Solid gold advice from David Rivers on how to approach visual design for web applications. This is not visual design as in making things pretty - it’s visual design as in proper problem solving.
Even just listening to the first couple of minutes gives you his 9 principles - Using The Stage; Attention Grabbers; Consistency; Interaction Planes; Borders, Boxes and Alignment; Fonts; Colour, Lighting and Branding; Affordances; Mocking Up With Real Data.
But he goes on to talk about other aspects, including my favourite stuff which was about designing data views for web apps - combining columns, using up to five shades of grey to differentiate, avoiding alternating row colours. And best of all, he points out that the ‘visited link’ state makes almost no sense in a web app. (As opposed to an information-rich website, where it’s vital). I can safely say that no-one’s mentioned that crucial distinction to me before!