HTML is the foundation of the web, the core language that all web pages are written in. Like all coding languages it has gone through a series of revisions, and currently stands at version 4.01 - where it has been stuck since 1999.

So HTML 4.01 has been around for 10 years, which is a long time when it comes to the internet. Things have moved on a lot since then - the web is now increasingly interactive and many sites are more like applications than sets of pages, as they were predominantly back in 1999. And, as the web has progressed, it has increasingly been straining the bounds of what is possible with the current HTML specs, which is why the long-awaited next revision, HTML 5, has been getting a lot of people (read: developers) excited recently.

What will an HTML 5 web look like?

HTML 5 offers the promise of native support for video and audio playback, something that currently requires proprietary browser plug-ins such as Adobe Flash or Microsoft Silverlight to achieve. Why does this matter? Because the web is built and has succeeded due to its use of open, non-proprietary standards, and these browser plugins break that paradigm. What happens if Adobe goes bust and stops developing its Flash Player? Or decides to start charging for its usage? With native support for audio and video, the web is no longer reliant on one commercial entity, which is a very good thing. It also includes native APIs for doing drawing on the web, via the <canvas> element.

HTML 5 will also bring in a new era of accessibility tools which will greatly benefit web users with disabilities. It also includes better tools for the developing of web applications and user-interaction elements of pages such as web forms, all of which will eventually lead to a greatly improved experience for users.

And last, but by no means least, HTML 5 will allow developers to mark up their documents in a more semantic manner than is currently possible. Whilst the average web user wont notice the difference, this is an important step in keeping the web well structured and as accessible as possible to both people and entities such as search engines and whatever tools appear in the future to help us navigate the vast pool of knowledge that exists on the internet.

There is a lot more to HTML 5, but that about covers the highlights.

So when will HTML 5 be ready for use?

Well, currently the spec is in ‘working draft’ form, and the bad news is that it’s expected finalisation date is… 2022. Yep, in thirteen years time. But don’t worry! The majority of browser vendors are already implementing parts of the draft spec (with the newly released Firefox 3.5 and Safari 4.0 leading the pack), and in the next couple of years we will start to see plenty of sites starting to use elements of HTML 5. In fact, sites such as uxlondon.com are already sporting a shiny new HTML 5 doctype. And our own VGroup site will soon be getting a bit of a revamp to incorporate some HTML5 goodness, so keep watching this space!

VGroup has recently completed the branded event collateral for The International Capital Market Association’s (ICMA) Annual General Meeting and Conference. This years’ AGM took place in Montreux, Switzerland, at the Fairmont Le Montreux Palace on 3rd-5th June 2009. Although we won this project with ICMA last year, we’ve been beavering away since then on a whole suite of eye catching materials. Once the win had been announced, we made the final touches to the ‘Montreux 09’ - logotype which was conceived from opaque geometric shapes. This was then used over a period of time for various email campaigns to start promoting the event. Printed and digital marketing materials were produced, all designed to target registrations of delegates to attend the event and to draw on sponsorship opportunities.

A suite of colourful, eye catching and stylish collateral, including a sponsorship brochure and invitations, were sent to those who had registered to attend the event. They were sent an AGM Pack specially designed with the Montreux 09 branding, to give instant recognition. We also produced adverts for various financial publications, web banner advertising and exhibition graphics to include pop-up and pull-up banners. Our interactive team also updated the design to the ICMA Online Meeting Planner; due to the success of last year’s AGM this was a vital tool, since it enabled delegates attending the event to arrange a meeting with other delegates at a time of their choice and chosen location. Once a delegate logged on to the meeting planner and entered their email address, they could see who else was attending and request a meeting with that person, they in turn received an email notification of the request and subsequently has the choice to accept. With over 600 international attendees we’ve been told the event was a great success and a good time had by all.

Often many clients ‘forget’ to include budget for copywriting, because they don’t realise how important copy is, and what a big difference professionally written copy can make. Copywriting is one of those stages that clients sometimes like to ‘shelve’ when we present them with the estimate for a job. “We can write the copy ourselves” is a line you hear now and then, and your heart sinks. We know we are going to have to spend a lot of time working on that copy - proof reading, polishing it and sometimes re-writing it to try and make it usable. But, it will never be as good as it could be. False economy, I would say. If money was spent on using a professional copywriter (which isn’t that expensive anyway), one would get good quality copy from the beginning, and not have to spend time (and money) trying to get it right at the last minute.

A copywriter generally writes for promotional purposes - to promote a product, business, person or idea - and can work within a wide range of media such as print, web, television or radio. They differ from other writers, who might write books, magazines or newspapers, and are called journalist or writer, not copywriter - even though they all write copy. A copywriter is trained in seeking out your business’ core values and promotes them in the right tone, to optimise understanding and credibility of your business. Consulting a copywriter will not just ensure correct language and grammar, but you will benefit from on-brand copy, using the correct language style to suit your messaging. Professional copywriters work against jargon and make sure the text actually communicates what it is intended to, for the right target.

Copywriting becomes increasingly important when it comes to writing web content. The web is where most of us search for what we need, and it is here you can (literally) get your copy to work hard for you, driving traffic to your site through SEO (search engine optimisation). Text appearing in specific locations (for example in the navigation, title, headings and page content) attracts search engines, which compare this information with the information from other sites. SEO copywriting strives to get the your web page to rank high in searches through the strategic placing and repetition of keywords and uses unique copy to distinguish it from other pages that would come up in a similar search. However, just as important with SEO copywriting is to produce effective, persuasive text, to keep the reader on the site and generate sales. However good the SEO is, if the text isn’t of highly quality, potential buyers will leave the site. That is when copywriting has become a very costly business. You can’t really afford not to spend money on good copywriting, since bad copywriting = bad results, whatever the media.

Whilst looking to see what events were happening in London during the summer, I noticed that this year’s Design Art London fair has been renamed the Pavilion of Arts & Design London, and will feature a stronger decorative art element. The reason for the renaming is that the organisers have developed the concept to mirror Paris event Pavilion des Arts et du Design Paris.

The London fair will be held in Berkeley Square, Mayfair, from 14-18 October. It will be worth a visit since as part of the fair, designers - including Zaha Hadid, Philippe Starck and Mattia Bonetti - will produce miniature chairs for children to be sold at the event, with all proceeds donated to the NSPCC.

As part of the roll out of the new brand we have created for Archer-Hoblin we have designed vinyl graphics for the hoardings that surround their current building developments. The above picture was sent to us by the signage compnay on completing the first facia installation.

The fresh new green colour used for the logo of their Community division logo has a real imapact against the dark blue hoarding. Being in a prominent location on Ealing Broadway in London this will create a real impact and we hope push the new brand in the right direction.

(don’t worry… the old logo on the white board in the background will be replaced soon)

We just received this picture of pop-up stand and table that we have designed for KNEIP. Fresh Display took the snap for us when they had printed and assembled, it’s great to see our work at such a large scale! The striking stand and table are headed for the Monaco to brand KNEIP’s space at Fund Forum 2009. We think it’s looking great, and builds on the work we’ve done on KNEIP’s global rebrand and press ads.

Get out from behind you computer screens and see some type in the real world (well, while the sun is still shining) on a typographic tour of London, which run monthly. Also available are Baskerville’s Birmingham or get out of the UK altogether and have a jaunt around Typographic Rimini or Amsterdam.

Fancy a bit of nostalgia? With over 12,000 original items of packaging from Victorian times to present day the Museum of Brands, Packaging and Advertising is the place to get your fix.

For all you fashionistas, head to the Berkeley Hotel for an afternoon tea with a couture twist. Prêt-à-Portea is inspired by themes and current style from the fashion world. The menu is redesigned every 6 months by the likes of Alexander McQueen, Christian Louboutin, and Oscar de la Rent so your cakes are never out of fashion. God forbid.

Smell the print at St Bride Library. 50,000 books, 3,500 periodicals and a heap of artifacts from wood block to lithographic stones will show you everything there is to know about printing, books, binding and type. If you don’t just want to look at it, you can book a day workshop at Harrington and Squires for £125 day fee. Other letterpress workshops and courses are available from Letterpress Alive.

See the world FIRST continuous paper making machine at the Frogmore Paper Mill which has been in operation since 1219 when it used to alternate between making paper and flour making depending on the community requirements.

Insider London offers a whole host of design related tours around London. You could opt for their Innovative Interiors tour, which will show you futuristic egg toilets, an indoor rainforest and a cave made from (real!) gold in and around the cafes and stores of London. Or you may prefer the Modern Architecture, Cutting Edge Green (floating garden, anyone?) or Ethical Fashion tours.

Certainly on my design geek to-dos is a visit to the Basel Paper Museum in Switzerland where you can make your own paper from clothing rags as has been done here since 1453. (I first saw this on Stephen Fry’s super-duper documentary about the Gutenberg Press.)

They say we live, breath and sleep it, so why not put your head down for the night in a design hotel? Design Hotels showcases the best of the best from the slick and sophisticated to the weird and wacky, but all of them are amazing.

Remember to send us a postcard!

VGroup Interactive are passionate about great information architecture when it comes to websites, and this is a key part of our methodology. So when planning a new suite of websites as part of the recent Archer-Hoblin Group rebrand, we enjoyed the similarities between both the architecture that we do, and the architecture that Archer-Hoblin do.

A major part of the rebrand was a big shift in brand architecture, with the Archer-Hoblin Group being divided into six divisions, reflecting the areas of specialisation that Archer-Hoblin has evolved into in recent years. Accordingly, the new websites each needed to work as stand alone entities, such as archerhoblinprojects.com, and as part of the group suite of sites as users approach the Group online from archerhoblin.com.

Launch campaign
The new brand and the websites were launched via an integrated marketing campaign involved direct mail and email shots to Archer-Hoblin’s clients, prospects and suppliers. Different segments of the database received printed brochures, invitations to download online brochures, or a pack of printed cards representing each section, which invited the recipient to get architectural and put them together in whichever way they fancied.

The website launch and email campaign was all tracked via our email broadcast tool linked in with Google Analytics, so we were able to provide the client with feedback on traffic to the websites as a result of the campaign, and stats on how many brochures from each division were downloaded.

New technologies
The website also launched a live web cam feed of one of their community housing projects in progress. By exposing the inner workings of their construction sites to the world, web cam is part of Archer-Hoblin’s commitment to transparency – Archer-Hoblin’s faith in their Health and Safety practises.

VGroup facilitated the installation of a web camera, wireless connection and dedicated ADSL phone line on the Ealing site, and integrated this camera feed into the Archer-Hoblin Community website.

The camera feed will also allow Archer-Hoblin to build time lapse videos of the development being completed, as well as extra security for the site.

As a collaborative copywriters group, The Copy House had the words but needed help with representing themselves visually.

During our initial meetings with them, they brought along a pile of their sketchbooks, notes and scribbles that form part of their creative copywriting process and we wanted to reflect this energy and bespoke approach in their brand identity with something a little more fluid and hand rendered.

Working on your own company projects is sometimes very difficult as you are often too close to them, so we muscled in on their job [copywriting] and also came up with their new strapline–where words live–that we think sits perfectly with the new brand.

One of the issues copywriters find in promoting their services is that people are often unclear of about what a copywriter is and can offer, so we opted for an approachable font and an interchangeable suite of cheery colours to start the dialogue. As they, The Copy House, work for varied clients from website designers to lawyers, we gave them the option of customising the colour palette of the brand to appeal to these various different sectors.

The Copy House name and symbol represents a place where a collection of creative copywriters, editors, user experience buffs and scriptwriters all work under one roof and can be cherry picked from to work and collaborate on specific of copy jobs projects relevant to their expertise…. It really is a place where words live!

They also wanted something a little different, yet still cost effective for the their stationery, so we chose an unusual but inexpensive 100% recycled grey board for business cards on which the information was foil blocked in just one colour. We had a rubber stamp made for the house symbol to be applied by hand in differently coloured inks for that extra personal touch.

We are currently working on their website and other materials but hope they are already starting to feel at home with their new brand.

You can see The Copy House new branding on their Twitter page: twitter.com/thecopyhouse

Recently VGroup have been involved in designing and supplying promotional gifts for our client Natures Way Foods, amongst others. The NWF items will be used by their staff to coincide with the recent implementation of designed canvasses and wall graphics throughout their offices, adding brand awareness internally, and also they will be given to their customers. Apart from consideration given to the design, time was spent on researching the right products to suit the client, their corporate brand personality and indeed their staff. Getting this wrong, even with the right design, can provide a negative response, which is totally the opposite effect to what you want to achieve.

We have also created a collection of Baringa Partners promotional items recently. Baringa is an international consulting company with extensive knowledge of Energy and Financial Markets so they chose branded stress balls, a wooden puzzle/brain teaser and a sophisticated silver pen with their logo engraved.

The point I am trying to make is that selecting and designing suitable promotional material is very important, because you can get it wrong and risk damaging your brand instead of improving it. Recently a colleague received a promo mug in the post which is the size of a fish bowl, so heavy you can hardly lift it, I can’t imagine the postage costs. The ironic thing is that it was sent by a Sports company, which doesn’t at all fit their image… a large heavy mug?! Exactly.

So, if you think it’s time to update your promotional items, please let us know, so we can help you to make sure it’s ’on-brand’.