Google+, Hipster, Connect.me and Instagram! They all hit a gazillion users in no time at all — and you can even read all about it in everyday media today. This is every product creator’s dream. Ok, granted, Google already had their users well before the launch of its social extension. But how did the other ones succeed in building such a strong fellowship in a few months (or even days)? Turns out that many of these services’ creators were very busy bees and made small details about their product’s launch addictive. It even turns...

   There are many elements that make up any visual design, whether it’s good or not. Becoming familiar with the parts of a design is necessary before you can start to apply the principles of good design to your own work, in the same way that a doctor needs to have an understanding of anatomy before he can learn to heal a patient. There are seven basic elements of any design. Some are easier to grasp than others, but all are important. Once you can identify the elements of a design, whether it’s your own or someone else’s, you can learn how the...

   Today, the market consists of countless synthetic materials that showcase the talent and hard research of man. However, at the core of these products are four elements that have existed since time can remember: earth, air, fire and water. The elements have long been thought of as the essential materials to sustain the human race. However, in the modern age, these elements are starting to be an aesthetic source for man-made projects, such as exterior architecture, interior design and packaging. Now they have made their footprint on design in the technological age,...

   In 2002, Mark Newhouse published the article "Taming Lists", a very interesting piece in which he explained how to create custom list markers using pseudo-elements. Almost a decade later, Nicolas Gallagher came up with the technique pseudo background-crop which uses pseudo-elements with a sprite. Today, on the shoulders of giants, we’ll try to push the envelope. We’ll discuss how you can style elements with no extra markup and using a bidi-friendly high-contrast proof CSS sprite technique. The technique will work in Internet Explorer 6/7 as well. Starting...