I'm not the only Brad Coughlin.

So as I’m searching Twitter (using http://search.twitter.com) for the trending top #swineflu, I notice something pretty obvious. Twitter users are popping up with names like @AboutSwineFlum, @swinefluh1n1, @swineflualerts and @swineflucast. Apparently these users are creating accounts to directly relate to a trending topic – very clever. But how will this affect Twitter as a news source in the future?

Right now when a hot new topic comes up it rapidly becomes a trend on twitter. Searching the topic returns primarily relevant data from real people. If ‘trendbots’ take over every new trend, will it drown out the tweets from human users? Can Twitter prevent users from essentially spamming a trending topic by tweeting the same message and hashtag over and over? Will this tactic ultimately dilute the relevance of Twitter search?

I don’t know. But I’m guessing it will cause some backlash from Twitter users. I’m already finding it irritating only minutes from noticing the trend.

Examples of the spammy user accounts:

This is just a question for the internet community at large. Has anyone seen this issue before when creating animated GIFs? Firefox plays the animation in ‘real-time’ without delay, but Internet Explorer (6, 7, haven’t tried 8 ) plays the file considerably slower. The video below demonstrates what I’m talking about.

This is a extremely simple but effective user-interface design for a local IT company I used to work for.

Met some very cool people at Omaha Tweetup #4 downtown at the Nomad. Thanks to Dusty and Jeff from BIGOmaha for sponsoring the tweetup. Very distinctive bar establishment with huge wooden pillars, open industrial ceilings and very swank-looking drapes everywhere adding to the moodiness and overall cool factor.

Several people were bemoaning the fact that they had to re-print their business cards to include their @whoever name on twitter. I of course did not plan for this either, but fortunately mine is just a predictable @bradcoughlin.

With BIGOmaha only a few weeks away, it was a great oppurtunity to put faces to at-names prior to the event. A couple of folks like @pingpongin and @88improv had only been on Twitter for a matter of days! Props to them for getting out into the twitterverse so early in their Twitter-ing careers.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, go check out Anne Good’s Daily Dog Blog over at www.agOutLoud.com. (It was great to meet you guys. Look forward to seeing you in a few weeks! Go Gary V!)

P.S. Please excuse my very un-personalized blog theme. At least it’s getting some content : )

Please check back soon, as I will be adding articles, a brand new website portfolio and more. Thank you!

You can visit http://www.bradpc.com for more information and to reach me via my contact form.

Here’s a nifty animated .gif design I created for a Twitter contest. I believe the contest was one of the first of its kind, and spawned many clone contests thereafter. Animated GIFs are easier for analytics programs to track. Building a relatively smooth one under 150 kilobytes takes some practice. This one features the Flip MinoHD camera, and weighs in at only 75 KB. It’s pretty much no-nonsense but is high-contrast to attract attention.

This banner has a 4 or 5 part message for the viewer, then a call to action button placed strategically below the text once the message has been played. Bright, high-contrast orange and green colors set this advertisement apart from the light blue elements on the original web page.

A prescription drug online pharmacy website needed a splash page to welcome visitors prior to their initial launch. This design fills a 1920 x 1280 pixel area, filling the screen of very high resolution monitors. The content box in the middle is designed to contain the brief welcome message in html.

Prescription Drug Website Splash Page