eBay Save Homes from "Fibber McGee's Closet" Syndrome
NEWS FLASH!
....Complicated stuff sold to unknowing public who, after beating heads against walls, squirrel it away in closets and pass it off to other rubes on eBay....
Read all about it in Seductive Electronic Gadgets Are Soon Forgotten
"People acquire these things — hand-held personal digital assistants, flatbed scanners, compact disc copiers and a host of other objects — because they promise to make life more efficient, more fun, or, some confess, simply because they appear to help them keep up with what their 'wired' friends and neighbors have.
But many such products are simply too complicated for their own good. And all too often, the buyers find that they cannot really change their lives just by acquiring something new and different."
"Ms. Kirschner, 52, has developed a theory, which she said applied not only to herself but to most anyone buying gadgets. "If the setup is hard and you're not sure why you need it, chances are it will head to the graveyard," she said. "If you really need it, by dogged determination you'll make that thing work."
More:
- Fibber McGee's Closet
- Photo: Fibber McGee's Closet
- Don Norman: The Perils of Home Theater
October 15, 2003
Men say too many legit emails = spam
From He Spammed, She Spammed:
"Men were more frustrated, offended, by e-mails from companies they may have done business with but haven't given permission" for e-mail, said Scott Knoll, vice president of marketing solutions at New York-based DoubleClick.
"And even if they do give permission, men react strongly to getting too many e- mails from companies.
"Men tended to think being flooded by legitimate companies was more offensive to their sensibilities than receiving pornographic spam. The sheer quantity of legitimate but unwanted e-mail is turning men off to this marketing channel, Knoll said."
From He Spammed, She Spammed:
"Men were more frustrated, offended, by e-mails from companies they may have done business with but haven't given permission" for e-mail, said Scott Knoll, vice president of marketing solutions at New York-based DoubleClick.
"And even if they do give permission, men react strongly to getting too many e- mails from companies.
"Men tended to think being flooded by legitimate companies was more offensive to their sensibilities than receiving pornographic spam. The sheer quantity of legitimate but unwanted e-mail is turning men off to this marketing channel, Knoll said."
So What ARE the Defacto Web Standards Today?
"Web Design Practices is a site devoted to helping designers understand what design practices are currently in use on the Web—and aims to gather research about the usability of commonly-employed design practices."
The WDP site is excellent - great, valuable content in a nicely designed package!
"Web Design Practices is a site devoted to helping designers understand what design practices are currently in use on the Web—and aims to gather research about the usability of commonly-employed design practices."
The WDP site is excellent - great, valuable content in a nicely designed package!
October 14, 2003
Don Norman Interviewed on Emotional Design
BBC News has published an interview with "the Don" entitled "Technology to make you go 'wow'". In the interview, Norman summarizes some of the points he made in a talk I went to at the University of Minnesota; points that are surely expanded upon in his forthcoming book.
"He argues that the levels on which the brain works correspond with three different levels of design."
'The visceral level is the low biological level and there's where beauty comes in and appearances matter. 'On the surface something looks attractive and something feels good. That is very important and that makes the brain function differently.'
"On a visceral level, the brain is a little bit more creative so if there something does not work well, people are more willing to forgive it if they like it.
"Then there is the behavioural level which controls muscles, perception and language. It is at this level that usability and how something feels lie, something which he and his colleagues have examined in great detail.
But Dr Norman wants to move on and think at the deeper level of reflection, the level that dictates how we feel about things, he says.
'That is where having a good brand name matters. Having a good brand name has to earned because they stand for trust,' he says.
"Good design must incorporate all three levels, and that is what emotional design is all about."
You can pre-order Don Norman's upcoming book:
BBC News has published an interview with "the Don" entitled "Technology to make you go 'wow'". In the interview, Norman summarizes some of the points he made in a talk I went to at the University of Minnesota; points that are surely expanded upon in his forthcoming book.
"He argues that the levels on which the brain works correspond with three different levels of design."
'The visceral level is the low biological level and there's where beauty comes in and appearances matter. 'On the surface something looks attractive and something feels good. That is very important and that makes the brain function differently.'
"On a visceral level, the brain is a little bit more creative so if there something does not work well, people are more willing to forgive it if they like it.
"Then there is the behavioural level which controls muscles, perception and language. It is at this level that usability and how something feels lie, something which he and his colleagues have examined in great detail.
But Dr Norman wants to move on and think at the deeper level of reflection, the level that dictates how we feel about things, he says.
'That is where having a good brand name matters. Having a good brand name has to earned because they stand for trust,' he says.
"Good design must incorporate all three levels, and that is what emotional design is all about."
You can pre-order Don Norman's upcoming book:
Great customer service example
I'm a Blogger user, but have only used the free service for quite some time. Blogger used to offer a for-fee service called "Blogger Pro." They recently changed the *free* service to include all the features of the "Pro" version and eliminated the Pro service. Naturally, those who'd been paying for the Pro version might get a bit miffed at this news, but the Blogger team has handled this well.
The announcement Evan at Blogger sent to Pro users amazed me. How many companies would do what they are doing: giving out sweatshirts or refunds (your choice)? If Google were a public company, they'd not likely want to give out refunds, but private companies don't have to worry so much about quarterly results and can do what's right for the long run.
Kudos to Evan and all the folks on the Blogger/Google team! Great attitude!
From the "Important Blogger Pro Announcement" (emphasis is mine):
"More importantly, I want to stress that we couldn't have gotten to where we are today without you. Pro subscribers helped keep us going as a struggling start-up, when servers and bandwidth were at an extreme premium. We wanted to keep basic Blogger free, but we needed to start charging in order to keep the lights on. So we built new things that would appeal to some Blogger users (namely, you).
Thanks to supportive people like yourself, this plan allowed us to grow and build a better service -- and, eventually, get us to much more stable ground. We're eternally grateful, and I hope you were happy with the relationship, as well.
Today, as you may know, Blogger's situation is much different. For one thing, we're part of Google. (If you missed that announcement, check the FAQ). Google has lots of computers and bandwidth. And Google believes blogs are important and good for the web.
This is a good thing.
So we're in the fortunate position of being able to give back to our users. Specifically, to each of you who paid for Pro (and never cancelled), we want to send you a Blogger hooded sweatshirt as a way of saying thanks. Just fill out this form* by October 1, 2003 to claim yours. (If you'd prefer to have a pro-rated refund instead, just let us know.)"
I'm a Blogger user, but have only used the free service for quite some time. Blogger used to offer a for-fee service called "Blogger Pro." They recently changed the *free* service to include all the features of the "Pro" version and eliminated the Pro service. Naturally, those who'd been paying for the Pro version might get a bit miffed at this news, but the Blogger team has handled this well.
The announcement Evan at Blogger sent to Pro users amazed me. How many companies would do what they are doing: giving out sweatshirts or refunds (your choice)? If Google were a public company, they'd not likely want to give out refunds, but private companies don't have to worry so much about quarterly results and can do what's right for the long run.
Kudos to Evan and all the folks on the Blogger/Google team! Great attitude!
From the "Important Blogger Pro Announcement" (emphasis is mine):
"More importantly, I want to stress that we couldn't have gotten to where we are today without you. Pro subscribers helped keep us going as a struggling start-up, when servers and bandwidth were at an extreme premium. We wanted to keep basic Blogger free, but we needed to start charging in order to keep the lights on. So we built new things that would appeal to some Blogger users (namely, you).
Thanks to supportive people like yourself, this plan allowed us to grow and build a better service -- and, eventually, get us to much more stable ground. We're eternally grateful, and I hope you were happy with the relationship, as well.
Today, as you may know, Blogger's situation is much different. For one thing, we're part of Google. (If you missed that announcement, check the FAQ). Google has lots of computers and bandwidth. And Google believes blogs are important and good for the web.
This is a good thing.
So we're in the fortunate position of being able to give back to our users. Specifically, to each of you who paid for Pro (and never cancelled), we want to send you a Blogger hooded sweatshirt as a way of saying thanks. Just fill out this form* by October 1, 2003 to claim yours. (If you'd prefer to have a pro-rated refund instead, just let us know.)"
Presentation to UPA-MN Chapter on usability research
I gave a little presentation last night at our local UPA-MN chapter meeting. I discussed the role of research, highlighted some good resources for research, and also gave a quick run-down of some recent research I found interesting. The slides are available in PDF form
Drop me a note with your comments! (See my masked email address in the "About" box at left.)
I gave a little presentation last night at our local UPA-MN chapter meeting. I discussed the role of research, highlighted some good resources for research, and also gave a quick run-down of some recent research I found interesting. The slides are available in PDF form
Drop me a note with your comments! (See my masked email address in the "About" box at left.)
October 13, 2003
Poorly designed user interfaces suck the ROI right out of enterprise software
In Pigeons can push random buttons, Rupert Goodwins makes a few good points about the lack of focus on usability in most enterprise software implementation projects:
"It continues to amaze me that twenty years after Apple showed the world what well-designed software looked like, most IT departments think the word "Usability" is shorthand for user stopping, activity blighting, information losing, irksome travesty...
"There is little point in shelling out six or seven figures on a major IT project in the name of efficiency if you never bother to find out whether the people who use it have a fighting chance of being efficient at their jobs. In the great scheme of business, everything boils down to what the employees do and how well they do it: that this never enters the design equation of IT projects is one of the great unmentioned sins of technology."
Working on a big system implementation? Do the right thing for your business: hire a usability consultant to make sure you're not wasting millions of dollars in development and user productivity.
In Pigeons can push random buttons, Rupert Goodwins makes a few good points about the lack of focus on usability in most enterprise software implementation projects:
"It continues to amaze me that twenty years after Apple showed the world what well-designed software looked like, most IT departments think the word "Usability" is shorthand for user stopping, activity blighting, information losing, irksome travesty...
"There is little point in shelling out six or seven figures on a major IT project in the name of efficiency if you never bother to find out whether the people who use it have a fighting chance of being efficient at their jobs. In the great scheme of business, everything boils down to what the employees do and how well they do it: that this never enters the design equation of IT projects is one of the great unmentioned sins of technology."
Working on a big system implementation? Do the right thing for your business: hire a usability consultant to make sure you're not wasting millions of dollars in development and user productivity.
October 12, 2003
Nokia's CEO says usability heart of their approach
In the Financial Times' Squaring up to usability at Nokia:
"Jorma Ollila, chairman and chief executive, says usability is 'at the heart' of the company's approach. He adds that it was one of the first to realise that ease of use had to become 'the main goal in design.' The company also describes design as 'a fundamental building block of the brand', adding that it is 'central to our product creation and is a core competence integrated into the entire company'. It thus devotes a considerable amount of time and money researching what customers will want and then designing products that are intended to fulfil these needs"
There you have it, from a CEO of a large company:
usability is the key to design, and design is key to the brand, AND THEREFORE, they invest heaviliy in User Centered Design. I knew this about Nokia because I keep running into Nokia folks at UPA and CHI conferences...
In the Financial Times' Squaring up to usability at Nokia:
"Jorma Ollila, chairman and chief executive, says usability is 'at the heart' of the company's approach. He adds that it was one of the first to realise that ease of use had to become 'the main goal in design.' The company also describes design as 'a fundamental building block of the brand', adding that it is 'central to our product creation and is a core competence integrated into the entire company'. It thus devotes a considerable amount of time and money researching what customers will want and then designing products that are intended to fulfil these needs"
There you have it, from a CEO of a large company:
usability is the key to design, and design is key to the brand, AND THEREFORE, they invest heaviliy in User Centered Design. I knew this about Nokia because I keep running into Nokia folks at UPA and CHI conferences...
October 09, 2003
Technology should be simpler, more robust and more transparent
John Seely Brown makes a number of good comments in Forbes' "Back in Touch" interview, including this one:
"The real spirit of ubiquitous computing is to let technology disappear. I drive high-performance automobiles. What is the question you never ask when you buy a car: Is it powered by Unix or Windows? There is serious computing going on inside the automobile, but you don't even know it's there. With ABS braking, you don't have to activate a system. It diagnoses when you need help, moves seamlessly to help you, and then moves out of the way again. We're incredibly far from that with most technology. There has been no new innovation in interfaces for 30 years. We have to use the power of Moore's Law not just to design things that amplify our computing abilities but to keep things simple, robust, and transparent."
Related:
- John Seely Brown's page at PARC
- The Social Life of Information
John Seely Brown makes a number of good comments in Forbes' "Back in Touch" interview, including this one:
"The real spirit of ubiquitous computing is to let technology disappear. I drive high-performance automobiles. What is the question you never ask when you buy a car: Is it powered by Unix or Windows? There is serious computing going on inside the automobile, but you don't even know it's there. With ABS braking, you don't have to activate a system. It diagnoses when you need help, moves seamlessly to help you, and then moves out of the way again. We're incredibly far from that with most technology. There has been no new innovation in interfaces for 30 years. We have to use the power of Moore's Law not just to design things that amplify our computing abilities but to keep things simple, robust, and transparent."
Related:
- John Seely Brown's page at PARC
- The Social Life of Information
October 01, 2003
New Usability Testing Software in Development by Techsmith
Just got an email from the folks at Techsmith with info about a a new product they are working on to help automate recording usability testing sessions. (Techsmith is the company that makes SnagIt and Camtasia - two tools that are often cited as the best screen capture and screen recording tools on the market.) Techsmith was present in force at the UPA 2003 conference and was actively doing research into the needs of usability professionals when it comes to recording test sessions. From their calendar, it looks like they plan on continuing their research.
Evidently the product will:
- Record audio and video (synchronized)
- Record system events like mouse clicks, dialog boxes, and keyboard use.
- Log marked events during sessions (maybe like Twinview does with its little remote control "clicker"?)
- Allow you to search recordings
- Help with creation of highlight videos
- Reduce amount of hardware needed.
The product is called Morae (not sure what that name means), and more information is hidden on their web site here. Not only could this new tool make the jobs of usability professionals easier, but it could also help promote usability testing by making it just a bit easier for people to do.
Just got an email from the folks at Techsmith with info about a a new product they are working on to help automate recording usability testing sessions. (Techsmith is the company that makes SnagIt and Camtasia - two tools that are often cited as the best screen capture and screen recording tools on the market.) Techsmith was present in force at the UPA 2003 conference and was actively doing research into the needs of usability professionals when it comes to recording test sessions. From their calendar, it looks like they plan on continuing their research.
Evidently the product will:
- Record audio and video (synchronized)
- Record system events like mouse clicks, dialog boxes, and keyboard use.
- Log marked events during sessions (maybe like Twinview does with its little remote control "clicker"?)
- Allow you to search recordings
- Help with creation of highlight videos
- Reduce amount of hardware needed.
The product is called Morae (not sure what that name means), and more information is hidden on their web site here. Not only could this new tool make the jobs of usability professionals easier, but it could also help promote usability testing by making it just a bit easier for people to do.
September 24, 2003
12 Click Rule for Mobile Sites?
Just read this bit about a usability study of mobile web portals and as one who does not believe in the "three click rule" for web sites, I question the validity of the "12 click rule" for mobile. I DO however buy into the fact that more clicks is bad all other things being equal:
"The situation is rather acute with the average portal click-distance (number of clicks/menus to arrive at the desired content) is in excess of 16 and often greater than 20. Moreover the number of mobile services that are within the critical click-distance of 12 (believed to be the point at which users loose interest) is, on average, less than 36%!’
"The Plight of the Mobile Navigator makes it clear that the success of the mobile Internet is at a critical juncture. Smyth argues ‘Unless usability is treated as a priority it is very hard to see how mobile service usage will increase –an issue the industry at large requires to happen"
Mobile Metrix is a company focusing on the Mobile Internet. In their coverage of the "Plight of the Mobile Navigator" report they say:
"Two years ago, a report from Norman Nielsen Group examined WAP Usability. That analysis documented the results of a WAP user survey based on a series of timed information tasks such as locating a news article, a weather report or TV listings. The survey results highlighted the usability problems that existed then with current 2G WAP services, with users taking an average of 120-150 seconds to locate target content across the various studies.
"The survey participants of Nielsen Norman report indicated that, to be genuinely useful, mobile portals must be able to bring content to users within approximately 30 seconds. In other words, mobile content services that are more than 30 seconds from the portal homepage are unlikely to attract regular users.
"That analysis was conducted in December 2000. Two years later based on the results of an analysis undertake by ChangingWorlds the situation does not seem to have improved."
According to ChangingWorlds' CTO in an article called "The Missing Link - User-Experience and Incremental Revenue Generation on the Mobile Internet":
"Every second saved on navigation time creates an additional three seconds of content-viewing time," Smyth suggests, meaning that mobile operators would be well advised to start channeling bigger percentages of their portal-development budgets to usability and away from snazzy content that might never be viewed. Achieving the balance between the offer of stimulating content and easy access is the challenge."
Just read this bit about a usability study of mobile web portals and as one who does not believe in the "three click rule" for web sites, I question the validity of the "12 click rule" for mobile. I DO however buy into the fact that more clicks is bad all other things being equal:
"The situation is rather acute with the average portal click-distance (number of clicks/menus to arrive at the desired content) is in excess of 16 and often greater than 20. Moreover the number of mobile services that are within the critical click-distance of 12 (believed to be the point at which users loose interest) is, on average, less than 36%!’
"The Plight of the Mobile Navigator makes it clear that the success of the mobile Internet is at a critical juncture. Smyth argues ‘Unless usability is treated as a priority it is very hard to see how mobile service usage will increase –an issue the industry at large requires to happen"
Mobile Metrix is a company focusing on the Mobile Internet. In their coverage of the "Plight of the Mobile Navigator" report they say:
"Two years ago, a report from Norman Nielsen Group examined WAP Usability. That analysis documented the results of a WAP user survey based on a series of timed information tasks such as locating a news article, a weather report or TV listings. The survey results highlighted the usability problems that existed then with current 2G WAP services, with users taking an average of 120-150 seconds to locate target content across the various studies.
"The survey participants of Nielsen Norman report indicated that, to be genuinely useful, mobile portals must be able to bring content to users within approximately 30 seconds. In other words, mobile content services that are more than 30 seconds from the portal homepage are unlikely to attract regular users.
"That analysis was conducted in December 2000. Two years later based on the results of an analysis undertake by ChangingWorlds the situation does not seem to have improved."
According to ChangingWorlds' CTO in an article called "The Missing Link - User-Experience and Incremental Revenue Generation on the Mobile Internet":
"Every second saved on navigation time creates an additional three seconds of content-viewing time," Smyth suggests, meaning that mobile operators would be well advised to start channeling bigger percentages of their portal-development budgets to usability and away from snazzy content that might never be viewed. Achieving the balance between the offer of stimulating content and easy access is the challenge."
September 18, 2003
No more e-mail in France
The French government has banned the use of the word 'e-mail' in all its ministries, documents, publications and websites.
"In the latest step 'to stem an incursion of English words into the French language', the Culture Ministry says the term should be replaced with 'courriel'. The ministry's General Commission on Terminology and Neology insists Internet surfers in France already use the phrase courrier electronique (electronic mail) instead of e-mail. The commission ruled: 'Evocative, with a very French sound, the word courriel is broadly used in the press and competes advantageously with the borrowed mail in English.' The commission has links to the Academie Francaise, the prestigious institution that has been one of the top opponents to the seeping of English terms into the French language."
God forbid languages evolve.
Note also that the Oxford Dictionary staff estimates that roughly 28% of English words come from a French origin.
Maybe we should purge the English language of French words. Here's a list of words the American government should ban. After all, we should keep the American language pure, shouldn't we?
The French government has banned the use of the word 'e-mail' in all its ministries, documents, publications and websites.
"In the latest step 'to stem an incursion of English words into the French language', the Culture Ministry says the term should be replaced with 'courriel'. The ministry's General Commission on Terminology and Neology insists Internet surfers in France already use the phrase courrier electronique (electronic mail) instead of e-mail. The commission ruled: 'Evocative, with a very French sound, the word courriel is broadly used in the press and competes advantageously with the borrowed mail in English.' The commission has links to the Academie Francaise, the prestigious institution that has been one of the top opponents to the seeping of English terms into the French language."
God forbid languages evolve.
Note also that the Oxford Dictionary staff estimates that roughly 28% of English words come from a French origin.
Maybe we should purge the English language of French words. Here's a list of words the American government should ban. After all, we should keep the American language pure, shouldn't we?
August 26, 2003
How to design a good web site
Great advice from an expert on design below:
Strong Bad's design tips (warning: plays audio)
Standard "sytem is down" error message
404 Error
Strong Bad's Web Site
Thanks Jeremy!
Great advice from an expert on design below:
Strong Bad's design tips (warning: plays audio)
Standard "sytem is down" error message
404 Error
Strong Bad's Web Site
Thanks Jeremy!
August 22, 2003
Proof that search still sucks - even with Google
Here are some search keywords and phrases that have lead web browsers to this site via Google and other search engines:
- lap dancers
- how do monkeys communicate
- impact of architecture on health
- pictures of hitlers dead body
- some things that start with letter o
- spanish lap dancers
- elrond action figures
- fun colored 13" tvs
This site has nothing to do with these topics, yet it's a prominent search result for these word combinations without even making it a "phrase search" by putting them in quotes.
How could THIS site be the #2 site listed on Google when searching for "fun colored 13" tvs"?! I need to start offering advertising for electronics stores!
Search has come a long way, but it still fails miserably when it comes to helping someone find what they are looking for.
Here are some search keywords and phrases that have lead web browsers to this site via Google and other search engines:
- lap dancers
- how do monkeys communicate
- impact of architecture on health
- pictures of hitlers dead body
- some things that start with letter o
- spanish lap dancers
- elrond action figures
- fun colored 13" tvs
This site has nothing to do with these topics, yet it's a prominent search result for these word combinations without even making it a "phrase search" by putting them in quotes.
How could THIS site be the #2 site listed on Google when searching for "fun colored 13" tvs"?! I need to start offering advertising for electronics stores!
Search has come a long way, but it still fails miserably when it comes to helping someone find what they are looking for.
August 21, 2003
SAP Style Guide for PDA Applications
If you're working on mobile, handheld, or PDA applications, the SAP Design Guild has a nice style guide for PDA applications built using SAP. Also interesting is the "SAP Style Guide for Blue-Collar Worker PDAs" and "Touchscreen Usability in Short" from the Interaction Design Guide for Touchscreen Applications.
If you're working on mobile, handheld, or PDA applications, the SAP Design Guild has a nice style guide for PDA applications built using SAP. Also interesting is the "SAP Style Guide for Blue-Collar Worker PDAs" and "Touchscreen Usability in Short" from the Interaction Design Guide for Touchscreen Applications.
August 18, 2003
Online retail sales to skyrocket by 2008
"The growth will be sparked by a growing online consumer base, increases in new product categories and efforts by online retailers to optimize the online shopping experience, according to Forrester Research."
Here's a tidbit from the original Forrester report:
"As retailers invest in site design and usability testing, online shopping continues to evolve -- from an experience resembling a trip to a bare-bones strip mall to one more akin to shopping the Miracle Mile. Retailers have spent the past two years crafting better online and multichannel eCommerce sites: 84% of the top 92 sites now offer zoom on product detail pages, retailers like J.C. Penney and Lillian Vernon offer catalog quick shop features and online versions of their offline circulars, and Sears and Office Depot serve the Hispanic market with Spanish-language sites. In response, consumers open their wallets more often: Average online retail conversion rates have risen from 2.2% in 2000 to 3.2% in 2002, according to Shop.org's "The State of Retailing Online 6.0" Report."
From the Shop.org press release:
“It took the catalog industry 100 years to represent 4.7 percent of retail sales. It took online retailers only six years to accomplish the same feat.” said Elaine Rubin, Chairman, Shop.org.
Related Posts:
The online retail experience will get better (and why you should be worried about that)
"The growth will be sparked by a growing online consumer base, increases in new product categories and efforts by online retailers to optimize the online shopping experience, according to Forrester Research."
Here's a tidbit from the original Forrester report:
"As retailers invest in site design and usability testing, online shopping continues to evolve -- from an experience resembling a trip to a bare-bones strip mall to one more akin to shopping the Miracle Mile. Retailers have spent the past two years crafting better online and multichannel eCommerce sites: 84% of the top 92 sites now offer zoom on product detail pages, retailers like J.C. Penney and Lillian Vernon offer catalog quick shop features and online versions of their offline circulars, and Sears and Office Depot serve the Hispanic market with Spanish-language sites. In response, consumers open their wallets more often: Average online retail conversion rates have risen from 2.2% in 2000 to 3.2% in 2002, according to Shop.org's "The State of Retailing Online 6.0" Report."
From the Shop.org press release:
“It took the catalog industry 100 years to represent 4.7 percent of retail sales. It took online retailers only six years to accomplish the same feat.” said Elaine Rubin, Chairman, Shop.org.
Related Posts:
The online retail experience will get better (and why you should be worried about that)
U-Pods - Support Groups for User Experience Managers
"U-Pods is a new organisation aimed at managers of usability facilities. " ... "the goal is to form a usability manager's support group where ideas and information can be shared. U-Pods will comprise a number of small groups (or 'pods') in which members from non-competing companies can benefit from the experiences and insights of their peers with respect to managing usability or human factors teams and establishing these disciplines in companies. Teams of five to six people is becoming the norm."
More about U-Pods
via Usability News
"U-Pods is a new organisation aimed at managers of usability facilities. " ... "the goal is to form a usability manager's support group where ideas and information can be shared. U-Pods will comprise a number of small groups (or 'pods') in which members from non-competing companies can benefit from the experiences and insights of their peers with respect to managing usability or human factors teams and establishing these disciplines in companies. Teams of five to six people is becoming the norm."
More about U-Pods
via Usability News
August 15, 2003
The online retail experience will get better
(and why you should be worried about that)
According to research by ForeSee Results, an online customer satisfaction firm, online retailers are not very happy with their own shopping experiences.
Satisfaction Survey
According to the survey report (available on the ForeSee Results web site):
"The results in the study were collected using an online survey co-sponsored by ForeSee Results and Internet Retailer. This survey used the methodology of the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) to measure the satisfaction of e-retail industry insiders’ shopping experience with other e-retailing sites. A total of 368 e-retail industry insiders participated in the study and were asked to evaluate their experience with online retailers, other than their own company’s."
"The good news is e-retail insiders are more satisfied with the state of their e-retail experiences than last year, with their overall satisfaction surging ahead 8.6%, improving from a 58 last year to a 63 this year, on a 100-point scale. Yet as they are the most demanding of online customers, they still significantly trail overall consumers’ very strong Online Retail Satisfaction score of 83, as measured by the ACSI.
It's interesting that the general Online Retail Satisfaction score (83) is higher than the Offline Retail Industry satisfaction score of 75. Amazon.com has the highest satisfaction score of anyone online (measured in this way): 88.
What it means
The report "suggests that e-retailing will continue to get more competitive because the insiders want the online shopping experience to get better. "Investors and customers should be happy that these insiders are so hard on themselves," ForeSee Results CEO Larry Freed in a statement. "It means they're not taking their success for granted and aren't just sitting back and enjoying their accomplishments."
Okay, the words "success" and "accomplishments" should be taken with a grain of salt, since not many online retailers can tell big success stories yet.
"Internet history and ACSI experience suggest that online customers’ expectations will continue to rise and preferences will change rapidly. To keep the pulse on these expectations and preferences, e-retailers should constantly measure and work to improve customer satisfaction at their sites. The first step in continuous improvement is to be able to identify weaknesses and opportunities."
Thoughts & Predictions
This is a good indicator that online retailers (and others who place a high value on their online channel) will be looking for more ways to improve their sites. Currently Amazon.com is the benchmark for retail sites, and as leaders like Amazon keep raising the bar, consumer expectations will rise as well. Sites that can't keep up will see lower customer satisfaction. Sites that provide the best experiences will see higher customer satisfaction, higher revenue and higher customer retention. The best big sites will get bigger, the bad sites will get fewer, and like most other industries, you'll see consolidation over the long term.
Online businesses looking to stay around will need to lean on good experience design and utilize usability (user-centered design), information architecture, branding, and channel integration. Offline businesses who want to take advantage of the online channel will need to meet customer expectations of a good online experience. Those expectations will be set by online leaders. Metrics will be key to constant improvement and benchmarking.
If you don't have a team constantly measuring and improving your customers' online experience, your online days will be painful and numbered until you change your approach.
The days of playing around in the web channel have ended for most serious businesses. Small start-ups will continue to innovate and bring breakthrough ideas to market; challenging the leaders and stirring the proverbial pot. (See Google for a recent example.)
Is there a Google comin' to get you?
Amazon, eBay, Yahoo!, and Google all have sizable User Experience or Usability teams. Those teams play a major role in their companies' success. Their company cultures are also very centered on the quality of their products - their web sites, applications, and services. For example, Google's Enterprise Search Appliance is sold as "plug and play" -- they sell you a piece of equipment that you plug into the power and network in your data center, and it's a simple configuration process to set it up to provide search results on your intranet. No messing around with multiple hardware and software vendors, no worrying about who supports the hardware the software runs on - Google supports the whole solution. (Yes, I said that buzzword "solution" -- in this case it's actually warranted.) There's no chance of vendors pointing fingers at each other. Have technolgy vendors like IBM, Oracle and HP noticed this model? Are they worried it'll take off? Or are they considering how to use this model to get a leg up on the competition?
IBM likely doesn't see Google as a "competitor" -- but it's the Googles of the world that should keep them awake at night. It's those wickedly smart companies that are 100% committed to selling more intuitive solutions, more usable products, and better experiences that can quickly redefine an industry just as Google has done with search. Amazon's done it with books and online retail.
Are you worried about where your next competition will come from? You should be. (Regular readers may wonder:) What does this have to do with user experience? Everything.
--------
Initial ComputerWorld article fournd via Webword
Study finds Internet retailers unhappy with own online shopping experiences
Related Posts:
- Practicing Usability in the future
- User centered design sells products
(and why you should be worried about that)
According to research by ForeSee Results, an online customer satisfaction firm, online retailers are not very happy with their own shopping experiences.
Satisfaction Survey
According to the survey report (available on the ForeSee Results web site):
"The results in the study were collected using an online survey co-sponsored by ForeSee Results and Internet Retailer. This survey used the methodology of the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) to measure the satisfaction of e-retail industry insiders’ shopping experience with other e-retailing sites. A total of 368 e-retail industry insiders participated in the study and were asked to evaluate their experience with online retailers, other than their own company’s."
"The good news is e-retail insiders are more satisfied with the state of their e-retail experiences than last year, with their overall satisfaction surging ahead 8.6%, improving from a 58 last year to a 63 this year, on a 100-point scale. Yet as they are the most demanding of online customers, they still significantly trail overall consumers’ very strong Online Retail Satisfaction score of 83, as measured by the ACSI.
It's interesting that the general Online Retail Satisfaction score (83) is higher than the Offline Retail Industry satisfaction score of 75. Amazon.com has the highest satisfaction score of anyone online (measured in this way): 88.
What it means
The report "suggests that e-retailing will continue to get more competitive because the insiders want the online shopping experience to get better. "Investors and customers should be happy that these insiders are so hard on themselves," ForeSee Results CEO Larry Freed in a statement. "It means they're not taking their success for granted and aren't just sitting back and enjoying their accomplishments."
Okay, the words "success" and "accomplishments" should be taken with a grain of salt, since not many online retailers can tell big success stories yet.
"Internet history and ACSI experience suggest that online customers’ expectations will continue to rise and preferences will change rapidly. To keep the pulse on these expectations and preferences, e-retailers should constantly measure and work to improve customer satisfaction at their sites. The first step in continuous improvement is to be able to identify weaknesses and opportunities."
Thoughts & Predictions
This is a good indicator that online retailers (and others who place a high value on their online channel) will be looking for more ways to improve their sites. Currently Amazon.com is the benchmark for retail sites, and as leaders like Amazon keep raising the bar, consumer expectations will rise as well. Sites that can't keep up will see lower customer satisfaction. Sites that provide the best experiences will see higher customer satisfaction, higher revenue and higher customer retention. The best big sites will get bigger, the bad sites will get fewer, and like most other industries, you'll see consolidation over the long term.
Online businesses looking to stay around will need to lean on good experience design and utilize usability (user-centered design), information architecture, branding, and channel integration. Offline businesses who want to take advantage of the online channel will need to meet customer expectations of a good online experience. Those expectations will be set by online leaders. Metrics will be key to constant improvement and benchmarking.
If you don't have a team constantly measuring and improving your customers' online experience, your online days will be painful and numbered until you change your approach.
The days of playing around in the web channel have ended for most serious businesses. Small start-ups will continue to innovate and bring breakthrough ideas to market; challenging the leaders and stirring the proverbial pot. (See Google for a recent example.)
Is there a Google comin' to get you?
Amazon, eBay, Yahoo!, and Google all have sizable User Experience or Usability teams. Those teams play a major role in their companies' success. Their company cultures are also very centered on the quality of their products - their web sites, applications, and services. For example, Google's Enterprise Search Appliance is sold as "plug and play" -- they sell you a piece of equipment that you plug into the power and network in your data center, and it's a simple configuration process to set it up to provide search results on your intranet. No messing around with multiple hardware and software vendors, no worrying about who supports the hardware the software runs on - Google supports the whole solution. (Yes, I said that buzzword "solution" -- in this case it's actually warranted.) There's no chance of vendors pointing fingers at each other. Have technolgy vendors like IBM, Oracle and HP noticed this model? Are they worried it'll take off? Or are they considering how to use this model to get a leg up on the competition?
IBM likely doesn't see Google as a "competitor" -- but it's the Googles of the world that should keep them awake at night. It's those wickedly smart companies that are 100% committed to selling more intuitive solutions, more usable products, and better experiences that can quickly redefine an industry just as Google has done with search. Amazon's done it with books and online retail.
Are you worried about where your next competition will come from? You should be. (Regular readers may wonder:) What does this have to do with user experience? Everything.
--------
Initial ComputerWorld article fournd via Webword
Study finds Internet retailers unhappy with own online shopping experiences
Related Posts:
- Practicing Usability in the future
- User centered design sells products
August 12, 2003
Breadcrumbs Affect User's Mental Model of Web Sites
Wichita State University's Software Usability Research Laboratory (SURL) has released findings of a study of web breadcrumbs. The results, published in Breadcrumb Navigation: Further Investigation of Usage are pretty interesting. Here are a few key points:
"Breadcrumb users were found to use the Back button less often than users who did not use the breadcrumb; however, no differences were found in the efficiency measures of total pages visited, navigation bar clicks, embedded link clicks, or time to complete the search tasks. It is not known if all participants understood the function of the breadcrumb as a navigational tool. Future studies should investigate whether a simple understanding of the purpose of the breadcrumb trail or minimal training impacts usage and/or efficiency.
"Location of the breadcrumb trail did have an effect on usage. Breadcrumb trails positioned under the page title (at eye level and closer to other links on the page) were used more than breadcrumb trails positioned at the top of the page. It is recommended, therefore, that breadcrumb trails be positioned in this location rather than at the top of the page. The results also suggest that exposure to a breadcrumb trail in a site may contribute to the type of site model formed by the user. Participants that used a site with a breadcrumb trail were more likely to choose a hierarchical model than those that used the non-breadcrumb site. This assessment of the user’s mental model requires further study."
I've always thought the value of breadcrumbs was in exposing site structure and helping form a mental model of the site. It'll be interesting to see what additional research the team at SURL conduct in the future.
Related:
- Breadcrumbs > Breadcrumbs > Breadcrumbs
- Research Project: Methods and Models of Navigation in Hypertextual Space
- SURL: Breadcrumb Navigation: An Exploratory Study of Usage
Wichita State University's Software Usability Research Laboratory (SURL) has released findings of a study of web breadcrumbs. The results, published in Breadcrumb Navigation: Further Investigation of Usage are pretty interesting. Here are a few key points:
"Breadcrumb users were found to use the Back button less often than users who did not use the breadcrumb; however, no differences were found in the efficiency measures of total pages visited, navigation bar clicks, embedded link clicks, or time to complete the search tasks. It is not known if all participants understood the function of the breadcrumb as a navigational tool. Future studies should investigate whether a simple understanding of the purpose of the breadcrumb trail or minimal training impacts usage and/or efficiency.
"Location of the breadcrumb trail did have an effect on usage. Breadcrumb trails positioned under the page title (at eye level and closer to other links on the page) were used more than breadcrumb trails positioned at the top of the page. It is recommended, therefore, that breadcrumb trails be positioned in this location rather than at the top of the page. The results also suggest that exposure to a breadcrumb trail in a site may contribute to the type of site model formed by the user. Participants that used a site with a breadcrumb trail were more likely to choose a hierarchical model than those that used the non-breadcrumb site. This assessment of the user’s mental model requires further study."
I've always thought the value of breadcrumbs was in exposing site structure and helping form a mental model of the site. It'll be interesting to see what additional research the team at SURL conduct in the future.
Related:
- Breadcrumbs > Breadcrumbs > Breadcrumbs
- Research Project: Methods and Models of Navigation in Hypertextual Space
- SURL: Breadcrumb Navigation: An Exploratory Study of Usage
Outlook 2003 More Usable?
I use Outlook for most of my email needs. It generally sucks, but is still the best email alternative I've found. According to James Governor of RedMonk, both Outlook and Exchange are supposed to get better from a usability and performance standpoint.
"People question whether software upgrades are really necessary. In this case the usability and performance tweaks alone could justify an upgrade."
"Focus on usability and real customer working patterns and the rest can fall into place. Microsoft and the industry at large should take note."
Related posts:
- Outlook, how do I hate thee? Let me count the ways.
- Rising Costs of Free Web E-Mail
- User centered design sells products
I use Outlook for most of my email needs. It generally sucks, but is still the best email alternative I've found. According to James Governor of RedMonk, both Outlook and Exchange are supposed to get better from a usability and performance standpoint.
"People question whether software upgrades are really necessary. In this case the usability and performance tweaks alone could justify an upgrade."
"Focus on usability and real customer working patterns and the rest can fall into place. Microsoft and the industry at large should take note."
Related posts:
- Outlook, how do I hate thee? Let me count the ways.
- Rising Costs of Free Web E-Mail
- User centered design sells products
August 11, 2003
Monkey See, Monkey Do Development
"Humans and higher primates share approximately 97% of their DNA in common. Recent research in primate programming suggests computing is a task that most higher primates can easily perform.
"Great apes (hominids) do not have tails, while monkeys do. Research indicates that great apes are very productive in the areas of software maintenance and report writing, while most monkeys will struggle. Monkeys however are great at software testing. So the rule of thumb is, if you don’t have a tail, you can probably program."
"Baboons handle software testing at PPI. Baboons work in colonies and can get very rowdy at work when things are going well."
Get a load of Cathleen. What beauty, and value priced too!
Related:
- Jakob Nielsen: Are developers people?
(How could Jakob be so wrong?)
"Humans and higher primates share approximately 97% of their DNA in common. Recent research in primate programming suggests computing is a task that most higher primates can easily perform.
"Great apes (hominids) do not have tails, while monkeys do. Research indicates that great apes are very productive in the areas of software maintenance and report writing, while most monkeys will struggle. Monkeys however are great at software testing. So the rule of thumb is, if you don’t have a tail, you can probably program."
"Baboons handle software testing at PPI. Baboons work in colonies and can get very rowdy at work when things are going well."
Get a load of Cathleen. What beauty, and value priced too!
Related:
- Jakob Nielsen: Are developers people?
(How could Jakob be so wrong?)
August 10, 2003
New UPA Site Launched
New, updated site for the Usability Professionals Association.
Some notable sections:
- Projects (including certification and a "body of knowledge")
- Job Bank
- User Experience Magazine (great publication!)
- Consultants and Members Directories
New, updated site for the Usability Professionals Association.
Some notable sections:
- Projects (including certification and a "body of knowledge")
- Job Bank
- User Experience Magazine (great publication!)
- Consultants and Members Directories
Hero Joy Nightingale
Matt May (of bestkungfu blog) brought an amazing story to my attention: the story of Hero Joy Nightingale, a 16-year-old girl with locked-in syndrome. She has been accepted to study fine art at Oxford. She is "the most severely handicapped student ever to be granted a place at Oxford. She suffers from 'locked-in syndrome', a profound apraxia caused by brain damage that renders her body useless and her voice mute."
She's obviously a tremendously brilliant and beautiful young lady who in a profound way wants people to understand her. On her personal web site's photo page, she says:
"I fear imagination conjuring my features into a fictitious freakish shape, readers manipulating words such as "locked-in" and "profound disability" and "neuro-developmental disorder" with ignorance & naivity until I am not a normal being of flesh and feeling but a pitiable alien thing. The photos depict a fragment of a busy life."
She has also edited her own online magazine, which is fascinating. At the end of the first issue (of nine), she wrote the following:
"This is the pain of Frustration as I at least experience it, and it relates more to hands than voice - I'll explain about being mute in a mo. My hands are the object of my hatred and scorn because they fretfully and reflexboundly fiddle and in so doing agitate my aspirations. I long to sculpt. I long to chip marble into poetic form hue imagination into a sturdy outer reality that bellows of the music fed to me by the wind. I long to forge hot iron to twisted forms that lurk huge and somatically within plastered brain eggs of my mind. I long to weave yarns into rugs that enthrall and warm with their homespun tones and I long to reap from travel the elements of my yarns."
Looks like she'll get an opportunity to sculpt and create art at Oxford. Amazing!
She has a great story on her site about her struggles to communicate with people called "How I communicate."
"Hero" is a very appropriate name. She is definitely someone many young girls should look up to. You go girl!
Related:
- bestkungfu: The myth of Accessible
- bestkungfu: Accessibility
Matt May (of bestkungfu blog) brought an amazing story to my attention: the story of Hero Joy Nightingale, a 16-year-old girl with locked-in syndrome. She has been accepted to study fine art at Oxford. She is "the most severely handicapped student ever to be granted a place at Oxford. She suffers from 'locked-in syndrome', a profound apraxia caused by brain damage that renders her body useless and her voice mute."
She's obviously a tremendously brilliant and beautiful young lady who in a profound way wants people to understand her. On her personal web site's photo page, she says:
"I fear imagination conjuring my features into a fictitious freakish shape, readers manipulating words such as "locked-in" and "profound disability" and "neuro-developmental disorder" with ignorance & naivity until I am not a normal being of flesh and feeling but a pitiable alien thing. The photos depict a fragment of a busy life."
She has also edited her own online magazine, which is fascinating. At the end of the first issue (of nine), she wrote the following:
"This is the pain of Frustration as I at least experience it, and it relates more to hands than voice - I'll explain about being mute in a mo. My hands are the object of my hatred and scorn because they fretfully and reflexboundly fiddle and in so doing agitate my aspirations. I long to sculpt. I long to chip marble into poetic form hue imagination into a sturdy outer reality that bellows of the music fed to me by the wind. I long to forge hot iron to twisted forms that lurk huge and somatically within plastered brain eggs of my mind. I long to weave yarns into rugs that enthrall and warm with their homespun tones and I long to reap from travel the elements of my yarns."
Looks like she'll get an opportunity to sculpt and create art at Oxford. Amazing!
She has a great story on her site about her struggles to communicate with people called "How I communicate."
"Hero" is a very appropriate name. She is definitely someone many young girls should look up to. You go girl!
Related:
- bestkungfu: The myth of Accessible
- bestkungfu: Accessibility
August 08, 2003
Sez U
Linux nears Windows XP usability (???!!!)
Also:
Linux closes on Windows in usability tests
I don't read German, but I'm a bit skeptical (as are others) of this report. Would be great if Linux was catching up, but the jury's still out on the test methodology used to assert such big claims.
"The Linux testers were in fact able to complete some tasks more quickly than the Windows testers, including playing and burning a CD and using email. Relevantive found that in the case of CD burning, this was probably due to the fact that the function has been integrated into Windows Explorer, which went against the expectations of the Windows testers."
...waiting for the English translation of the report...
Related Posts:
- Lyle: Usability and Open Source Software
- Open Letter to a Power User / Developer
Linux nears Windows XP usability (???!!!)
Also:
Linux closes on Windows in usability tests
I don't read German, but I'm a bit skeptical (as are others) of this report. Would be great if Linux was catching up, but the jury's still out on the test methodology used to assert such big claims.
"The Linux testers were in fact able to complete some tasks more quickly than the Windows testers, including playing and burning a CD and using email. Relevantive found that in the case of CD burning, this was probably due to the fact that the function has been integrated into Windows Explorer, which went against the expectations of the Windows testers."
...waiting for the English translation of the report...
Related Posts:
- Lyle: Usability and Open Source Software
- Open Letter to a Power User / Developer
Mark Hurst's Take on "The Role"
In a somewhat veiled response to the aftermath of Tog's bomb, Mark makes some awesome points I whole-heartedly agree with in Usability Professionals Must Disappear:
"Here's the thing about user experience work: its success depends primarily on the buy-in from everybody else in the larger organization. The primary issue isn't what you're named, but what results you're generating, and what buy-in you're getting from the company."
"In short, a good user experience practitioner is a facilitator - someone who quietly (having disappeared) guides the process, allowing knowledge to emerge, from users and the company alike. Instead of coming in with the answers, or the framework, or (my personal favorite) "the 200 rules of user experience design," they should come in with their auditory organs turned up to eleven. Listening."
Amen, Amen, Amen!
(Extra points for the Spinal Tap reference, too!)
My New Title
I'm having a hard time choosing my new title:
A. Professional Whale Tackler
B. User Boy
C. Customer-Centered Weenie
Related Spinal Tap Quotes:
"In ancient times, hundreds of years before the dawn of history, an ancient race of people... the Druids. No one knows who they were or what they were doing..." - Nigel
"It's such a fine line between stupid, and clever. " - David
Ian: "Nigel gave me a drawing that said 18 inches. Now, whether or not he knows the difference between feet and inches is not my problem. I do what I'm told."
David: "But you're not as confused as him are you. I mean, it's not your job to be as confused as Nigel."
Related:
- Lyle: An Open Letter to Tog
- Tog: It's Time We Got Respect
- Challis Hodge: UX Roles & Titles: Trend or Profession?
In a somewhat veiled response to the aftermath of Tog's bomb, Mark makes some awesome points I whole-heartedly agree with in Usability Professionals Must Disappear:
"Here's the thing about user experience work: its success depends primarily on the buy-in from everybody else in the larger organization. The primary issue isn't what you're named, but what results you're generating, and what buy-in you're getting from the company."
"In short, a good user experience practitioner is a facilitator - someone who quietly (having disappeared) guides the process, allowing knowledge to emerge, from users and the company alike. Instead of coming in with the answers, or the framework, or (my personal favorite) "the 200 rules of user experience design," they should come in with their auditory organs turned up to eleven. Listening."
Amen, Amen, Amen!
(Extra points for the Spinal Tap reference, too!)
My New Title
I'm having a hard time choosing my new title:
A. Professional Whale Tackler
B. User Boy
C. Customer-Centered Weenie
Related Spinal Tap Quotes:
"In ancient times, hundreds of years before the dawn of history, an ancient race of people... the Druids. No one knows who they were or what they were doing..." - Nigel
"It's such a fine line between stupid, and clever. " - David
Ian: "Nigel gave me a drawing that said 18 inches. Now, whether or not he knows the difference between feet and inches is not my problem. I do what I'm told."
David: "But you're not as confused as him are you. I mean, it's not your job to be as confused as Nigel."
Related:
- Lyle: An Open Letter to Tog
- Tog: It's Time We Got Respect
- Challis Hodge: UX Roles & Titles: Trend or Profession?
Inspiration Soup and Mackerelly
You have to read the text on this site and especially for each recipe card (there's about 25 of them) - some are pretty hilarious. Weight Watchers recipe cards from 1974
My favorite cards:
- Fluffy Mackerel Pudding
"Once upon a time the world was young and the words "mackerel" and "pudding" existed far, far away from one another. One day, that all changed. And then, whoever was responsible somehow thought the word fluffy would help."
- Frankfurter Spectacular
- Caucasian Shashlik
- Inspiration Soup
You have to read the text on this site and especially for each recipe card (there's about 25 of them) - some are pretty hilarious. Weight Watchers recipe cards from 1974
My favorite cards:
- Fluffy Mackerel Pudding
"Once upon a time the world was young and the words "mackerel" and "pudding" existed far, far away from one another. One day, that all changed. And then, whoever was responsible somehow thought the word fluffy would help."
- Frankfurter Spectacular
- Caucasian Shashlik
- Inspiration Soup
August 06, 2003
Coders or Cannibals
Programming Language Inventor or Serial Killer?
I always knew the folks that invented things like C++ and Java were sadistic, sick individuals!
:-)
Programming Language Inventor or Serial Killer?
I always knew the folks that invented things like C++ and Java were sadistic, sick individuals!
:-)
August 05, 2003
An Open Letter to Tog
Tog (aka Bruce Tognazzini) of NNG has a new article called "It's Time We Got Respect." Tog issues a rally-cry for "software designers, or interaction engineers, or human interface folks, or whatever we who create the interaction model for our products are calling ourselves this week." He thinks we need a "new beginning" - that we need to name ourselves something new (Interaction Architects) that we need to create a collective brand, and that we need a new professional organization to go with it all.
I disagree.
Below is my response that I posted on the Yahoo! Group Tog has setup to discuss the article. I've added some emphasis here to facilitate better scanning for those of you that don't hang on my every word. :)
----------
Are you in the game or sitting on the sidelines?
Okay, so I'm already a SIG-CHI member, I'm on the board of a local UPA chapter, and I consider myself an active member of the "SIG-IA" community. I'm already over-committed. Aifia is new, AIGA-ED is new, DUX is new...we've seen plenty of new organizations and events recently.
I don't call myself a "Usability Professional", although I would say I belong to that field, my title is "User Experience Architect." I came to the conclusion a long time ago that most titles need some explaining, and in the course of explaining mine I get to tell people the *value* of what I do. (For what it's worth, I also picked "architect" for many of the same reasons Tog did.) If you say you're a "lawyer," people will want to know what kind of shark, er lawyer you are, especially if they are considering using your services.
To put it bluntly, I don't need yet another organization to belong to, and I think there is enough latitude within existing organizations to accomplish Tog's stated goals. In fact, I can't see how Tog's goals are any different from UPA's.
(From the UPA web site:)
The Usability Professionals' Association was formed to:
- Provide a network and opportunities through which usability professionals can communicate and share information about skills and skill development, methodology used and/or proposed in the profession, tools, technology, and organizational issues.
- Present the viewpoints of the profession to the public and other interested parties.
- Educate the general public and others on the usefulness of the profession.
- Represent the profession before governmental bodies and agencies.
- Provide the methods and means to increase the members' knowledge of the profession through seminars, newsletters, magazines, and other communication tools, and through meetings and conventions.
- Serve the best interests of the usability profession.
They also list some Usability and User-Centered Design Activities including design.
http://www.upassoc.org/outreach/common.activities.html
I'm mainly a designer, and while I do some testing in the course of my work I've never said I was a "tester." I've never seen UPA as an organization for "testers" -- UPA promotes every aspect of User-Centered Design (or Human-Centered Design if you like) and all the requisite roles therein. They are, as Tog points out, very practitioner focused. Lots of interaction design and information architecture folks regularly attend our local UPA-MN meetings and international UPA events.
So what should we do?
My suggestion would be for people to get active in UPA or SIG-CHI or AIGA-ED or aifa or whatever and make an impact in the direction of those organizations. Help them better acheive their stated goals.
Start a local chapter, volunteer for a board position, start a SIG, plan an event around ID/IA that's sponsored by an existing organization. It's a hell of a lot less work than creating a whole new organization, and you won't be competing with related organizations either. Want to promote ID or Usability? Join (or chair) a communications committee and send out some press releases, recognize companies with awards, generate some interest. The number of folks really active in these fields isn't great enough to support lots of organizations. (Tog, think about how much more you and others in NNG could do for UPA or SIG-CHI...)
Critics of existing organizations may think that those organizations are doing exactly what they want to do, but the fact is that most organizations aren't doing anything close to what they'd like to do. Their efforts are severly limited by a lack of resources - financial, physical, and emotional. They can use your help, your fresh ideas, and your enthusiasm.
We are definitely "two sides of the same coin," so let's work together. Want to do something? Realize you can change what exists today, get off of the sidelines, and get in the game so we can win. Don't go start a new game - we need you on our team!
I'd be happy to discuss this further. As Tog indicated in his article's introduction, this is a very important issue.
Lyle Kantrovich
http://crocolyle.blogspot.com/
--------------
Related:
- Blog post: "Why I’m not calling myself an Information Architect anymore"
- B&A Comments on "Why I’m not calling myself an Information Architect anymore"
- The Making of a Discipline: The Making of a Title
- Challis Hodge - UX Roles & Titles: Trend or Profession?
- Argus-ACIA Salaries and Benefits for Information Architects - Most Common Titles
- Bloug: IAs: Better at Marketing than they Thought?
Tog (aka Bruce Tognazzini) of NNG has a new article called "It's Time We Got Respect." Tog issues a rally-cry for "software designers, or interaction engineers, or human interface folks, or whatever we who create the interaction model for our products are calling ourselves this week." He thinks we need a "new beginning" - that we need to name ourselves something new (Interaction Architects) that we need to create a collective brand, and that we need a new professional organization to go with it all.
I disagree.
Below is my response that I posted on the Yahoo! Group Tog has setup to discuss the article. I've added some emphasis here to facilitate better scanning for those of you that don't hang on my every word. :)
----------
Are you in the game or sitting on the sidelines?
Okay, so I'm already a SIG-CHI member, I'm on the board of a local UPA chapter, and I consider myself an active member of the "SIG-IA" community. I'm already over-committed. Aifia is new, AIGA-ED is new, DUX is new...we've seen plenty of new organizations and events recently.
I don't call myself a "Usability Professional", although I would say I belong to that field, my title is "User Experience Architect." I came to the conclusion a long time ago that most titles need some explaining, and in the course of explaining mine I get to tell people the *value* of what I do. (For what it's worth, I also picked "architect" for many of the same reasons Tog did.) If you say you're a "lawyer," people will want to know what kind of shark, er lawyer you are, especially if they are considering using your services.
To put it bluntly, I don't need yet another organization to belong to, and I think there is enough latitude within existing organizations to accomplish Tog's stated goals. In fact, I can't see how Tog's goals are any different from UPA's.
(From the UPA web site:)
The Usability Professionals' Association was formed to:
- Provide a network and opportunities through which usability professionals can communicate and share information about skills and skill development, methodology used and/or proposed in the profession, tools, technology, and organizational issues.
- Present the viewpoints of the profession to the public and other interested parties.
- Educate the general public and others on the usefulness of the profession.
- Represent the profession before governmental bodies and agencies.
- Provide the methods and means to increase the members' knowledge of the profession through seminars, newsletters, magazines, and other communication tools, and through meetings and conventions.
- Serve the best interests of the usability profession.
They also list some Usability and User-Centered Design Activities including design.
http://www.upassoc.org/outreach/common.activities.html
I'm mainly a designer, and while I do some testing in the course of my work I've never said I was a "tester." I've never seen UPA as an organization for "testers" -- UPA promotes every aspect of User-Centered Design (or Human-Centered Design if you like) and all the requisite roles therein. They are, as Tog points out, very practitioner focused. Lots of interaction design and information architecture folks regularly attend our local UPA-MN meetings and international UPA events.
So what should we do?
My suggestion would be for people to get active in UPA or SIG-CHI or AIGA-ED or aifa or whatever and make an impact in the direction of those organizations. Help them better acheive their stated goals.
Start a local chapter, volunteer for a board position, start a SIG, plan an event around ID/IA that's sponsored by an existing organization. It's a hell of a lot less work than creating a whole new organization, and you won't be competing with related organizations either. Want to promote ID or Usability? Join (or chair) a communications committee and send out some press releases, recognize companies with awards, generate some interest. The number of folks really active in these fields isn't great enough to support lots of organizations. (Tog, think about how much more you and others in NNG could do for UPA or SIG-CHI...)
Critics of existing organizations may think that those organizations are doing exactly what they want to do, but the fact is that most organizations aren't doing anything close to what they'd like to do. Their efforts are severly limited by a lack of resources - financial, physical, and emotional. They can use your help, your fresh ideas, and your enthusiasm.
We are definitely "two sides of the same coin," so let's work together. Want to do something? Realize you can change what exists today, get off of the sidelines, and get in the game so we can win. Don't go start a new game - we need you on our team!
I'd be happy to discuss this further. As Tog indicated in his article's introduction, this is a very important issue.
Lyle Kantrovich
http://crocolyle.blogspot.com/
--------------
Related:
- Blog post: "Why I’m not calling myself an Information Architect anymore"
- B&A Comments on "Why I’m not calling myself an Information Architect anymore"
- The Making of a Discipline: The Making of a Title
- Challis Hodge - UX Roles & Titles: Trend or Profession?
- Argus-ACIA Salaries and Benefits for Information Architects - Most Common Titles
- Bloug: IAs: Better at Marketing than they Thought?
July 31, 2003
One-Eyed Zombies Are Becoming More Real
An article entitled Reality bytes discusses force-feedback and haptics for input and output devices.
"Improvements in graphics and sound have already raised the bar. Now, the physically immersive technology known as "haptics" is beginning to deliver on the science-fiction dream of interactive alternative realities, making gamers feel a part of their games as never before. ... Haptics technology explores how peripheral computing devices can impart force and vibrations in response to what is taking place on the screen. The military began research in the field in the 1960s. Later the focus shifted to bringing a more tactile computing experience to users of medical and automotive technologies."
"One result is technology that aims to convince the brain that it is feeling, say, a seven-gram change in pressure from a haptic device. Haptic research has also drawn on the work of scientists who have inserted probes into the arm nerves of patients to determine the effects of various tactile experiences. "Ultimately, though, you can only ask consumers if they thought it was realistic or not," Chang says. "You can't put probes in their brain and measure."
An article entitled Reality bytes discusses force-feedback and haptics for input and output devices.
"Improvements in graphics and sound have already raised the bar. Now, the physically immersive technology known as "haptics" is beginning to deliver on the science-fiction dream of interactive alternative realities, making gamers feel a part of their games as never before. ... Haptics technology explores how peripheral computing devices can impart force and vibrations in response to what is taking place on the screen. The military began research in the field in the 1960s. Later the focus shifted to bringing a more tactile computing experience to users of medical and automotive technologies."
"One result is technology that aims to convince the brain that it is feeling, say, a seven-gram change in pressure from a haptic device. Haptic research has also drawn on the work of scientists who have inserted probes into the arm nerves of patients to determine the effects of various tactile experiences. "Ultimately, though, you can only ask consumers if they thought it was realistic or not," Chang says. "You can't put probes in their brain and measure."
July 06, 2003
Are you a change agent?
In Prototype the Experience, Ian White makes a few points that ring true with my experience selling services to my clients:
"The context within which a product exists strongly influences the user experience and provides meaning. Illustrating this context by constructing a scenario around the artifact allows a business audience to understand a solution, rather than see a component which any design firm could provide."
"You owe it to your clients to help them think differently about design. Make them the champion of new products, services and opportunities. You can gloat in their success and be regarded as a powerful change agent."
My take:
Many designers and usability professionals ARE change agents -- but they may not see themselves that way. Change agents have to provide a vision that resonates with their clients. Clients really don't just want to know what you DO, they want to envision what you'll facilitate for their customers, their businesses and their own careers.
Provide inspiration from the start and they'll understand the solutions you provide, otherwise they'll just see the deliverables and the invoice.
"Those who have changed the universe have never done it by changing officials, but always by inspiring the people."
- Napoleon Bonaparte
In Prototype the Experience, Ian White makes a few points that ring true with my experience selling services to my clients:
"The context within which a product exists strongly influences the user experience and provides meaning. Illustrating this context by constructing a scenario around the artifact allows a business audience to understand a solution, rather than see a component which any design firm could provide."
"You owe it to your clients to help them think differently about design. Make them the champion of new products, services and opportunities. You can gloat in their success and be regarded as a powerful change agent."
My take:
Many designers and usability professionals ARE change agents -- but they may not see themselves that way. Change agents have to provide a vision that resonates with their clients. Clients really don't just want to know what you DO, they want to envision what you'll facilitate for their customers, their businesses and their own careers.
Provide inspiration from the start and they'll understand the solutions you provide, otherwise they'll just see the deliverables and the invoice.
"Those who have changed the universe have never done it by changing officials, but always by inspiring the people."
- Napoleon Bonaparte
Usability: A Requirement for Security
This article has a number of good points to consider when designing "secure" systems.
"For security to be effective, it has to be convenient. That means designing to relieve the burdens of everyday users and system administrators instead of adding new ones. Companies that ignore this will fail to increase security."
"Strong security is more than just technology. The lack of usability of today's technology means that only the most sensitive data handled by the most paranoid employees stands a chance of being protected properly."
This article has a number of good points to consider when designing "secure" systems.
"For security to be effective, it has to be convenient. That means designing to relieve the burdens of everyday users and system administrators instead of adding new ones. Companies that ignore this will fail to increase security."
"Strong security is more than just technology. The lack of usability of today's technology means that only the most sensitive data handled by the most paranoid employees stands a chance of being protected properly."
June 19, 2003
Do Some Research on Being a Client
Jason at Signal vs. Noise points out a great learning tactic: hire someone in your line of work and try being on the client end of the job for once. He notes that it's a great way to learn how hard it is to be the client. I'd like to refine and add a few points to his:
- You'll learn how hard it is to be the client.
- You'll see how another consultant/designer explains things.
- You might see new deliverables, methods or techniques you can learn or adapt.
- You'll refine (or at least validate) your current approach.
- You'll be more empathetic with your own clients in the future.
- You'll learn about critical steps of the client experience you may take for granted like finding and interviewing a consultant, deliverable turnover, expectation setting, communication needs (e.g. status updates), and billing processes.
Jason at Signal vs. Noise points out a great learning tactic: hire someone in your line of work and try being on the client end of the job for once. He notes that it's a great way to learn how hard it is to be the client. I'd like to refine and add a few points to his:
- You'll learn how hard it is to be the client.
- You'll see how another consultant/designer explains things.
- You might see new deliverables, methods or techniques you can learn or adapt.
- You'll refine (or at least validate) your current approach.
- You'll be more empathetic with your own clients in the future.
- You'll learn about critical steps of the client experience you may take for granted like finding and interviewing a consultant, deliverable turnover, expectation setting, communication needs (e.g. status updates), and billing processes.
Why Things Don't Work
Don Norman talks about things usability and user experience folks need to do better to be more successful.
The way for usability professionals to get the attention of senior management is to talk about dollars and cents. ... "Executives know that service costs are enormous, the sort of costs companies try to cut. It's extremely easy to make the case that subjecting a product to usability testing up front eliminates service costs and makes customers happier."
One of the best examples of a top technology executive who thinks about usability, Norman says, is Michael Dell. "Someone once asked him why Dell keeps doing so well on market share and margins. Dell responded that his company doesn't go after market share or margins. Instead, he and his team think about whether they are satisfying customers, both in terms of usability and across the board in every aspect of the customer's experience. If you focus on that, the rest takes care of itself."
Don Norman talks about things usability and user experience folks need to do better to be more successful.
The way for usability professionals to get the attention of senior management is to talk about dollars and cents. ... "Executives know that service costs are enormous, the sort of costs companies try to cut. It's extremely easy to make the case that subjecting a product to usability testing up front eliminates service costs and makes customers happier."
One of the best examples of a top technology executive who thinks about usability, Norman says, is Michael Dell. "Someone once asked him why Dell keeps doing so well on market share and margins. Dell responded that his company doesn't go after market share or margins. Instead, he and his team think about whether they are satisfying customers, both in terms of usability and across the board in every aspect of the customer's experience. If you focus on that, the rest takes care of itself."
March 25, 2003
Harvard Business School - The Mayo Clinic Experience
HBS has a neat story on the Mayo Clinic called "Why Docs Don’t Wear White Coats Or Polo Shirts at the Mayo Clinic." It clearly outlines a thoughtful approach to the customer experience in a medical setting. It provides a glimpse into the Mayo brand and their focus on patients' well-being, both physical and emotional.
"The potential of design to promote healing through stress reduction has been documented in dozens of studies. For these reasons, more medical institutions are making an effort to create open, welcoming spaces with soft, natural light. Mayo Clinic goes further with its design philosophy, which is perhaps as well honed and articulated as that of any major service provider in America, and pays strict attention to how every detail affects the patient’s experience."
"A well-designed physical environment has a positive impact on employees as well, reducing physical and emotional stress—which is of value not only to employees but also to patients because visible employee stress sends negative signals. In our interviews, patients commented on the lack of apparent stress; one said, “It did not seem like a doctor’s office when we went to Mayo. There was no tension.”
Here's a photo of a waiting room at the Mayo Clinic from the American Institute of Architects - Academy of Architecture for Health.
A quick check of the Mayo site highlights more of their customer-focus in their unique patient amenities like an education center, 'quiet rooms', a communications center, pagers, and a movie auditorium.
There you have it: more proof that good design can positively impact both employees and customers.
Related:
A Cancer Patient's Perspectives on Facilities Design - facility design considerations for clinics serving cancer patients (e.g. lighting, privacy, door design)
- Mayo Clinic.Org - about the clinic
- Mayo Clinic.com - a health information site, elegantly designed
HBS has a neat story on the Mayo Clinic called "Why Docs Don’t Wear White Coats Or Polo Shirts at the Mayo Clinic." It clearly outlines a thoughtful approach to the customer experience in a medical setting. It provides a glimpse into the Mayo brand and their focus on patients' well-being, both physical and emotional.
"The potential of design to promote healing through stress reduction has been documented in dozens of studies. For these reasons, more medical institutions are making an effort to create open, welcoming spaces with soft, natural light. Mayo Clinic goes further with its design philosophy, which is perhaps as well honed and articulated as that of any major service provider in America, and pays strict attention to how every detail affects the patient’s experience."
"A well-designed physical environment has a positive impact on employees as well, reducing physical and emotional stress—which is of value not only to employees but also to patients because visible employee stress sends negative signals. In our interviews, patients commented on the lack of apparent stress; one said, “It did not seem like a doctor’s office when we went to Mayo. There was no tension.”
Here's a photo of a waiting room at the Mayo Clinic from the American Institute of Architects - Academy of Architecture for Health.
A quick check of the Mayo site highlights more of their customer-focus in their unique patient amenities like an education center, 'quiet rooms', a communications center, pagers, and a movie auditorium.
There you have it: more proof that good design can positively impact both employees and customers.
Related:
A Cancer Patient's Perspectives on Facilities Design - facility design considerations for clinics serving cancer patients (e.g. lighting, privacy, door design)
- Mayo Clinic.Org - about the clinic
- Mayo Clinic.com - a health information site, elegantly designed
Move it baby!
I think this violates some heuristic about users feeling in control, but it's kinda fun...
I think this violates some heuristic about users feeling in control, but it's kinda fun...
March 07, 2003
The Benefits of Applying Interface Guidelines
There's a good explanation of the benefits of following the most basic conventions for the UI platform you're designing for from the Apple (OS X) Aqua Human Interface Guidelines.
"The implementation of Apple’s human interface principles make the Macintosh what it is: intuitive, friendly, elegant, and powerful."
There's a good explanation of the benefits of following the most basic conventions for the UI platform you're designing for from the Apple (OS X) Aqua Human Interface Guidelines.
"The implementation of Apple’s human interface principles make the Macintosh what it is: intuitive, friendly, elegant, and powerful."
March 02, 2003
Segmenting Users with Navigation Games
The Rayovac corporate site has one of the worst navigation bars I've seen on a company web site in a long time. Talk about bad interaction design. Try selecting "About Rayovac", then mouse into the body of the page, then try to click on one of the second level navigation options like "Supplier Diversity." Depending on the path your mouse travels, your target is likely to disappear before your mouse gets there. Yet another gratuitous use of Flash. Maybe one of their design goals was to make navigating something of a puzzle - a challenging game of manual dexterity. Then again, maybe their target customers are people who could win at the classic kids' game "Operation."
[Via Andrew's HeyBlog]
The Rayovac corporate site has one of the worst navigation bars I've seen on a company web site in a long time. Talk about bad interaction design. Try selecting "About Rayovac", then mouse into the body of the page, then try to click on one of the second level navigation options like "Supplier Diversity." Depending on the path your mouse travels, your target is likely to disappear before your mouse gets there. Yet another gratuitous use of Flash. Maybe one of their design goals was to make navigating something of a puzzle - a challenging game of manual dexterity. Then again, maybe their target customers are people who could win at the classic kids' game "Operation."
[Via Andrew's HeyBlog]
February 28, 2003
Usability will win the war
Googlefight, the number one research source I never hesitate to miss, says usability will beat Saddam Hussein...Now the whole world will know that usability kicks butt!
Googlefight research also proves that developers defeat usability. That 'research' quantifies just how much developers defeat usability, although it offers no real explanations for the findings or how to turn the tide. Maybe Jared Spool offers a solution to this confused problem with those blankety-blank developers when he recommends usability folks "search for seducible moments." Of course, you can get fired or sued or even better for doing stuff like that, so be careful when implementing that recommendation with developers. Keep in mind that even if they say they want do some 'unit testing' with you later, that doesn't mean you should treat them like 'objects.'
Jakob Nielsen doesn't disagree with Googlefight when he says "numbers are powerful." He adds that "such metrics are great for assessing long-term progress" and suggests that we look at our success rate. Maybe Jakob will grant me "partial credit" for this blog post...
Googlefight, the number one research source I never hesitate to miss, says usability will beat Saddam Hussein...Now the whole world will know that usability kicks butt!
Googlefight research also proves that developers defeat usability. That 'research' quantifies just how much developers defeat usability, although it offers no real explanations for the findings or how to turn the tide. Maybe Jared Spool offers a solution to this confused problem with those blankety-blank developers when he recommends usability folks "search for seducible moments." Of course, you can get fired or sued or even better for doing stuff like that, so be careful when implementing that recommendation with developers. Keep in mind that even if they say they want do some 'unit testing' with you later, that doesn't mean you should treat them like 'objects.'
Jakob Nielsen doesn't disagree with Googlefight when he says "numbers are powerful." He adds that "such metrics are great for assessing long-term progress" and suggests that we look at our success rate. Maybe Jakob will grant me "partial credit" for this blog post...
James Lileks on the Saddam Interview
Okay, so I went on a rant about Dan Rather's interview with Saddam. I blasted CBS pretty hard, but I think they deserve it. James Lileks (who has a great blog) is a little softer, but makes basically the same key points - maybe lack of subtlety is why I don't get paid to write for a major newspaper like he does.
Some excerpts from Lileks' Bleat today:
"The tyrants of the 20th century have become iconic, and as such they seem to exist divorced from human nature. Men that evil are so rare it's almost comforting to watch them - oh, we'd know their kind if they came again. But we don't. The lesson is lost. Hitlers and Stalins and Maos and Kim Il Jungs aren't the anomalies, really; there are millions of people like them. They're just the ones who had what it took."
"What made Rather's trip such a waste was the water-kneed obsequiousness of it all. He was more interested in three full hours of bland conversation than 20 minutes of sharp discussion that ended with Saddam leaving the room. What was there to fear? Anyone think Saddam would have him shot? Stand up in the middle of the interview, put a round through Rather's skull and yell at his dead body for five minutes? Since the Iraqis controlled the production facilities, CBS apparently feared they wouldn't get the tape if Rather didn't gargle with Meek Juice before each question. Fine. As long as you realize that Rather would have been tougher on the Pope."
"Not so with the Saddam interview. The deference was pathetic, the questions toothless, the answers predictable. Sometimes history is farce the first time."
Lileks points out that CBS gave Saddam an opportunity to appear like just a normal, nice guy, and that Hitler would have appeared no different given the chance. How many psychopathic murderers have we seen on trial in our own country - people that neighbors and friends would never have suspected of mass murder or gruesome atrocities? Yet, I truly believe there were many people who fell for the 'nice guy' Saddam image CBS presented in all its prime-time glory. Proof: check out news sites and count the number of editorials discounting the interview versus the number of stories reporting Saddam's desire for a debate with Bush or his refusal to disarm. Most media outlets took this interview straight on, hook, line and sinker.
Okay, so I went on a rant about Dan Rather's interview with Saddam. I blasted CBS pretty hard, but I think they deserve it. James Lileks (who has a great blog) is a little softer, but makes basically the same key points - maybe lack of subtlety is why I don't get paid to write for a major newspaper like he does.
Some excerpts from Lileks' Bleat today:
"The tyrants of the 20th century have become iconic, and as such they seem to exist divorced from human nature. Men that evil are so rare it's almost comforting to watch them - oh, we'd know their kind if they came again. But we don't. The lesson is lost. Hitlers and Stalins and Maos and Kim Il Jungs aren't the anomalies, really; there are millions of people like them. They're just the ones who had what it took."
"What made Rather's trip such a waste was the water-kneed obsequiousness of it all. He was more interested in three full hours of bland conversation than 20 minutes of sharp discussion that ended with Saddam leaving the room. What was there to fear? Anyone think Saddam would have him shot? Stand up in the middle of the interview, put a round through Rather's skull and yell at his dead body for five minutes? Since the Iraqis controlled the production facilities, CBS apparently feared they wouldn't get the tape if Rather didn't gargle with Meek Juice before each question. Fine. As long as you realize that Rather would have been tougher on the Pope."
"Not so with the Saddam interview. The deference was pathetic, the questions toothless, the answers predictable. Sometimes history is farce the first time."
Lileks points out that CBS gave Saddam an opportunity to appear like just a normal, nice guy, and that Hitler would have appeared no different given the chance. How many psychopathic murderers have we seen on trial in our own country - people that neighbors and friends would never have suspected of mass murder or gruesome atrocities? Yet, I truly believe there were many people who fell for the 'nice guy' Saddam image CBS presented in all its prime-time glory. Proof: check out news sites and count the number of editorials discounting the interview versus the number of stories reporting Saddam's desire for a debate with Bush or his refusal to disarm. Most media outlets took this interview straight on, hook, line and sinker.
Aw, c'mon, that Butcher in Baghdad, he's really a nice guy
Let me get this straight - CBS' "unbiased and balanced" media whores (including Dan Rather) will bend over backwards for an exclusive 'interview' with a known mass-murdering dictator. They'll then pitch a bunch of softball questions at said murderer - who dons a nice suit and tie (as opposed to his usual military fatigues). This monster, responsible for nearly two million deaths, is then given more than an hour of prime-time network airtime to spout lies and retoric. Yet, a White House spokesman (not a known killer or rapist) isn't good enough (in the judgement of the 'fair news editors' at CBS) to represent the U.S. administration's rebuttal to this circus of an 'interview' aimed at snagging big numbers during ratings sweeps week. CBS would accept no less than a Secretary of State's mug on their network - evidently Ari Fleischer's face is too commonplace these days to draw the requisite viewers and ratings. Talk about selling your soul to the devil.
"White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told Reuters the White House had offered a representative to counter what he said would be propaganda, lies and "irresponsible statements" by Saddam in the rare interview. He said CBS replied it was interested only if President Bush made the response himself -- which he said the White House rejected on the grounds that it could imply a "moral equivalence" between the two leaders. CBS made a new offer on Wednesday. "If the president, the vice president or Secretary of State (Colin) Powell would like to appear on the program tonight we would be happy to have them appear on the program," Genelius said."
A Butcher? In who's opinion?
"According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in 2001, Iraqis have become the second largest group of refugees in the world. Iraqis also top the table of foreign nationals seeking asylum in the UK. Saddam Hussein has been ruthless in his treatment of any opposition to him since his rise to power in 1979. A cruel and callous disregard for human life and suffering remains the hallmark of his regime.
Torture is systematic in Iraq. The most senior figures in the regime are personally involved. Saddam Hussein runs Iraq with close members of his own family and a few associates, most of whom come from his hometown of Tikrit. These are the only people he feels he can trust. He directly controls the security services and, through them and a huge party network, his influence reaches deep into Iraqi society. All real authority rests with Saddam and his immediate circle. Saddam is head of state, head of government, leader of Iraq’s only political party and head of the armed forces.
Saddam has, through the RCC, issued a series of decrees establishing severe penalties (amputation, branding, cutting off of ears, or other forms of mutilation) for criminal offences. In mid-2000, the RCC approved amputation of the tongue as a new penalty for slander or abusive remarks about the President or his family. These punishments are practised mainly on political dissenters. Iraqi TV has broadcast pictures of these punishments as a warning to others.
According to an Amnesty International report published in August 2001, ‘torture is used systematically against political detainees. The scale and severity of torture in Iraq can only result from the acceptance of its use at the highest level.’ Over the years, Amnesty and other human rights organisations have received thousands of reports of torture and interviewed numerous torture victims.
This report, based on the testimony of Iraqi exiles, evidence gathered by UN rapporteurs and human rights organisations, and intelligence material, describes the human cost of Saddam Hussein’s control of Iraq. It examines in turn Iraq’s record on torture, the treatment of women, prison conditions, arbitrary and summary killings, the persecution of the Kurds and the Shia, the harassment of opposition figures outside Iraq and the occupation of Kuwait."
Saddam Hussein’s Regime’s Methods of Torture
- Eye gouging
- Piercing of hands with electric drill
- Suspension from the ceiling
- Electric shock
- Sexual abuse
- "Falaqa"
- Other physical torture
- Mock executions
- Acid baths
[I'm leaving out the gory details here...]
- from SADDAM HUSSEIN: crimes and human rights abuses, UK gov't
So what?
No matter what your opinion is on the impending war with Iraq, I think it's very clear that giving a man like this so much airtime to spew his lies and deceit is irresponsible. There were no questions about mustard gas, Kurds or torture. No tough quesions about the facts related to weapons of mass destruction. And through it all, CBS smirking all the way to the bank as they throw away any last remaining shred of journalistic integrity they used to have.
The day a major American TV network sells out to a tyrant and then says a White House spokesman isn't important enough in the interests of editorial balance is the day I quit watching that network. Anyone else have a mind to boycott CBS?
References:
- A biography of Saddam Hussein
- SADDAM HUSSEIN: crimes and human rights abuses A report on the human cost of Saddam’s policies by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office of the UK government
- Tales of the Tyrant - a fascinating account of Saddam's daily life, a glimpse at the man behind the tyranny.
A Call to Action:
"There must be a law governing humanity and governing relations in humanity, that there should not be an aggressor while others are silent about the aggression. There should not be a killer while those who watch and applaud the killing. There should not be an occupier of the land belonging to others while there are those who keep quiet and never move to remove the occupation"
- Saddam Hussein in his interview with Dan Rather
Saddam, I agree - and I believe one way or another, whether at the hands of the U.S. and its allies, or at the hands of your own people, you, the agressor, killer, and occupier, will be removed from your occupation of terror in Iraq.
Let me get this straight - CBS' "unbiased and balanced" media whores (including Dan Rather) will bend over backwards for an exclusive 'interview' with a known mass-murdering dictator. They'll then pitch a bunch of softball questions at said murderer - who dons a nice suit and tie (as opposed to his usual military fatigues). This monster, responsible for nearly two million deaths, is then given more than an hour of prime-time network airtime to spout lies and retoric. Yet, a White House spokesman (not a known killer or rapist) isn't good enough (in the judgement of the 'fair news editors' at CBS) to represent the U.S. administration's rebuttal to this circus of an 'interview' aimed at snagging big numbers during ratings sweeps week. CBS would accept no less than a Secretary of State's mug on their network - evidently Ari Fleischer's face is too commonplace these days to draw the requisite viewers and ratings. Talk about selling your soul to the devil.
"White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told Reuters the White House had offered a representative to counter what he said would be propaganda, lies and "irresponsible statements" by Saddam in the rare interview. He said CBS replied it was interested only if President Bush made the response himself -- which he said the White House rejected on the grounds that it could imply a "moral equivalence" between the two leaders. CBS made a new offer on Wednesday. "If the president, the vice president or Secretary of State (Colin) Powell would like to appear on the program tonight we would be happy to have them appear on the program," Genelius said."
A Butcher? In who's opinion?
"According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in 2001, Iraqis have become the second largest group of refugees in the world. Iraqis also top the table of foreign nationals seeking asylum in the UK. Saddam Hussein has been ruthless in his treatment of any opposition to him since his rise to power in 1979. A cruel and callous disregard for human life and suffering remains the hallmark of his regime.
Torture is systematic in Iraq. The most senior figures in the regime are personally involved. Saddam Hussein runs Iraq with close members of his own family and a few associates, most of whom come from his hometown of Tikrit. These are the only people he feels he can trust. He directly controls the security services and, through them and a huge party network, his influence reaches deep into Iraqi society. All real authority rests with Saddam and his immediate circle. Saddam is head of state, head of government, leader of Iraq’s only political party and head of the armed forces.
Saddam has, through the RCC, issued a series of decrees establishing severe penalties (amputation, branding, cutting off of ears, or other forms of mutilation) for criminal offences. In mid-2000, the RCC approved amputation of the tongue as a new penalty for slander or abusive remarks about the President or his family. These punishments are practised mainly on political dissenters. Iraqi TV has broadcast pictures of these punishments as a warning to others.
According to an Amnesty International report published in August 2001, ‘torture is used systematically against political detainees. The scale and severity of torture in Iraq can only result from the acceptance of its use at the highest level.’ Over the years, Amnesty and other human rights organisations have received thousands of reports of torture and interviewed numerous torture victims.
This report, based on the testimony of Iraqi exiles, evidence gathered by UN rapporteurs and human rights organisations, and intelligence material, describes the human cost of Saddam Hussein’s control of Iraq. It examines in turn Iraq’s record on torture, the treatment of women, prison conditions, arbitrary and summary killings, the persecution of the Kurds and the Shia, the harassment of opposition figures outside Iraq and the occupation of Kuwait."
Saddam Hussein’s Regime’s Methods of Torture
- Eye gouging
- Piercing of hands with electric drill
- Suspension from the ceiling
- Electric shock
- Sexual abuse
- "Falaqa"
- Other physical torture
- Mock executions
- Acid baths
[I'm leaving out the gory details here...]
- from SADDAM HUSSEIN: crimes and human rights abuses, UK gov't
So what?
No matter what your opinion is on the impending war with Iraq, I think it's very clear that giving a man like this so much airtime to spew his lies and deceit is irresponsible. There were no questions about mustard gas, Kurds or torture. No tough quesions about the facts related to weapons of mass destruction. And through it all, CBS smirking all the way to the bank as they throw away any last remaining shred of journalistic integrity they used to have.
The day a major American TV network sells out to a tyrant and then says a White House spokesman isn't important enough in the interests of editorial balance is the day I quit watching that network. Anyone else have a mind to boycott CBS?
References:
- A biography of Saddam Hussein
- SADDAM HUSSEIN: crimes and human rights abuses A report on the human cost of Saddam’s policies by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office of the UK government
- Tales of the Tyrant - a fascinating account of Saddam's daily life, a glimpse at the man behind the tyranny.
A Call to Action:
"There must be a law governing humanity and governing relations in humanity, that there should not be an aggressor while others are silent about the aggression. There should not be a killer while those who watch and applaud the killing. There should not be an occupier of the land belonging to others while there are those who keep quiet and never move to remove the occupation"
- Saddam Hussein in his interview with Dan Rather
Saddam, I agree - and I believe one way or another, whether at the hands of the U.S. and its allies, or at the hands of your own people, you, the agressor, killer, and occupier, will be removed from your occupation of terror in Iraq.
February 27, 2003
Is Microsoft deliberately sabotaging their user experience?
I believe Capitalism works, I don't think Microsoft is evil, and I don't use Opera, but after reading "Opera 'borks' MSN in standards spat" I can't say I'm impressed with the folks at Microsoft and MSN. It sounds like MSN is screwing with Opera users on purpose and it appears to be an attempt to get those users to switch back to IE. What value is there in deliberately "displaying [MSN] pages improperly" for Opera users? Does that help MSN's advertisers? I don't think so. Does it make their content more accessible? I don't think so. Does it make any sense? No.
I believe Capitalism works, I don't think Microsoft is evil, and I don't use Opera, but after reading "Opera 'borks' MSN in standards spat" I can't say I'm impressed with the folks at Microsoft and MSN. It sounds like MSN is screwing with Opera users on purpose and it appears to be an attempt to get those users to switch back to IE. What value is there in deliberately "displaying [MSN] pages improperly" for Opera users? Does that help MSN's advertisers? I don't think so. Does it make their content more accessible? I don't think so. Does it make any sense? No.
Consider these points:
- MSN can only make less money for Microsoft and advertisers by breaking pages for users.
- Opera is pretty darn standards compliant and clearly supports enough standards that the MSN designers could easily send Opera users a page which displays correctly. Don't tell me they've never heard of "graceful degradation." (From the sound of it, nothing would need to "degrade" anyway - MSN just needs to code things correctly.)
- Many of MSN's pages don't validate or have bugs, and IE isn't 100% standards compliant either.
- Most web users don't give a thought to technical standards, nor should they. Do car drivers care about what "standards" their vehicles are engineered to?
- Web users upgrade browsers infrequently and standards evolve. This means not all standards will be supported by all browsers used by MSN's users at any given point in time.
According to Opera:
"In October 2001, Opera users were blocked from the MSN site. The event caused an uproar among Web users and MSN was forced to change their policy. However, MSN continues a policy of singling out its Opera competitor by specifically instructing Opera to hide content from users .... MSN now allows access to users of Opera 7, but is still targeting and sending users of earlier versions a broken page. This treatment is completely unnecessary, as the page would look the same in Opera as in Microsoft's own Internet Explorer if it had been fed the same information."
When Microsoft reopened MSN to Opera users they said, "the experience may be slightly degraded, simply because (those browsers) don't support the standards we support closely, as far as the HTML standard in those browsers" are concerned.
Microsoft's hypocrisy:
They clearly took a swipe at Opera and other browsers as being less standards compliant. Yet earlier that same year, David Massy of Microsoft said that Microsoft's "position is very clear because a standard exists, that does not mean Microsoft will automatically implement it. Microsoft will implement appropriate standards that we believe are useful to our customers." This clearly shows Microsoft's hypocrisy when accusing Opera of not being 100% compliant. You also have to ask what they mean by "useful to our customers." Which customers are they talking about? Or did they mean shareholders? It seems pretty evident that the 'standard' that Microsoft designs for is Internet Explorer - the 'standard' web browser.
Microsoft is getting their just deserts:
Clearly, Microsoft is one of the companies most responsible for making it difficult for designers, coders, and QA people to deliver a simple cross-browser compatible HTML design. Now their MSN design problems (intentional or not) are being used by a small upstart competitor to make the folks at Microsoft look like heavy-handed, arrogant jerks who would rather screw up their user experience than let someone have a pleasant experience with at competing browser.
So where is the user is all this?
Users are left wondering why the web sucks. Wondering why they have to know so much about computers, web browsers, and upgrades; worrying if the next install of IE they try will go okay or if it'll bomb or mess anything up. Many computer users still see their desktop systems as fragile ecosystems that they'd rather not mess with. Because they didn't setup the technology to experience the technology. They hope to USE the technology to experience things: a more efficient business life, entertainment from new sources, critical information that somehow enriches their life. It's not about the damn technology! Technology should be about changing people's life experiences for the better.
I've been a happy IE user for a number of years (I was once a die-hard Netscape user, but they didn't keep up), but since reading about these shenanigans from MS, I've downloaded the latest versions of Opera, Netscape and Mozilla for personal use and have been taking another look at what browser I want to use in my day to day web use. Microsoft made me pause and wonder again why I was using their browser (which I'd been quite happy with). Attitudes matter.
Related Links:- Opera's Press Release on The Bork edition of Opera 7.01 - explains their rationale.
- Opera FAQ: Why doesn't MSN work with Opera? - good explanation and detailed "evidence" as to what exactly MSN is doing differently for Opera users.
- Jakob Nielsen: Stuck With Old Browsers Until 2003 - Jakob's added an update in February 2003 with comments about how accurate he thinks his predictions were in this article from early 1999.
- Microsoft Developer Network: Internet Explorer 6 and Standards
- W3C members fail standards test - "browser makers like Microsoft, AOL Time Warner and Apple and authoring tool producers, including Adobe Systems, Macromedia and Microsoft," remain noncompliant with W3C standards.
February 13, 2003
Can you design with your gut?
I found the discussion/comments on this Elegant Hack post - Good Gut so thought provoking I had to post my own 25 cents worth. How much do you trust your 'gut' when it comes to usability evaluations or design? Post your comments on Christina's site.
I found the discussion/comments on this Elegant Hack post - Good Gut so thought provoking I had to post my own 25 cents worth. How much do you trust your 'gut' when it comes to usability evaluations or design? Post your comments on Christina's site.
February 07, 2003
Web users' navigation behaviors changing and findings from testing search query formulation
A new StatMarket survey shows a couple of interesting trends:
- 64% of users now go directly where they want to go by typing in URLs and using bookmarks, while only 35% get there via surfing (just following links)
- Similar surveys done in February 2002 and 2001 showed surfing much higher - at 47% and 52% respectively.
- 13% of users arrived at a site via a search engine, up from 8 percent in 2002. So, while search engine referrals are growing, it's link-to-link navigation that is decreasing
Here are a few excerpts from an IDG article covering the survey results:
"Meandering is decreasing. This is a sign that the market is maturing," said Geoff Johnston, vice president of product management for the StatMarket division of WebSideStory Inc. which released the report Thursday.
While the Internet's cornucopia of information may have left Net users starry-eyed in the early days, users are now determined to get down to business rather than browse."
Not only is search engine use growing, people are getting better at using them, said Matthew Berk, a senior analyst at Jupiter Research.
Johnston ... comparing the Internet to TV. "After a while you get tired of flipping through the channels and just turn to the programs you like," he said."
Are users really better at searching?
I don't agree that with the statement that "people are getting better at using" search engines. My take is Google has improved the effectiveness of web search engines -- making even their competitors serve web searchers better by focusing on improving search algorithms and ranking methods. Maybe a very small percentage of web searchers have become more savvy about search query formulation or which engine to use, but I think it's more likely that the usability improvements made in search engines have accounted for users trusting them to meet their needs more often.
My experience shows that most users aren't very sophisticated in their approach to using search. For example, when usability testing an intranet site recently, we wanted to test how people would try to find the site on an internal search engine. We asked people to search for the site, knowing that it wasn't in the search engine's index. Our goals were two-fold:
1) see what query terms users would enter so they we could make sure those terms worked later, and
2) see how many different terms users would try before giving up.
The results amazed me. Many users totally gave up after just one or two search attempts, and no one made more than four search attempts. It was a very useful exercise - we ended up with a huge list of key query terms that we could focus on -- making sure those queries would find the site in the future. We also learned just how important first and second search result sets are, and that users will NOT be patient or successful with a poor search engine.
You might give that exercise a try on your next effort. You just have to reassure the test participant so they don't feel bad about not completing the task. We actually admitted to our participants right after that task that there was no way they wouldv'e found the site that day. We then explained why we set the test up that way, and how their struggle with different queries helped us. We also reassured them that there were no more 'trick' tasks like that in the study. This seemed to help them regain any lost confidence.
Related:
- StatMarket page covering the survey results (Note StatMarket links haven't been reliable in the past.)
- Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox - Search: Visible and Simple - note Jakob talks about observing how effective users are at query formulation.
- 37signals E-Commerce Search Report - a review of 25 online retailers' search engines that identifies 22 best practices.
A new StatMarket survey shows a couple of interesting trends:
- 64% of users now go directly where they want to go by typing in URLs and using bookmarks, while only 35% get there via surfing (just following links)
- Similar surveys done in February 2002 and 2001 showed surfing much higher - at 47% and 52% respectively.
- 13% of users arrived at a site via a search engine, up from 8 percent in 2002. So, while search engine referrals are growing, it's link-to-link navigation that is decreasing
Here are a few excerpts from an IDG article covering the survey results:
"Meandering is decreasing. This is a sign that the market is maturing," said Geoff Johnston, vice president of product management for the StatMarket division of WebSideStory Inc. which released the report Thursday.
While the Internet's cornucopia of information may have left Net users starry-eyed in the early days, users are now determined to get down to business rather than browse."
Not only is search engine use growing, people are getting better at using them, said Matthew Berk, a senior analyst at Jupiter Research.
Johnston ... comparing the Internet to TV. "After a while you get tired of flipping through the channels and just turn to the programs you like," he said."
Are users really better at searching?
I don't agree that with the statement that "people are getting better at using" search engines. My take is Google has improved the effectiveness of web search engines -- making even their competitors serve web searchers better by focusing on improving search algorithms and ranking methods. Maybe a very small percentage of web searchers have become more savvy about search query formulation or which engine to use, but I think it's more likely that the usability improvements made in search engines have accounted for users trusting them to meet their needs more often.
My experience shows that most users aren't very sophisticated in their approach to using search. For example, when usability testing an intranet site recently, we wanted to test how people would try to find the site on an internal search engine. We asked people to search for the site, knowing that it wasn't in the search engine's index. Our goals were two-fold:
1) see what query terms users would enter so they we could make sure those terms worked later, and
2) see how many different terms users would try before giving up.
The results amazed me. Many users totally gave up after just one or two search attempts, and no one made more than four search attempts. It was a very useful exercise - we ended up with a huge list of key query terms that we could focus on -- making sure those queries would find the site in the future. We also learned just how important first and second search result sets are, and that users will NOT be patient or successful with a poor search engine.
You might give that exercise a try on your next effort. You just have to reassure the test participant so they don't feel bad about not completing the task. We actually admitted to our participants right after that task that there was no way they wouldv'e found the site that day. We then explained why we set the test up that way, and how their struggle with different queries helped us. We also reassured them that there were no more 'trick' tasks like that in the study. This seemed to help them regain any lost confidence.
Related:
- StatMarket page covering the survey results (Note StatMarket links haven't been reliable in the past.)
- Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox - Search: Visible and Simple - note Jakob talks about observing how effective users are at query formulation.
- 37signals E-Commerce Search Report - a review of 25 online retailers' search engines that identifies 22 best practices.
February 04, 2003
Mad as hell
"It's as if the user interface folks have had their clocks flashing 12:00 for two full decades."
- TechWeb: Putting A Bad Interface On Things
"It's as if the user interface folks have had their clocks flashing 12:00 for two full decades."
- TechWeb: Putting A Bad Interface On Things
January 16, 2003
Forrester: ERP Usability Sucks
Forrester analysts tried their hands at performing basic tasks in 11 different ERP software systems - you know, the systems that cost millions and millions of dollars. If you want to check out their findings, you can currently read a two-page brief on the Forrester site called "App User Interfaces Still Need Work" (if you register for guest access), and ZDNet has a short article on it as well which incorporates some additional quotes. Here are some excerpts and my take:
From the ZDNet article:
"Forrester analysts received no user training before testing the software. Companies typically invest in extensive training for their workers, spending between 10 percent and 15 percent of their project budgets on average, according to Forrester. However, the analysts tested what they thought of as "straightforward" tasks that shouldn't require training"
"Forrester receives many complaints from businesses about the poor design of ERP software, Orlov said. While such complaints aren't necessarily on the rise, Orlov said, in a depressed market for corporate applications, now is the time to improve the situation. "In a buyer's market, customers should be demanding better usability," Orlov said. The costs to businesses that use poorly designed software are huge, according to Orlov."
From the Forrester brief:
"While users invest trillions of dollars in enterprise software to supercharge productivity, boost customer satisfaction, and increase revenues, hard-to-use apps mean that users suffer decreased productivity and increased costs."
"Would anyone buy a Porsche if shifting gears required weeks of model-specific training and a lot of muscle? Just as shifting is basic in a sports car, so are these application-management tasks.
"Poor usability creates angry customers -- by driving up costs and squandering user productivity. To avoid this, vendors must perform scenario reviews on their apps and support Web sites. The next steps?
- Get outside help. Vendors should choose an accredited reviewer. The reviewer should follow a methodology focused on detailed design personas and perform lab and real-world testing.
- Prioritize fixes. Once problems are identified, vendors should prioritize based on importance to the user and the ease of fixing the issue."
My Prediction:
Until corporations learn to incorporate real usability measurements in their software evaluation processes, they will continue to buy expensive software that becomes shelfware, requires lots of additional training, and sucks productivity out of their businesses. Companies need to make usability a priority when talking to vendors: they need to ask when, how and if usability tests are conducted, they need to ask for test results (ideally reported by third parties), and they need to suggest that vendors add usability professionals to their staff. Until they do that, vendors will keep cranking out bloated featureware with horrible user experiences and steep learning curves.
Forrester analysts tried their hands at performing basic tasks in 11 different ERP software systems - you know, the systems that cost millions and millions of dollars. If you want to check out their findings, you can currently read a two-page brief on the Forrester site called "App User Interfaces Still Need Work" (if you register for guest access), and ZDNet has a short article on it as well which incorporates some additional quotes. Here are some excerpts and my take:
From the ZDNet article:
"Forrester analysts received no user training before testing the software. Companies typically invest in extensive training for their workers, spending between 10 percent and 15 percent of their project budgets on average, according to Forrester. However, the analysts tested what they thought of as "straightforward" tasks that shouldn't require training"
"Forrester receives many complaints from businesses about the poor design of ERP software, Orlov said. While such complaints aren't necessarily on the rise, Orlov said, in a depressed market for corporate applications, now is the time to improve the situation. "In a buyer's market, customers should be demanding better usability," Orlov said. The costs to businesses that use poorly designed software are huge, according to Orlov."
From the Forrester brief:
"While users invest trillions of dollars in enterprise software to supercharge productivity, boost customer satisfaction, and increase revenues, hard-to-use apps mean that users suffer decreased productivity and increased costs."
"Would anyone buy a Porsche if shifting gears required weeks of model-specific training and a lot of muscle? Just as shifting is basic in a sports car, so are these application-management tasks.
"Poor usability creates angry customers -- by driving up costs and squandering user productivity. To avoid this, vendors must perform scenario reviews on their apps and support Web sites. The next steps?
- Get outside help. Vendors should choose an accredited reviewer. The reviewer should follow a methodology focused on detailed design personas and perform lab and real-world testing.
- Prioritize fixes. Once problems are identified, vendors should prioritize based on importance to the user and the ease of fixing the issue."
My Prediction:
Until corporations learn to incorporate real usability measurements in their software evaluation processes, they will continue to buy expensive software that becomes shelfware, requires lots of additional training, and sucks productivity out of their businesses. Companies need to make usability a priority when talking to vendors: they need to ask when, how and if usability tests are conducted, they need to ask for test results (ideally reported by third parties), and they need to suggest that vendors add usability professionals to their staff. Until they do that, vendors will keep cranking out bloated featureware with horrible user experiences and steep learning curves.
January 09, 2003
How what we do compares to art and porn
I laughed out loud today reading this bit from Boxes and Arrows:
"Boxes and Arrows was born in 2002. We came into the world in March like a lion, and swore to write about “what we do” even though we couldn't agree what that was or what to call it. Like art or porn, we agreed we knew it when we saw it, and that was good enough. As the year unfolded, we discovered “it” was strategy and practice, design and evaluation, and most of all understanding and empathy for users and business. We definitely design, but we design more than just an interface or just a sitemap. We discovered we need a vast variety of skills to do our jobs well. And we need to do our jobs well to survive."
Christina has a great writing style and often makes me laugh while making an excellent point.
I laughed out loud today reading this bit from Boxes and Arrows:
"Boxes and Arrows was born in 2002. We came into the world in March like a lion, and swore to write about “what we do” even though we couldn't agree what that was or what to call it. Like art or porn, we agreed we knew it when we saw it, and that was good enough. As the year unfolded, we discovered “it” was strategy and practice, design and evaluation, and most of all understanding and empathy for users and business. We definitely design, but we design more than just an interface or just a sitemap. We discovered we need a vast variety of skills to do our jobs well. And we need to do our jobs well to survive."
Christina has a great writing style and often makes me laugh while making an excellent point.
January 08, 2003
Do Not Reply to This Message Directly
Susan Weinschenk tells a good story of bad online banking customer service.
Susan Weinschenk tells a good story of bad online banking customer service.
December 10, 2002
The Smart Money Behind Computer Aesthetics
A NewFactor Special Report talks about aesthetics and design -- I half expected Don Norman to be quoted in the article. Even though they didn't talk to Don, they did an excellent job of covering the topic. Don's trying to raise awareness of this fact within the HCI community with his upcoming book and recent talks.
Repeat after me, non-believing usability gurus, "beauty and style do matter to consumers and users." Can you say it? I knew you could.
"Dennis Boyle, a studio leader and principal of the IDEO industrial design firm, told NewsFactor that aesthetics becomes more important for many products as they mature. The first computers, like the first cars and airplanes, were functional and plain. "They start out with people just trying to make them work," said Boyle, who recently designed the Handspring Treo PDA and has worked on Palm, Apple, Dell, HP and other computers. "But eventually people don't care what's inside. They just want it to work well."
"Industrial designers are walking a fine line. As Boyle pointed out, "Aesthetics is just one of the plates spinning on the stick." Too little attention to aesthetics will alienate buyers. Too much attention can slow down the product cycle, delay introduction of performance improvements and add to products' cost."
Usability engineers are walking a parallel fine line. Yes, usability is just another spinning plate -- and yes, you can have 'too much usability.' As the saying goes, 'all things in moderation.'
A NewFactor Special Report talks about aesthetics and design -- I half expected Don Norman to be quoted in the article. Even though they didn't talk to Don, they did an excellent job of covering the topic. Don's trying to raise awareness of this fact within the HCI community with his upcoming book and recent talks.
Repeat after me, non-believing usability gurus, "beauty and style do matter to consumers and users." Can you say it? I knew you could.
"Dennis Boyle, a studio leader and principal of the IDEO industrial design firm, told NewsFactor that aesthetics becomes more important for many products as they mature. The first computers, like the first cars and airplanes, were functional and plain. "They start out with people just trying to make them work," said Boyle, who recently designed the Handspring Treo PDA and has worked on Palm, Apple, Dell, HP and other computers. "But eventually people don't care what's inside. They just want it to work well."
"Industrial designers are walking a fine line. As Boyle pointed out, "Aesthetics is just one of the plates spinning on the stick." Too little attention to aesthetics will alienate buyers. Too much attention can slow down the product cycle, delay introduction of performance improvements and add to products' cost."
Usability engineers are walking a parallel fine line. Yes, usability is just another spinning plate -- and yes, you can have 'too much usability.' As the saying goes, 'all things in moderation.'
Design blooper: Car park barrier
David Travis from System Concepts nicely illustrates a parking garage barrier design that gets "iterated" a number of times. He then aptly asks "how many participants would have been needed in a usability test to spot this blooper?" It's a great illustration of where usability testing would have been FAR cheaper than the resulting hacks to fix a bad design. In this example, the company who created the design is probably not the same company who bought it and was trying to fix it. Travis has also authored a new book called E-commerce Usability. Some sample chapters are available online.
David Travis from System Concepts nicely illustrates a parking garage barrier design that gets "iterated" a number of times. He then aptly asks "how many participants would have been needed in a usability test to spot this blooper?" It's a great illustration of where usability testing would have been FAR cheaper than the resulting hacks to fix a bad design. In this example, the company who created the design is probably not the same company who bought it and was trying to fix it. Travis has also authored a new book called E-commerce Usability. Some sample chapters are available online.
December 07, 2002
since1968: Interview with Steve Krug
Marc Garrett has posted a nice, fresh interview with Steve Krug, author of Don't Make Me Think. Marc avoids the boring, trite questions and asks some that I find more interesting like "Are you aware of any other Web books that have "Hatch, Sen. Orrin" as an index entry?" and "Are you a farmer or a cowman?" Reading this interview, I also learned that Croc O' Lyle is one of Steve's favorite sites. Needless to say, I'm flattered. Thanks Steve, you're too kind.
Here's my favorite quote:
"...it reminds me of a line from an underground comic called The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers from back in the 1970's: "Dope will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no dope." Having a small budget and someone on the project with clout who really cares about whether users have a good experience--which is often the case with an amateur site--will often get you much farther than a big budget and no one guiding the whole thing."
Marc Garrett has posted a nice, fresh interview with Steve Krug, author of Don't Make Me Think. Marc avoids the boring, trite questions and asks some that I find more interesting like "Are you aware of any other Web books that have "Hatch, Sen. Orrin" as an index entry?" and "Are you a farmer or a cowman?" Reading this interview, I also learned that Croc O' Lyle is one of Steve's favorite sites. Needless to say, I'm flattered. Thanks Steve, you're too kind.
Here's my favorite quote:
"...it reminds me of a line from an underground comic called The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers from back in the 1970's: "Dope will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no dope." Having a small budget and someone on the project with clout who really cares about whether users have a good experience--which is often the case with an amateur site--will often get you much farther than a big budget and no one guiding the whole thing."
December 06, 2002
Usability and Open Source Software
A paper from the University of Waikato, New Zealand does a great job of discussing at length some of the causes of poor usability of Open Source Software (OSS). I got this link from a developer-type cohort. He keeps trying to convince me to help bring usability to the OSS community. The paper does a good job of explaining why that just doesn't sound like fun to me.
One of the core problems:
"The OSS approach fails for end user usability because there are 'the wrong kind of eyeballs' looking at, but failing to see, usability issues. In some ways the relatively new problem with OSS usability reflects the earlier problem with commercial systems development: initially the bulk of applications were designed by computing experts for other computing experts, but over time an increasing proportion of systems development was aimed at non-experts and usability problems became more prominent. The transition to non-expert applications in OSS products is following a similar trajectory, just a few years later."
I question whether OSS will eventually follow the same trajectory - after all, the market drove commercial software to take that trajectory. The "market" for OSS is rather different. The author talks about OSS developers being incented to "scratch a personal itch" -- that and recognition are how they get "paid" to a large extent.
"The 'personal itch' motivation creates a significant difference between open source and commercial software development. Commercial systems development is usually about solving the needs of another group of users. The incentive is to make money by selling software to customers, often customers who are prepared to pay precisely because they do not have the development skills themselves."
Finally, how many usability folks would want to dive into this for the "public good"?
"Open source draws its origins and strength from a hacker culture (O'Reilly, 1999). This culture can be extremely welcoming to other hackers, comfortably spanning nations, organisations and time zones via the Internet. However it may be less welcoming to non-hackers. Good usability design draws from a variety of different intellectual cultures including but not limited to psychology, sociology, graphic design and even theatre studies. Multidisciplinary design teams can be very effective, but require particular skills to initiate and sustain. As a result, existing OSS teams may just lack the skills to solve usability problems and even the skills to bring in 'outsiders' to help. The stereotypes of low hacker social skills are not to be taken as gospel, but the sustaining of distributed multidisciplinary design teams is not trivial."
Working on a project with no clear leadership, ill-defined roles, consensus-based decision making, and a bunch of developers who have no desire to listen to a "usability expert" -- yikes, I'd rather swim with a bunch of lawyers...er I mean sharks...Okay, same thing.
Related posts:
- Confessions of a Mozillian
- Linux needs focus not whiners
- Open Letter to a Power User / Developer
A paper from the University of Waikato, New Zealand does a great job of discussing at length some of the causes of poor usability of Open Source Software (OSS). I got this link from a developer-type cohort. He keeps trying to convince me to help bring usability to the OSS community. The paper does a good job of explaining why that just doesn't sound like fun to me.
One of the core problems:
"The OSS approach fails for end user usability because there are 'the wrong kind of eyeballs' looking at, but failing to see, usability issues. In some ways the relatively new problem with OSS usability reflects the earlier problem with commercial systems development: initially the bulk of applications were designed by computing experts for other computing experts, but over time an increasing proportion of systems development was aimed at non-experts and usability problems became more prominent. The transition to non-expert applications in OSS products is following a similar trajectory, just a few years later."
I question whether OSS will eventually follow the same trajectory - after all, the market drove commercial software to take that trajectory. The "market" for OSS is rather different. The author talks about OSS developers being incented to "scratch a personal itch" -- that and recognition are how they get "paid" to a large extent.
"The 'personal itch' motivation creates a significant difference between open source and commercial software development. Commercial systems development is usually about solving the needs of another group of users. The incentive is to make money by selling software to customers, often customers who are prepared to pay precisely because they do not have the development skills themselves."
Finally, how many usability folks would want to dive into this for the "public good"?
"Open source draws its origins and strength from a hacker culture (O'Reilly, 1999). This culture can be extremely welcoming to other hackers, comfortably spanning nations, organisations and time zones via the Internet. However it may be less welcoming to non-hackers. Good usability design draws from a variety of different intellectual cultures including but not limited to psychology, sociology, graphic design and even theatre studies. Multidisciplinary design teams can be very effective, but require particular skills to initiate and sustain. As a result, existing OSS teams may just lack the skills to solve usability problems and even the skills to bring in 'outsiders' to help. The stereotypes of low hacker social skills are not to be taken as gospel, but the sustaining of distributed multidisciplinary design teams is not trivial."
Working on a project with no clear leadership, ill-defined roles, consensus-based decision making, and a bunch of developers who have no desire to listen to a "usability expert" -- yikes, I'd rather swim with a bunch of lawyers...er I mean sharks...Okay, same thing.
Related posts:
- Confessions of a Mozillian
- Linux needs focus not whiners
- Open Letter to a Power User / Developer
New Data Leaves No Doubt about Why CRM Results Disappoint
A good article on CRM Guru talks about customer-centricity and how it's key to success in the marketplace. The author's "curmudgeon" tone also makes for a good read. Note too the case study at the end of the article.
"But the excruciating pain, the generator of post-traumatic planning disorder, is that developing customer-centric strategies requires us to trade in our "inspirational" and "creative" planning methods (read "short, sweet and dry") for time-consuming, boring, sweaty, stinky trudging through data looking for win-win opportunities with customers. Opportunities that don't sit up on the surface waiting to be seen but only appear to those willing to muck around in customer input and information long enough to find what competitors have not found—profitable strategies hidden beyond the reach of inspiration and strategic "brainstorms" and first obvious conclusions. Hell, just take me behind the barn and shoot me."
A good article on CRM Guru talks about customer-centricity and how it's key to success in the marketplace. The author's "curmudgeon" tone also makes for a good read. Note too the case study at the end of the article.
"But the excruciating pain, the generator of post-traumatic planning disorder, is that developing customer-centric strategies requires us to trade in our "inspirational" and "creative" planning methods (read "short, sweet and dry") for time-consuming, boring, sweaty, stinky trudging through data looking for win-win opportunities with customers. Opportunities that don't sit up on the surface waiting to be seen but only appear to those willing to muck around in customer input and information long enough to find what competitors have not found—profitable strategies hidden beyond the reach of inspiration and strategic "brainstorms" and first obvious conclusions. Hell, just take me behind the barn and shoot me."
November 26, 2002
Users Begin to Demand Software Usability Tests
Computerworld talks about the Common Industry Format for Usability Test Reports as well as a how some customers are viewing usability as a requirement when purchasing products.
"Boeing played a lead role in the development of CIF after its experience and internal studies showed that usability played a significant role in total cost of ownership. In one pilot of the CIF standard on a widely deployed productivity application, the Chicago-based company said improved product usability had a cost benefit of about $45 million."
Computerworld talks about the Common Industry Format for Usability Test Reports as well as a how some customers are viewing usability as a requirement when purchasing products.
"Boeing played a lead role in the development of CIF after its experience and internal studies showed that usability played a significant role in total cost of ownership. In one pilot of the CIF standard on a widely deployed productivity application, the Chicago-based company said improved product usability had a cost benefit of about $45 million."
October 31, 2002
October 01, 2002
Personal Writing Goal for the Day
Avoid TextSmell. Methinks this sometimes is a smelly blog. I promise I'll work on changing that. Thoughts?
Avoid TextSmell. Methinks this sometimes is a smelly blog. I promise I'll work on changing that. Thoughts?
September 27, 2002
JavaScript Misunderstood?
After reading Why Is JavaScript So Misunderstood?, all I can say is "big deal."
JavaScript (aka ECMAscript, JScript, etc.) is a cool 'programming language' for sure. The author leaves out a few key limitations of JavaScript like:
1. JavaScript is only really supported in browsers. Not all browsers (and versions) support JavaScrpt well or to the same extent. Many implementations are quite buggy.
2. This means you can't just simply 'run' your 'programs' easily, reliably or in stand-alone mode.
3. It also means that your user interfaces must be created with the limited UI capabilities available to web browsers and HTML.
4. Your 'programs' are restricted by the browser's Document Object Model (DOM). This greatly limits what you can use and access for input and output.
5. JavaScript development tools are very immature compared to other 'languages' like Java or Visual Basic.
6. You can't 'install' JavaScript 'applications' on a user's desktop. You typically access JS apps via a web page - this makes it more difficult for users to access and run. For example, you can't just click an icon on the desktop or Start menu (on Windows) -- you have to locate a URL or bookmark first.
7. JavaScript is really just client side. Sure, I know Netscape had some scheme for running JavaScript on a server, but no one in their right mind ever really used it. PERL, Java, and Microsoft technologies are much more respectable on the server side.
8. Need to read or write to an external database or file? How about create or delete files? From the client side you can't.
9. You can't manipulate or access other programs.
10. You can't modify a web page. Sure you can update values in form fields, but you can't change links, text or anything else that the DOM says is off limits.
So, while JavaScript is a great 'programming language', it really only fits a small niche of applications - those web sites and apps that need a lightweight scripting language.
Apologies to regularly 'usability topic' readers - we will now resume our irregular programming (or lack thereof).
After reading Why Is JavaScript So Misunderstood?, all I can say is "big deal."
JavaScript (aka ECMAscript, JScript, etc.) is a cool 'programming language' for sure. The author leaves out a few key limitations of JavaScript like:
1. JavaScript is only really supported in browsers. Not all browsers (and versions) support JavaScrpt well or to the same extent. Many implementations are quite buggy.
2. This means you can't just simply 'run' your 'programs' easily, reliably or in stand-alone mode.
3. It also means that your user interfaces must be created with the limited UI capabilities available to web browsers and HTML.
4. Your 'programs' are restricted by the browser's Document Object Model (DOM). This greatly limits what you can use and access for input and output.
5. JavaScript development tools are very immature compared to other 'languages' like Java or Visual Basic.
6. You can't 'install' JavaScript 'applications' on a user's desktop. You typically access JS apps via a web page - this makes it more difficult for users to access and run. For example, you can't just click an icon on the desktop or Start menu (on Windows) -- you have to locate a URL or bookmark first.
7. JavaScript is really just client side. Sure, I know Netscape had some scheme for running JavaScript on a server, but no one in their right mind ever really used it. PERL, Java, and Microsoft technologies are much more respectable on the server side.
8. Need to read or write to an external database or file? How about create or delete files? From the client side you can't.
9. You can't manipulate or access other programs.
10. You can't modify a web page. Sure you can update values in form fields, but you can't change links, text or anything else that the DOM says is off limits.
So, while JavaScript is a great 'programming language', it really only fits a small niche of applications - those web sites and apps that need a lightweight scripting language.
Apologies to regularly 'usability topic' readers - we will now resume our irregular programming (or lack thereof).
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