iPad-ready? Apple works the web standards angle

In celebration of the iPad retail launch, Apple has created a gallery of iPad-ready websites that are said to embrace “the latest web standards—including HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript”. That is, no Flash. You can even add your site to the gallery (scroll to the bottom).

Is Apple really opening up?

Let’s get the snark out of the way: a gallery, really? How novel. Right now there’s a vertical list (no Cover Flow?) of 20 top-tier websites. Will Apple really painstakingly update this list and add every possible HTML5/CSS3/JS-ready site submitted?

It’s a rare thing for Apple to lead a user-generated campaign like this but its best intentions are a thin veil over their real agenda—eliminating the competition and expanding further in the multimedia business. Does it really care about anything other than the big fish? What are the odds that the most humble of websites will even get into the gallery? Apple markets its products by partnering with the largest corporations that fit into its plans; I can’t imagine caring for the little guy in all of this.

This isn’t even in the same league as the iTunes app store—whose contents number in the hundreds of thousands—but could easily apply the profit-based and biased policies anyway. Not what I would call open or little guy friendly.

Is Apple a true web standards crusader?

Speaking of the app store: you can also develop specifically for the iPhone/iPod/iPad family using the SDK, but those apps don’t work in other devices. The mobile web is booming because of both the “web standards way” and the “mobile app” way, but how are device-specific apps any better than Flash apps (which happen to be cross-platform outside of Apple’s products)? Flipping off Flash when HTML5 and CSS3 aren’t ready isn’t a very responsible thing to do.

If Apple really wants to promote web standards, it should be doing a lot more with its resources to convert and educate people. The gallery is one thing, this documentation is another good step, but where are the resources for developing in HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript? Partnerships with web standards groups like WaSP? Zeldman or one of the Super Friends speaking at the keynote?

If Apple really wants to promote web standards, see how it practically equates HTML5 with Flash-free media and nothing more. No oohs and ahs over CSS3′s text shadows and rounded corners or HTML5′s geolocation and <canvas>. This is the perfect opportunity to introduce the mainstream crowd to the wonders of these new technologies, yet all it’s pushing is anti-Flash propaganda.

One more thing…

Dear Apple, you’ve done a lot of groundbreaking things, but if you’re going to use web standards as a selling point for your most adjective-ridden product ever, you can do a hell of a lot better than an an anti-Flash gallery.

FontStruct knows how to sell itself

A great product sells itself. In the case of FontStruct, which is a Flash-based tool for font design, its creators took no chances and went all out to promote it in the latest issue of their email newsletter: one full page showing what you can do with FontStruct.

Beautiful fonts created with FontStruct are put on display using powerful praises.

(The image above emphasizes only one testimonial. It would be too long if I put everything on the right side in full size.)

This is how you sell your product. You show it in action. And because we’re talking about typography here, nothing goes with beautiful type better than beautiful words. It also happens to be the smartest way to spice up testimonials, or similarly short pieces of text.

As long as you build a good product, you won’t have to worry about either the by-products or marketing copy. I mentioned “by-products” because aside from being a web-based tool, FontStruct is also a user-generated website. I know user-generated sites suffer from high noise-to-signal ratios and people are starting to doubt the “wisdom of the crowds”. But in creative environments like FontStruct, you tend to attract talented producers and enthusiastic consumers. Especially when coupled with a tool that works well.

If you’re looking for cool new fonts to play with, try FontStruct. You’re in for a pleasant surprise.