A popular design phenomenon is that of “office porn”. No, it’s not anything sexual or sinister, but the seemingly never-ending desire of every designer out there to have an office that’s slicker, sexier, and more loaded than technology than the last. From Flickr home office competitions to design firms loaded with Mac Pros and 32 inch displays, the design industry has a major crush on shiny high-performance equipment.

Unfortunately for newbie designers, furnishing a swanky design office requires a lot of money. A top design rig costs several thousands of dollars, and a multi-screen set-up can increase costs even further. Add in a huge executive desk, flashy lamps, and a high quality office chair and you’ve exhausted all your startup capital.

These six low-cost design tools go against the “expensive is best” idea that seems to flow through the design industry. Cheap, simple, and very designer-friendly, these gadgets, applications, resources, and services are perfect for bootstrapping designers and budding design firms.

1. The Wordpress Thesis Theme

No Wordpress theme is as flexible and user-friendly as Thesis. It’s 100% SEO optimized from the get-go, includes a range of awesome tools for developers, and is available with a multi-use developer license for just over a hundred bucks. Add to that the huge list of pre-built templates and themes, the massive support community, and the endless flexibility on offer and you’re left with one of the best Wordpress themes out there.

Sure, it’s not free, but it’s very cheap for the amount of value that it offers. If you’re a Wordpress developer or designer, pick it up today and cut down on development time and project-related stress.

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Every now and then, a product or technology comes along that’s so well designed and crafted it completely disrupts the market. In the motoring world, it was Henry Ford’s ultra-popular and highly disruptive Model T, followed by the Volkswagen Beetle. These cars had design so perfect that it changed the way consumers viewed their industries. In short, they changed the world.

These ten product and technology designs have done the same. From revolutionizing markets and boosting sales to completely killing current products, each one of these products has been designed with a specific purpose. If you’re a designer looking for inspiration, let these ten ultra-disruptive and highly iconic product and technology designs fuel your ambition and future design success.

1. Twitter

The internet’s hottest startup is also one of the most elegantly designed. A small message box, ultra-simple follower and following lists, and a clear divide between active content and sidebar navigation make Twitter a very classy design. It’s also got character in spades, from the cute mascots and background characters to the personalized error messages and options.

Of course, what makes Twitter iconic is the way design and purpose fuse into the technology. While some online services feature slick design, few feature it in the way that Twitter does.
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Digital photography is a huge and varied discipline, with millions of photographers worldwide meeting on services like Flickr and Picasa to share their shots, improve their work, and develop their career. Whether hobbyists or would-be professionals, these photographers share one thing in common – a burning desire to improve their photography and take cleaner, more balanced, and overall better photos.

Doing the same for yourself isn’t as difficult as you may think. Almost all digital cameras, even the inexpensive and old, are capable of taking great photos in the right hands. These five tips, tricks, and tactics for taking better pictures can help you improve your photography, build a portfolio of high quality images, and boost your visual artistic ability.

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Big is good. Despite the common assumption that small companies are the best when it comes to customer and client service, many businesses look the other way when selecting a service provider or contractor. Rather than selecting based on individual attention and customer care, they look for other signals of approval – the ability to work with large clients, a proven track record, and the structure to support large assignments and long-term contracts.

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For a small boutique provider, it can seem nearly impossible to get a foot in the door. The big guns are looking for companies like them – large, powerful, and very experienced – but in order to become one and gain access to their contracts, you need to become one yourself. For some small businesses, that means acquiring additional overheads and growing in size, even if its just perceived size for some of your clients and customers.

These five tips can help you transform your business’s image from small and micro-focused to large and powerful. With a few small additions, new strategies, and client interaction changes, these tips could land you ultra-valuable clients and customer contacts, long-term contracts, and the experience required to market yourself to the biggest companies in the world. Apply one, two, or all five, and watch your business’s value grow in front of you.

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It’s not uncommon to hear stories of large-scale online business failures. From major companies – anyone remember Webvan? – to small design firms and marketing agencies, failure is a part of doing business. With the low costs of starting and operating a business online, many businesses that would fail under other circumstances end up getting started. Sometimes they grow into leading enterprises, but more often than not, they don’t.

We’ve identified the six most common mistakes that newbie designers, entrepreneurs, and online businesspeople make when they start their own online businesses. If you’re just starting out online yourself, use this article as a template of what not to do in your business. The best business lessons are often learned from other people’s failures, and these six should give you a good foundation for creating a long-term online business.
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