Oprah: We have on the show with us today, writer and web edi­tor Amber Simmons. So tell me, Amber, how you got to be so pas­sion­ate about web content.

Amber: I used to be a web designer. While in the field, I ran across a lot of bad con­tent, and even more peo­ple who didn’t care that their con­tent was bad. They wanted these flashy sites – eye candy, basi­cally – but they didn’t want to invest the time or the money into cre­at­ing any­thing of substance.

As much time as we spend online today, so much of our daily intake of lit­er­a­ture, infor­ma­tion, and news comes from the web. So that con­tent needs to feed us. It needs to be rich, and won­der­ful, and mean­ing­ful. If the web is going to con­tinue to be a cor­ner­stone of our cul­ture, the con­tent that com­poses it needs to be badass.

Oprah: So why is so much of the web, ah, excuse my lan­guage, but, crap?

Amber: There are a lot of rea­sons. It takes a con­sid­er­able effort to cre­ate a good read­ing expe­ri­ence online. It takes cog­nizance of what your vis­i­tors need and expect. And it takes a range of tal­ents to cre­ate a well-rounded experience.

But good con­tent requires a lot of plan­ning. It requires a lot of coop­er­a­tion amongst many dif­fer­ent par­ties. And it requires some­one who knows what they’re doing and who loves the web for what it is. And site own­ers don’t always have that.

Oprah: You said you used to be a web designer? How come this site is so unimpressive?

Amber: *laugh­ing* Thanks for bring­ing that up, Oprah! I got really burned out in web design. When I thought about what I needed my site to do, the answer was really obvi­ous. I needed a site that was easy to read. I needed some­thing that let the con­tent be the focus. I wanted big words, big, bright titles, and inter­ested lead images. I’m never going to win any design awards, so why clut­ter up the page with “design ele­ments”? I fig­ure my read­ers just want the content.

Oprah: So why the web? I know you’re first and fore­most a writer. Why the web and not some other medium?

Amber: I love the web. I love, live, breathe the web. I adore it. I love the free­dom it grants cul­ture cre­ators, and the oppor­tu­nity for explo­ration it presents to learn­ers and folks who just want to be entertained.

I’m a free cul­ture evan­ge­list. I think copy­right laws need a major over­haul and I think the DMCA sucks. I think it’s impor­tant to share infor­ma­tion, ideas, and cre­ative impulses. I believe in a read/write cul­ture where the con­sumers are the cre­ators and vice versa. Slay the mid­dle man.

So, I mean, I chose the web because it lets peo­ple share. Lowers the bar­rier to entry. It allows me to find out almost any­thing from my lap­top. I love the oppor­tu­ni­ties the web pro­vides. That’s not to say we don’t have a long way to go. The web is still in its infancy, and it can do bet­ter. But I think it will do bet­ter. We just have to work to get there.