Website Ideas

SlanGoFoil2011

Hi,

Curious.

Is there somewhere you can go with website ideas.

Obviously 1) most are are just rubish ideas or 2) are just too expensive to pursue.

But how can you find out if it is rubbish or if someone would be willing to come onboard for a share and help with the development side.

I assume this is a common enough query?

If you cant programme or dont have €20K to pay someone should you just forget your idea or is there a path to follow?

I have had interest in the idea but not from someone who can actually programme and I wouldnt like to risk someone elses money. Even if I did get the money for the development I assume there is a constant requirement for funds to keep a website upto date and free of issue.

Any help apprieciated.

Thanks

BostonB

First off all a website is a business. As such you'd treat it like many other business, and do a business plan, research competitors and see what profit there is vs the costs to generate the profit. As such you questions would be better asked in the business forums than the development ones.

my 2 cents

You'd probably find a student, or graduate who's trying to build up a portfolio of work, who get a rough working prototype going for very little. Assuming the project is actually doable.

SlanGoFoil2011

Thanks - what college seems to specialise in web development- it would probably be a good start.

BostonB

I think you'd have to decide if you need a web designer, or a web developer first. TBH you could design it very roughly all on paper with a pencil, before you went near either.

SlanGoFoil2011

Developer Programmer is what I need.

frezzabelle

SlanGoFoil2011 wrote: »

Developer Programmer is what I need.

A good route would be someone doing a final project to give you a start. But you need some expertise in terms of frameworks, technologies, and deployment. Google do a boiler plate website service that might be worth having a look at. Maybe if you got a developer who backed your ideas you could do a partnership, then again you'd be doing none of the work!

superstrella

Hi what kinda of website/business are you planning on starting? I'm currently studying e-commerce, so might be able to give some advice

Enda_of_Eire

BostonB wrote: »

I think you'd have to decide if you need a web designer, or a web developer first. TBH you could design it very roughly all on paper with a pencil, before you went near either.

Making a proper website requires quite a few skills, Javascript/ html/ css for the client side, and then you would combine it with the server side using Perl scripting within an ajax setup so both sides can talk to each other.
Database would be handled on the server side with the Perl .DBI module and SQL or atleast this is how I handle it.

Then ofcourse Photoshop comes into play for design, and some flash animation if needed but these are soft skills.

Then you can combine all these skills with extra skills, and integrate the website with local software apps, like drop box do. You might use socket programming here but theirs a few ways.

Then you could combine it even further with custom hardware, and have that hardware communicate with your computer via a usb to serial cable, and have that computer communicate via you're app using sockets as a client to a server.exe running on your virtual private server, which then writes the data to a database, for sql queries run from your fancy javascript/ perl website to to make use of the data in some novel way.

I know friends who are in 4th year doing multimedia and their only at the level of css + html and some nice photoshop, so you're best bet is going with the programmer and trying to choose a smart one. Design is over stated, majority of multimedia students *in my oppinion* have got almost no valuable skills.

Theirs a wealth of stuff you can do in javascript and elsewhere that they don't even try to touch. What you need is to find the all rounder guy whos a programmer but creative and basically is very very good at photoshop and dabbles in flash.

Luckily I'm that guy and I'm addicted to both the programming and design sides and very good in all this stuff, and would be interested in taking part (though I'm still a noob in my oppinion compared to what I wan't to be (maths and opengl graphics), and only in 2nd year in college).

If its a really good idea, doesint even have to be good with regard to money because I don't care about that stuff, but a nice project idea that would be challenging and end up with something impressive, I'd happily help for a majority share, but depends on how good an idea if really good 50-50. I've helped with numourous 4th year final projects for friends just to learn.

If its an ok idea but you offer a lot of money I'll help.

If its most likely a bad idea, which from my experience soft-core computer users generally think is a world beater I'll just laugh at you. Even the level of custom hardware supplying data for a site to make something novel with, even at that level all the good ideas are taken (if their were any!).


PM me anyway if you wish but theirs a guy every week posting that he has an unreal idea on a forum and it never is, but only takes one.

BostonB

Enda_of_Eire wrote: »

Making a proper website requires quite a few skills, ....

Indeed, but finding out if its a business that will make money, is probably the most important.

komodosp

So far, you've only said "Website idea", you haven't mentioned whether it's an actual business idea or just an idea for a cool website you'd like to see done.

If it's a business idea, you might find that hiring a student could cause difficulties, the first one to mind is that they, not being paid, won't feel as passionate about it as you, and might not be to keen to maintain it after they've gotten their grade. Besides, aren't projects developed by students (for FYPs, etc.) property of the college? You'd want to check that out I'd say.

OTOH if it's just an idea you have that you think should be on the web, then students might be your ideal candidate.

stevenmu

Enda_of_Eire wrote: »

Design is over stated, majority of multimedia students *in my oppinion* have got almost no valuable skills.

I think it's very easy to underestimate the importance of design. You or I may be perfectly happy to use a site/app which is graphically poor but functionally rich, but Joe Public won't be. Perhaps even more importantly venture capitalists won't be either, unless it's a mind-bogglingly good idea, investors will be very swayed by design and branding. Poor design looks and feels unprofessional and most non-techies will be very put off by that. Good design is as much a skill as good development, and like all skills costs to get it done right.

And I'm saying that as a pure developer with 0 design ability.


(in fact last week was probably the first time in 8+ years development that I got complimented on my UI design, and that was pure Jquery UI/themes )

SlanGoFoil2011

Enda of Eire,

Dont know if it is world beater, but was just ,messing around with it on Excel and pople said it was something they would use online.
Someone I know in graphics did a logo and name and that got very positive feedback so all in all - seems like I might have something to build on.

SlanGoFoil2011

Steve

Have the graphics done to a point as I was asked to present it one time - so needed graphics.

Logo etc is also sorted.

Just the hard bit left

Enda_of_Eire

stevenmu wrote: »

I think it's very easy to underestimate the importance of design. You or I may be perfectly happy to use a site/app which is graphically poor but functionally rich, but Joe Public won't be. Perhaps even more importantly venture capitalists won't be either, unless it's a mind-bogglingly good idea, investors will be very swayed by design and branding. Poor design looks and feels unprofessional and most non-techies will be very put off by that. Good design is as much a skill as good development, and like all skills costs to get it done right.

And I'm saying that as a pure developer with 0 design ability.


(in fact last week was probably the first time in 8+ years development that I got complimented on my UI design, and that was pure Jquery UI/themes )

Jquery themes nice :P.

Good design is as much a skill as good development

I mostly agree with you, except for that point.
Good design is mostly talent based, very little skill.
Photoshop, flash, css their all rather weak and easy to learn, while many computer science and software dev courses now
cover photoshop in some form during the early stages. If you can get one of the many not-square-nerd-all-rounder guys who dabble in it,
then I would not pay for the multimedia designer guy at all, unless their was major funding that I could blow on one.

I know it was either a third or fourth year final term team of FOUR project, where they made a simple css/html/photoshop website, it took them three months.
They posted the link on facebook, thought it was unbelievably amazing. It was just a crappy css website that looked like one of those 40 euro templates.
Their at a very low level from what I can see. Graphics sure they might be useful, but the top interactive websites are generally mostly white and clean with few graphics.

Enda_of_Eire

SlanGoFoil2011 wrote: »

Enda of Eire,

Dont know if it is world beater, but was just ,messing around with it on Excel and pople said it was something they would use online.
Someone I know in graphics did a logo and name and that got very positive feedback so all in all - seems like I might have something to build on.

Sounds like a nice hobby for you,
hope it goes well.

BostonB

For me...a multimedia designer is not a web designer.

I wouldn't be basing my opinion on an industry on what one class of students do either.

Enda_of_Eire

BostonB wrote: »

For me...a multimedia designer is not a web designer.

I wouldn't be basing my opinion on an industry on what one class of students do either.

Oh yes ofcourse I would never base it on one class, I have built this oppinion after respecting them greatly and then getting to know over two years friends and friends of friends from two honours degree classes (one third year and one fourth year) and one from a further education college (level 6).

What they do is weak. It is by far the weakest type of degree of all respected degrees from what I can see. An all rounder computer science student offers almost as much as a multimedia student with regards to just the skills multimedia students can actually provide to a firm (html/css/javascript aka web scripting the programmer is much better, and then theirs just photoshop for graphics in apps/websites which is a weak hobby skill.).

Flash and video are very weak skills to have in life, and are drag and drop + spend days chopping and changing, good luck getting a job with these. Its a hobby course,
they pick the easy route and pay for it after college.

For an honours degree I find it laughable that people respect it so much, and have you ever met the average multimedia student?
I know a lot of them and the majority are annoying ego maniacs thinking their artistic geniuses (just my experience, theirs also nice respectable multimedia students).

I personally place it in the bracket of Arts.

BostonB

This project/product has nothing to to with multimedia so its irrelevant.

Enda_of_Eire

BostonB wrote: »

I think you'd have to decide if you need a web designer, or a web developer first.

BostonB wrote: »

This project/product has nothing to to with multimedia (students) so its irrelevant.

And where do qualified web designers come from then?
I hope you're other 10,000 posts are not as daft as these.

BostonB

Experience and a portfolio. Not some artificial world created by college.

Enda_of_Eire

So you're saying multimedia students are not web designers even though half of their 4 year course is focused on such?

tricky D

Kind of. Somebody who went to college to learn web design isn't that much use, unless they have some very good work experience under their belt or serious talent. Too many of these courses are based on out-of-date practices due to lead time, bad practices and product suite oriented. When looking at CVs, I want some one who can pick up most skills by self-learning from authoritative resources and with real world experience of dealing with customers and other types of users. A college graduate will rarely be preferred over someone with a good portfolio and experience as BB an others say. They may be able to do web design but they're just not that good. Mind you there are also plenty of designers who didn't go to college who aren't that good either.

Feckfox

Enda_of_Eire wrote: »

I mostly agree with you, except for that point.
Good design is mostly talent based, very little skill.
Photoshop, flash, css their all rather weak and easy to learn, while many computer science and software dev courses now
cover photoshop in some form during the early stages. If you can get one of the many not-square-nerd-all-rounder guys who dabble in it,
then I would not pay for the multimedia designer guy at all, unless their was major funding that I could blow on one.

Of course it's a skill. One that they learnt. It's not "weak". That's a ridiculous thing to say

And computer science courses covering photoshop? :eek:

One thing I would say is that a CS student will probably be more into everything to do with a computer/web than another random student - but a lot will half ass the design because they think design is not important.

BostonB

Enda_of_Eire wrote: »

So you're saying multimedia students are not web designers even though half of their 4 year course is focused on such?

You did by saying they were dire. Which they must be if you think the average graduate programmer can do better. Theres something fundamentally wrong there. Either they are truly brutal, or theres something else going on.

BostonB

Feckfox wrote: »

...
One thing I would say is that a CS student will probably be more into everything to do with a computer/web than another random student - but a lot will half ass the design because they think design is not important.

One of the team leads where I work, insisted on the whole interface of his web application, fairly large application, all being in comic sans ms. They produced 3 or 4 large related but different applications, all with the same interface, font, screen design, colours. To the point where users got confused about which application they were in.

You couldn't tell him either.

Deliverance

Enda_of_Eire wrote: »

Jquery themes nice :P.
the top interactive websites are generally mostly white and clean with few graphics.

Can you provide examples of the websites that your are talking about?

BostonB

Deliverance wrote: »

Can you provide examples of the websites that your are talking about?

Apparently this was done by a C++ programmer on work experience from college.

Deliverance

BostonB wrote: »

Apparently this was done by a C++ programmer on work experience from college.

ok, but who decided on the graphic, who decided on how it appeared, who was the hand model, who decided on the white space and who came up with the simple idea of showing it in the ltd space in such a way that the user will 'just get it'.

conor.hogan.2

If the site looks bad I wont go on it, unless its wolfram alpha or something that good or useful which it probably wont be. (ps. im not saying WA is bad looking)

Enda_of_Eire

Deliverance wrote: »

ok, but who decided on the graphic, who decided on how it appeared, who was the hand model, who decided on the white space and who came up with the simple idea of showing it in the ltd space in such a way that the user will 'just get it'.

Sorry but that's very small minded thinking and I shall explain why.

First of all you do realise Computer Science students in most colleges and institutes of technologies cover
whitespace theory etc along with Photoshop/ HTML/ CSS/ Javascript during their web authoring modules.
They have a perfectly good foundation to add to here, these are soft skills to add to.
Photoshop is easy and fun, website design theory could be written on a few pages.

Ok well thats out of the way.

Do you honestly think websites will be as basic as they are now - in 5 years time, with the proliferation of
WebGL and HTML canvas support in all major browsers?

Both of these require strong Javascript programming to even use. Both of these (much more so the WebGL)
will eventually allow web Design that is a million times better than what is currently on offer (Think of the graphics
you're favourite console game has versus the webs current graphics, where maths becomes more
important for design than drag and drop graphic creation, we are moving beyound sprites ).

Half of a multimedia students course centers on the web, be it CSS/ HTML/ Javascript or Photoshop + Theory.
Who do you think could write much better CSS/ HTML/ Javascript? From my experience the CS student can
write fluently, while the Multimedia student can't. Infact these are SO easy for CS students
they mock these languages.

Why do I bring these up? Surely their Developer stuff not Designer stuff.
Nope, Developer stuff is Perl, PHP, SQL, server side stuff. Design stuff
is HTML/ CSS and Javascript which are all used to create everything you see
on a webpage and are client sided.

I remember how pissed off my multimedia student friends were when Steve Jobs
killed off flash from the IPhone and IPad. Flash is a propriety resource hog that
is being made redundent and they are forced to spend about a quarter of their
time studying it without realising how useless it will be to them soon.

WIth flash about to die, and the web moving towards next generation WebGL based
websites, multimedia students as we know them are going to be completely left behind
in their main money making field, we don't need millions and millions of
people to edit video and hold cameras.

At the best you could say their not one bit future proof, but even currently
as I'm arguing, Computer Science students can design websites better than
Multimedia students, bar graphics. But how many graphics do you see on the top
websites that are hard to do? Youtube, Google, this forum, even general nice graphics
on smaller business sites are very easy once you cover the basics.

The multimedia degree is a very soft degree and is the easy fun route in college generally taken
by the Ego maniacs (but also many creative nice people).
Its a very badly structured degree. They should be forced to atleast learn to write javascript
fluently, or rename the course Drag and Drop editing and arty fun Degree.

BostonB

You started off saying that design was not about skills but talent. Then proceeded to explain how its the people with better technical skills who can design better....

In the real just because something is technically better, doesn't mean it will become dominant. Re; Betamax. You won't pay programmers to do design, thats makes no financial sense, and there will most likely be automated tools to do the coding anyway. Not that you can predict the future in technology, in 2yrs it will probably be all different.

What baffles me is why you'd derail someones request for help, into a crusade against multimedia design, and pour derision on what your "friends" in college are doing. None of that helps the OP.

conor.hogan.2

Odd why do I see an ad in the cs dept in UCD for a web site designer?

There is places for both and students from each are better at varying aspects of the other.

BostonB

conor.hogan.2 wrote: »

Odd why do I see an ad in the cs dept in UCD for a web site designer?...

With all the CS students doing Web design, they need someone for Polymorphism.

Feckfox

SlanGoFoil2011 wrote: »

Hi,

Curious.

Is there somewhere you can go with website ideas.

Obviously 1) most are are just rubish ideas or 2) are just too expensive to pursue.

But how can you find out if it is rubbish or if someone would be willing to come onboard for a share and help with the development side.

I assume this is a common enough query?

If you cant programme or dont have €20K to pay someone should you just forget your idea or is there a path to follow?

I have had interest in the idea but not from someone who can actually programme and I wouldnt like to risk someone elses money. Even if I did get the money for the development I assume there is a constant requirement for funds to keep a website upto date and free of issue.

Any help apprieciated.

Thanks

Getting back on track for the OP's sake.

• Is this a business?
• Is this a website you would like to use?

If it has the potential to make money and you want to go down that road, write up a business plan and try contact a developer to co-found it with you. Remember that you have to bring something to the table too, not just a one-off idea.

Money makers:
Ads - Boards.ie and most blogs run off these. To make any sort of money off ads, you need to have a large audience.

Subscriptions - I don't use any subscription based sites but I am sure others do. rememberthemilk.com is a to-do list application which I think survives off a subscription service.

Selling stuff - Online retailer like Amazon or something like a deal service like citydeal and boardsdeals. Or letting users sell stuff and taking a cut of the profits (ebay).

Other - you might be able to think of something else.

Phone apps are another revenue source. You have to decide to give them away free with ads or charge for them.

---

If it's just something you want to use, share the idea everywhere you can and hope someone makes it. Then you can use it! :pac:

SlanGoFoil2011

I have had a few indian and chinesse development companies through boards .ie.

They have offered to get involved and develope and price - but very few details shuch as how this happens etc.

Are these conn jobs or real options if you need development.

If they are how do you explain what you want.

Enda_of_Eire

SlanGoFoil2011 wrote: »

I have had a few indian and chinesse development companies through boards .ie.

They have offered to get involved and develope and price - but very few details shuch as how this happens etc.

Are these conn jobs or real options if you need development.

If they are how do you explain what you want.

Well if I was you I would just look up tutorials on the web and take it as a hobby. Web design is fun and easy to learn, and as you said you're idea is not a world beater. Theirs no money to be made from affiliate ads etc from my own experience. I had a site when I was younger that was getting 40,000 hits a week and it made nothing to speak of.

You would be surprised at the low number of hits you're website will probably get in the first year.

So before spending money I'd recommend you try to make it yourself, even with the use of something like Joomla and take it piece by piece in tutorials. My friend was able to use joomla and photoshop superbly after 8 night time classes, the material in these classes he said was comparatable with 3 hours of Youtube tutorials (15 a piece for both topics, covered everything he needed, and he passed the tests at the end thanks to them).

SlanGoFoil2011

Any recommendations on a corurse.

How long does it take to get trained to be a web developer - do you need to do a 4 year degree to get a job

Or is there respected 1 year courses. (as in an employer will employ you)

Enda_of_Eire

SlanGoFoil2011 wrote: »

Any recommendations on a corurse.

How long does it take to get trained to be a web developer - do you need to do a 4 year degree to get a job

Or is there respected 1 year courses. (as in an employer will employ you)

For web design companies here in cork, well they charge €500-€1000 per 5 page website, which to me is a ripoff if you seen their work. I wen't through the source of some of the more expensive ones, and in one of the Javascript files were two comments, one was "HMM KEEP GETTING ERROR HERE???" - He was missing a second = for a simple if comparison, the second comment (on a seperate companies past work website - no prices on website) was a comment saying something infotech (I wont name companies here) but it was an Indian web design outsourcing company, so they had outsourced the work.

Anyway the point is the level is fairly crap atleast here in Cork, I know one of the companies emailed my college looking for good students who had some spare time. Guessing they want cheap labour like they do by outsourcing.

I wouldn't go down this route in life unless you aim to be a really good web designer/ developer and worth employing over a student or being outsourced. To get to the level most people seem to be at I would say some basic classes and a lot of practice. To get really good, a few modules @ degree level and a thousand of hours of practice in you're own time. Its fun and easy, but this is compared to other things we learn @ degree level, not overall. My friend who took the 8 classes, hes not good enough to be employed. Hes good enough to make ok sites as hobbies.

Maybe others have better and more informed advice tho.

SlanGoFoil2011

Well lets forget web design - what about software design.

Just want to change career - a bit too old for a new 4 year degree.

I have had a few indian and chinesse development companies through boards .ie.

They have offered to get involved and develope and price - but very few details shuch as how this happens etc.

Are these conn jobs or real options if you need development.

If they are how do you explain what you want

but43r

SlanGoFoil2011 wrote: »

Well lets forget web design - what about software design.

Just want to change career - a bit too old for a new 4 year degree.

I have had a few indian and chinesse development companies through boards .ie.

They have offered to get involved and develope and price - but very few details shuch as how this happens etc.

Are these conn jobs or real options if you need development.

If they are how do you explain what you want

Are you still on your original question or has this thread gone in completely different direction??

BostonB

+1. You need to decide what you want to do here. Its start a business, build website as a hobby, or become a developer, designer. I don't think you know yourself which makes it hard for anyone else to answer for you.

This may not be directly relevent, but you might find it interesting.
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=69929616&postcount=11

There are some great Indian developers and companies, some say they will make most indigenousness software development redundant simply because they can be much cheaper. (I don't agree with that completely myself) However there are bad Indian developers, too. Just as there are good and bad Irish ones. So But you are way ahead of yourself thinking about that. You need to work out what you want to do.

At the end of the day it will come down to budget. If you don't have one then developing a live site yourself, getting it wrong, and fixing it will teach you a lot. You are what you do.

swordofislam

My experience of Chinese software development companies is very bad. That said Easeus are Chinese and they make a good product. My experience of outsourced development in India is quite positive. That said unless you know what you want you cannot get what you want.

Sparks

Enda_of_Eire wrote: »

For web design companies here in cork, well they charge €500-€1000 per 5 page website, which to me is a ripoff if you seen their work.

The usual reason that €500-€1000 is charged is that commercial websites make far more than that in business arising from the website. If you build something for someone and it makes them €50-60k p.a. for a four or five year lifespan, how much should you charge them for it?


As to the worth of outsourcing, I like the social worth of the idea and a lot of managers and bean counters love the initial accounting figures, but I've never yet encountered a real-world example of outsourced code that worked well enough to be considered fit for purpose, and I've spent quite a lot of time re-working code (or even rewriting it from scratch) because the outsourcing went horribly badly.

SlanGoFoil2011

Thanks for that feedback.

In other industries (not software), going to India and China always looks good on paper - but ends up costing alot in man hours down the line.

tricky D

It only works if you can put together a really really tight spec and can enforce it effectively. A big ask and risky. If you can't do that, it's usually a false economy.