Jason Fried - Preview 3: Highrise welcome and workspace tabs:

"The blank slate is the first screen someone sees when they log into a web-app for the first time. It’s what they see when there isn’t any data. It’s the critical first impression.

We pay a lot of attention to the blank slate states. I think Highrise has at least 8 of them. One for almost ever major feature and some special “almost-blank slates” for screen with just a little bit of data. Some blank slates go away instantly while others go away after you’ve done something three times."