashingConf Freiburg 2014 appeared first on Smashing Magazine.

The latest Firefox update has been released for general consumption and it’s loaded with big changes.

The most striking, of course, is the way the overall interface has been sleekified and rearranged. The default tool bar has been stripped completely clean, giving users the option to add only the tools they want. And adding those tools is super convenient: the Customize link is easily found on the new dropdown menu. A drag and drop page allows you to place tools and functions where they make the most sense to you. The only items you can’t move are the address field and dropdown menu icon (so you don’t inadvertently lock yourself out of the interface).

One thing you may have noticed even before the new UI is the tabs. Firstly—no second, first is that they’re very pretty—the difference between the inactive tabs and the active tab is much more dramatic. While I question the overall need (I personally wasn’t aware that the old inactive tabs were distracting) it does make for a much cleaner look. And, well, they’re pretty.

These visible changes reflect four priorities for the massive update:

1. To give Firefox users their most beautiful, deeply designed experience to date.
2. To streamline and declutter the default interface—in a sense, cleaning the slate—providing a versatile experience for the way people are using browsers today.
3. To make it easier for more users to customize their browser.
4. To improve consistency across multiple devices.

Ultimately, Mozilla aims to lay a foundation for seamlessly accommodating future features, and wants to make the browser’s inevitable growth and changes less of a roller coaster ride for users. While predicting the future of the web is a less-than-perfect science, it’s clear a great deal of careful and inspired thought has been put into this release.

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Apartheid. Fewer words have gained such infamy in the past half-century.

Pre-Mandela rule in South Africa illustrated how brutal institutionalized racial/ethnic discrimination can be. One might even argue that the U.S. has been a quasi-apartheid state for much of its history.

That is why John Kerry’s recent words carry such somber weight.

Last week, he stated before world leaders that Israel could risk becoming an apartheid state in its own right, if a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was not reached.

Heavily loaded words—certainly the kind that will make some stomachs churn and some tempers boil over.

But could they be justified?

After all, Israel has a slew of laws discriminating against Palestinians—even those who are Israeli citizens.

And Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent proposal won’t exactly discredit Kerry’s words, either.

There is no one infallible take on this. Yes, Kerry may have been a bit hyperbolic.

But just maybe, there’s a grain of truth to his claims.

What do you think? A justified firestorm… or a storm in a teacup?

Image courtesy of theatlantic.com

What does poverty look like?

We all have a library of images in our head that answer that question.

But today, the federal government paints a very different picture of poverty. 

Many poor families that the US government designates as poor own televisions, stereos and air conditioning. Plus, there’s no question that the poor in America are much better off than in many other nations.

But focusing on some of the relative luxuries enjoyed by the poor misses the point.

As the data above  shows, the prices of entertainment goods have fallen dramatically in the last 10 years. But more importantly, the prices of essentials like education, child care, and health care have been steadily creeping up. Yikes.

This tracks with a recent FiveThirtyEight analysis which concluded that inflation has hit the poor harder than the general population in the last two years. 

What’s even worse is that continued price increases on essentials make it harder to escape poverty.

As Jordan Weissmann of Slate put it:

A college education has become a necessary passport to financial stability. It’s hard to hold a job if you’re chronically ill. Working full-time is difficult if you can’t pay somebody to watch your child. While a high-definition television is nice, it won’t permanently improve your circumstances. 

So while it’s great that poor Americans can have nice things, don’t be fooled. Poverty in America still sucks. Big time.