DECENTRALIZE ! The 'center' tag is the most overused tag of Msntvers. Centering kills character. To center everything on a page will give it all the charm of a FBI wanted poster. Look at this typical page; there are not enough images nor information to justify it's lenth. By a simple change of alignment (and color in this case), the same elements are presented on a non-scrolling page with room to spare. If you can't build a page without center tags, at least align one or two elements to the right or left, just to keep things a little interesting. THINK SMALL TO THINK BIG ! Your sceen size is your canvas. The smaller your images and graphics are, the more spacious your page will appear to be. Huge graphics and text will make your page look cramped and confined. This concept should be easy to understand, you dork. MAKE YOURSELF CLEAR ! Every site builder should have a plain transparent gif. You can push images and text almost anywhere using one. Applying a clear gif for layout is the oldest trick, it still is used. There's a bunch on this page. Make one any size, then use the 'width' and 'height' tags to adjust the size as needed, no matter how distorted. This used to be a no-no, but no browser has a problem with it anymore. Too lazy to make one? Steal mine. TABLES ENABLE ! I highly recommend learning basic table codes. professional designers , both mainstream and cutting-edge, couldn't produce any site without 'em. Tables place images and text exaclly where you want. You can make lines, blocks of color, even insert tables within tables. If you don't know how to build tables, but know about things like CSS or Javascript, forget what you are doing, and take 10 steps back. Tables should be thought as part of your basic HTML. Learn them now, or forever hold your page. If you're versed in tables, push their ability as layout tools. If you're an expert of table codes, impress us! Seeing masters wasting their wisdom to make a table of links such as "Betty's Slow-Loading Page of 10-year-old Gifs", makes one weep. By the way, just because the 'table border' tag exists, doesn't mean you have to use it.....every damn time. The pros always have their code set at border="0". Instead, you should try a mix of 'table' and 'td' backgrounds. WIDE OPEN SPACES ! Pages crammed with information are great for commercial sites, but isn't recommended for personal sites. If you have a lot of text or images on a page, provide some empty areas, as seen to the left. This is called 'visual relief', we all need it. GIVE BREAKS A BREAK ! Writing headlines and links doesn't mean you have to have three breaks between lines of text. Using an absurd amount of "br" tags is a shameful waste of space.

Below is a rehash of the 'before-n-after" examples on this page, just to drill it into your head...

this, not this.

Remember, layout is about where you should stick it....