Aidan Williams - High Acuity

At my company we’re currently working on our new website. It’s an incredible experience to see what I believe to be such a fantastically talented group of people all vying to give their input on something that will represent us all to the rest of the world.

We came to a point recently where we had to make a final decision on a vital part of the website in terms of accessibility VS design. As a producer and the head of my department, I was fighting for accessibility, while the two Swedish designers in my company (who are, to be fair, f**king talented), were fighting hard for the design.

The major point for me is that this website has to represent every department as best as it possibly can. And if I’m going to be talking about accessibility in the media, then our website has to have the highest level of accessibility, combined with design, xhtml, development, etc – or we’re going to get laughed at. Also – any potential employees for my department have to come to our website and realise that this is the level of code we’re looking for.

Anyway – I’ve made quite light of this whole event as it actually spanned a couple of weeks, since we were all so busy with other things, and the designers (who I have a lot of respect for) and myself had a few arguments about it.

By the time we had the last meeting about it and one of the directors made the final decision, we were all a bit exhausted – we’re all so passionate about our individual areas of expertise, that each of the three of us who really cared about this point gave it our all. So this morning, I sent them both this email:

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Hi guys,

I’m sorry we couldn’t work out a solution that we were all happy with for the navigation problem and I hope you know that I wasn’t just doing it to be stubborn and I certainly don’t think that I ‘won’ anything - I/we were just trying to find a solution. I think we’re going to find lots of times in the future, from now on, where we’re going to be challenging each other - next time – bring your boxing gloves - b*tches!

Take care.

Aidan

PS – I win – you lose!
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… about thirty seconds after I sent it, one of the two designers in question burst out laughing at his desk, looked over at me and said “You f***ing c**t! and the other sat quietly and unresponsive and sent me this email:

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I was raised in the Bronx. My mother raised me on water and b*tch slaps. I don’t give a sh*t. Avant Garde however, that’s my niggah right there.
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And I sent this response:

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I’m considering putting on some traditional Irish music and doing a victory jig/dance – but I thought that might be taking too far – it still might happen though!

Watch this space!

Aidan
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Last week we launched a new viral marketing campaign for Myla, entitled “Pleasure Like No Other” – it’s meant to be a spoof of the Sony Bravia ad and I love the final version – it’s all filmed on and around Portobello Road here in London, very close to where I work and also the home to Myla’s main headquarters in London.

We pitched the concept to Myla a couple of months ago and no one (aside from the Art Director at my company) was sure how it would turn out, but I think it’s fantastic! We had a great launch party in the studio bar last Wednesday evening and Myla were extatic with the results. Sanjit designed the site last week and I produced the site on Tuesday.

Enjoy!

I worked from home today on a new site we’re doing for the United Nations. I’m already in the middle of a few large projects, but I really wanted to work on this site, so I worked from home and managed to get it all done in one day! All valid and compliant.

My dad sent me a really nice card after we met a couple of weekends ago:

Aidan,

Congratulations on all you’ve already achieved.

Please take a break from time to time.

Looking forward to seeing you again soon – scheduled late September.

Much love.

Dad

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The picture on the card is of the entrance to the Athenaeum, A private London gentleman’s club which he’s been a member of since before I was born.