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Lynda and Bruce.
Lynda and Jamie.
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It is hard to be in the Web development world for very long without
finding a reference to Lynda.com. If you don't find the Web site, surely
you will bump into a book relating to Web design by Lynda Weinman. It's
not that Lynda is everywhere —she is just everywhere that Web developers
want to go.
With a unique blend of serious learning and humor, respect for the
business of Web design and a practical, common sense perspective on
the Web, Lynda has helped countless designers increase their knowledge
and produce better work.
Contrast and balance was the overriding theme I found in my conversations
with Lynda. She has been at the forefront of Web development from the
early days of the explosion, writing her first book in 1995, and following
with 10 more to date. Yet, when I suggested that she was helping to
shape the future of the Web, she resisted that idea, claiming that she
simply learned the new technology and made it easy to understand.
Lynda is serious about her career, devoted to teaching and writing,
and strongly tied to family. Her highly successful Ojai Training Center
began as a solution to too much travel. At the height of her career
growth, having lived all her life in Los Angeles, she moved OUT of the
city to Ojai, California, a town of 6,000. Ojai is a great place for
her daughter Jamie to grow up, but the move was certainly opposite to
common patterns for someone in the midst of a high tech world.
But as you talk to Lynda you realize that she is not a star. She really
is 100% teacher at heart, albeit a gifted one, with strong opinions
on the best way to transfer information to others. One who, luckily
for us, absorbs new technology like a sponge and is committed to filtering
techno-talk into language and concepts that all can understand.
Make sure you visit Lynda.com and see
the exciting new features that have been added, including forums and
tutorials.
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Update on the FlashForward
2000 conference in San Francisco ... sold out!
Just a few of the many Web development books Lynda
has written since 1995. See Lynda.com
for a complete listing.
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Wendy: What is front and center for you right now in
your career. Will we see a new book soon? Video, public appearances?
Lynda: The FlashForward 2000 conference and Flash film festival
is the first conference I've ever developed (with partner Stewart McBride
of United Digital Artists). It's the world's first Flash conference,
and its first venue in San Francisco is almost sold out.
By the time this interview is published, the conference will be in
session (March 27 - 29)! The keynote sessions are being webcast by Apple
and Real Networks. We plan two more this year -- one in NY and one in
Europe later this fall. It's very exciting to get all these Flash developers
together from all over the world, and we've got a world-class program
to offer them. Lynda.com is in the planning stages on a few other conferences
as well, which I won't talk about until they're real.
I've just finished PhotoShop 5.5/ImageReady 2.0 for the Web Hands-On
Training (HOT)— a new 500 page book that took me five months to
write. It's all tutorial based, and I think it's a great way to teach
yourself these tools.
My other book in the HOT series is on Dreamweaver2, and we're updating
it right now for Dreamweaver 3. We have a slew of new videos coming
out — one on advanced Flash with Josh Ulm, an Advanced PhotoShop
video, and we're working on Dreamweaver 3 for an April release. Our
first DVD is coming out this month on PhotoShop/ImageReady for the Web.
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