last updated:16 Sep 2002 09: 16 Webword time, or 16 Sep 2002 14:16 UK time

Webword Statistics - Recent Comments (Comments added for week ending Sun 15 Sep 2002) | View Other Weeks

Usability study, Redwood City CA | Thu 12 Sep

Hi, if you live in the Bay Area and are interested in helping guide future directions, there will be some focus group work next week... the link above can get you connected. Thanks!

Fri 13 Sep 08:51 | Frank Lynch | What a dangerous way to recruit respondents for any kind of research... I don't know what this blog's reader profile is, but I hope they're not overly sophisticated web users...

Sun 15 Sep 00:24 | John Dowdell | Hi, that isn't the only way Macromedia gets feedback during development... self-selected focus groups like this are just one of the ways to reality-check development work. Regards, John Dowdell Macromedia Support

Sun 15 Sep 21:48 | Frank Lynch | WHEW!! Glad to hear it. But how much do you pay for 'self-selected'? Isn't any amount too much?? Isn't this like a poll on the CNN website?

Vote now! | Sat 14 Sep

Sat 14 Sep 23:06 | Jack Schonchin | I stopped using Yahoo when it added hundreds of links to the front page, plus content. I would never use Yahoo for news, weather, etc. IMHO, a portal jumps the shark, as it were, when it tries to become a destination, instead of a doorway.

Sun 15 Sep 07:59 | daniel szuc | Key for me is to get to the information I need as quickly as possible ... given Yahoo is now using Google I go straight for search.

Sun 15 Sep 21:15 | Chris | Why bother when a) Google is far more useful, b) Yahoo! have a degree of editorial control over the directory and don't always respond to submissions, c) advertising slows the whole thing down. Yahoo! was a flowerchild of the Internet that really lost its way in the pursuit of money. Even then, I like Google more than I ever liked Yahoo!.

WebWord Comment | Thu 12 Sep

What is going on here? When was this picture taken? What are people looking at?

Thu 12 Sep 19:51 | Marc Ramsey | They are watching Philippe Petit walk a tightrope between the World Trade Center towers in 1974.

Thu 12 Sep 19:57 | John S. Rhodes | The internet is amazing. It is so cool that someone knew the answer to my questions. I posted this only about 15 minutes ago.

Thu 12 Sep 21:54 | Matt | Forgive me if I'm missing the joke, but according to their website, the first Starbucks opened in NYC in 1994. This would make Marc's answer impossible.

Thu 12 Sep 21:58 | Frank Lynch | Highly unlikely, John. There hasn't been a Starbucks at that corner that long. (There weren't any Starbucks in NYC when I moved here in 1982, and I don't think we had any before 1992 - - I saw my first Starbucks on a visit to Chicago as the Winter Olympics were on, and I think it was the '92 ones in Albertville.) The *clothing* is not 1974, either. These people are on Park Row, a couple blocks from the Brooklyn Bridge (where I was by 9:59 on 9/11/01). New York's City Hall is in the background (the picture is facing north). These people are looking at the WTC, alright, but it's probably Sept 11 2001. Strong hunch.

Thu 12 Sep 22:01 | Frank Lynch | Matt, thanks for the confirmation (I was typing while you posted).

Thu 12 Sep 22:07 | Jack Schonchin | I saw this photo on a TV retrospective about 9-1-1. It was presented as people reacting to the plane crashes.

Thu 12 Sep 22:17 | Frank Lynch | For a map... The Starbucks is where the star is, and I guess the camera is really looking ENE. The WTC is at 9 o'clock, and the famous St. Paul's Chapel is at Broadway and Vesey, SW corner.

Thu 12 Sep 22:19 | Frank Lynch | Ooops, the Starbucks is one or two blocks further up Park Row, maybe at Beekman and Park Row.

Thu 12 Sep 23:23 | John S. Rhodes | Hmmm....I guess I'm feeling like an idiot right about now.

Fri 13 Sep 01:09 | MadMan | They're watching MadMan battle Godzilla... and MadMan's beating the pants off the ugly lizard.

Fri 13 Sep 01:36 | Marc Ramsey | I'm the one who should feel like an idiot. I assumed it was a trick question...

Fri 13 Sep 17:55 | Lydia | Well, to take a clue from the name of the picture - 'aghast' - I'd have to agree about the looks being for the WTC crash. It's just kind of weird, because it looks so posed. I guess this might be a later reaction shot, after the crowd formed to watch what was going on. The strange thing is, some of the people don't look frightened - they just look amazed. That's the interesting thing about trauma. Some people laugh in response to shock. These people look like they are in shock.

Fri 13 Sep 19:18 | JB | I thought it was an out-take from the Godzilla movie they shot a couple of years back.

Sun 15 Sep 21:06 | Frank Lynch | Lydia: I would say that people on the gorund by and large were not frightened (I was meandering to the Brooklyn Bridge to walk home and hug my kid, to reassure her I was OK). As best I could tell, everyone in the neighborhood felt safe because they were not in the buildings. Police at the borders of the cordoned area were trying to tell people to go home, but with little or no result. Most wanted to see the spectacle. It wasn't until the buildings started to fall and the dust cloud roared down the blocks that people imagined there was any danger. Though there were some, of course, who cried out in anguish over the fates of the people they presumed were still in the towers. But I'd say that at least as late as 9:45 everyone on the street was complacent over their own fates.

WebWord Comment | Fri 13 Sep

Jack asks: What is going on with Google sponsored links? Searching for lamp shades I noticed that the entire colored region of an ad is a click zone, not just the blue underlined text. I browse with multiple windows open, frequently returning to my primary Google window by clicking into it. When I do so, I invariably hit an advertisements click zone and end up at Ebay (because Ebay ads often come up in my search results). This drastically reduces my affinity for Google because I keep ending up at places I dont want to be. Plus, it generates invalid click-throughs for the advertisers.

Fri 13 Sep 20:42 | Jack Schonchin | Other observations: 1) The background color of the top-of-page sponsored links sometime change for the same advertiser. Hit 'refresh' several times and you may see it happen. 2) Google is obscuring the URL that should appear in my browser's status bar. Sure, Google is kind enough for the status bar to say 'go to www.Ebay.com' however, I want to know the exact URL I'm going to before I go there. This reduces the usability of advertisements for me. I distrust a URL when it has been toyed with. Google may not be evil, but between the wild click zones and obscuring the true URL, my browser is simmering.

Fri 13 Sep 21:09 | John S. Rhodes | Are there any times that it is good to mess with URLs in the browser status bar? The only practice that I don't mind is when people include both the URL and some text. Text alone...sucks.

Fri 13 Sep 21:29 | TimW | Too me, I see those shaded 'Sponsored Links' as the same as a banner add.. Text or an image it doesn't make a difference to me (cept the google ones are revelent* and not flashing or animated) so it kinda makes sense to have the entire banner area clickable... As for the urls.. I don't like it either.. it seems to break usability since I'm trained to know something is gonna show up there, and when it doesn't, I'm thinking something is wrong (although they do show the domain name for ever ad, and any click thru is going through atleast 1 crazy url for tracking) * I'm starting to ignore google ads since they don't really seem to be that revelent anymore.. For example, I know for 50% of the things i search for I'm going to get the same ebay ad with _SEARCH_TERM_ just filled in.. numb me with those and I'll never see something that actually might interest me...

Fri 13 Sep 23:11 | Jack Schonchin | My issue with the click zone is that the right-side of the page looks blank. When I'm choosing where to click on the page to make the window my dominant window again, I do it quick. Half a second. Quarter of a second. I don't know. It's automatic. Remember, I'm clicking into the Google page that is probably obscured by other windows. The last thing I want to do is pause for a full second to think about and remember that Google is presenting these big empty areas as click zones. I used to read a news web site that played this trick with news stories (the first paragraph of each story was on the front page, all paragraphs were clickable even though they did not look like links). I had to give up that site because it became unbearable. I hate to say it, but it would be easier for me if Google used regular ads. It's more honest. It's more usable. Gosh, or better yet, just make the blue underlined text clickable and leave the rest of the page alone.

Sat 14 Sep 21:34 | Aaron Swartz | Perhaps you should get a browser that supports tabbed browsing, or at least one that doesn't follow a link when you highlight the window. I can see why that would be very annoying.

Sun 15 Sep 10:38 | Jack Schonchin | Aaron, the browser is functioning normally. Google has engineered the link zone to work that way. I am not merely hovering over the link, I am clicking the link because it appears to be an unlinked, blank area of the page. I use -- people use -- blank areas of a page for this very purpose, to click into a window and make it the dominant window. The issue is that Google has created banner links that under certain circumstances do not appear to be links.

Letter to a Non-believer | Fri 13 Sep

I handle more email in a month than many people will see in a lifetime, and I have been using email as a professional tool since the late 80s. (Comments: This is a rant about usability and Linux written by Atul Chitnis.)

Fri 13 Sep 21:43 | John S. Rhodes | How many people do you think will click on Atul? I bet a ton of people! Seeing an image on the front page of WebWord is...different. What will we learn from the Atul Experiment?

Fri 13 Sep 22:44 | Jack Schonchin | What will we learn from front page photos? We'll learn that people want more Britney, less Atul. I'm particularly annoyed that the text doesn't wrap around the photo. It's an awkward placement.

Sat 14 Sep 02:08 | Jack Schonchin | Also, why does the photo link to the 'about' page instead of the article? Without a text label on the photo, I would assume it leads to the article. John, are you drumming up business for Flanders by making me utter the words... mystery meat navigation ...? Yes, I clicked on the photo. Bigger click zone. It's far easier than going to my eye doctor and asking for glasses I don't need because I want to read text labels that have great contrast, just to have my doctor tell me yet again that my eyes are perfectly fine and then warn me about venturing into bad parts of the web that are plagued with poor contrast. My doctor likes you John. Why do I get my eyes checked then? Insurance covers it, and I like getting a toy from the big treasure chest at the end of my visit. And for the confused guy at the back of the room... If reading me is like a bad drug trip, you do too many drugs and not enough WebWord. Sit back and read through all the comments this time, but ignore the linked sites with poor contrast. You'll have more fun reading the comments anyhow. Pure black and white baby. The way God intended.

Sat 14 Sep 02:20 | Eric Scheid | Back to the article ... this 'expert' commits the single greatest sin of usability: thinking he is the user.

Sat 14 Sep 04:01 | Anonymous | Make up your mind - is he an expert who is therefore not qualified to think like a user, or is he an 'expert' (i.e. not an expert) who is a luser?

Sat 14 Sep 05:24 | MadMan | John, change the link to point to his main page, will ya'?

Sat 14 Sep 06:49 | Mac | I am beginning to think that Users are not Designers are not Experts are not Users is very damaging to usability. What this means is that your 'opinions' as a user are worthless next to my 'opinions' as a designer or usability expert. We are all users. If you observe some user lab rats using a system then you 'become a user' by association. This would mean that the only 'true usability experts' would be people who have no contact with users. Hey that sounds just like the marketing department!

Sat 14 Sep 08:11 | Eric Scheid | Experts can think like users, but they need to remember that not all users think like them. Atul goes to great pains to establish his credibility by virtue of long experience with linux, operating system development, internet experience and so on. All well and fine, for him, but then he goes and falls on the sword of ecco homo: 'tell me and millions of others it can't be done'. If he can show that there are millions of others with the same depth of experience and specialist skills as his, then I'll withdraw my complaint.

Sat 14 Sep 09:16 | (the other) JS | 'millions of others with the same depth of experience' Interesting point. There is a strong assumption that the average user is a new user. Instead of browser statistics, I would love to find some study on depth of experience. Are the vast number of users moving down the experience curve? In what ways does this change basic assumptions, if at all?

Sat 14 Sep 09:22 | John S. Rhodes | MadMan and others, the image now points to the Atul home page. I gave in to peer pressure.

Sat 14 Sep 11:29 | daniel szuc | One potentially nice 'use' of a photo is to have it display next to a person's name when a message is posted. This may also provide more of a community feel. On the other hand, the pages may take longer to load ... ;) OR idea 2 you could have a page on webword with piccies, short bios of regular posters and links to persons web page on a webword community page. Thoughts? e.g. webword.com/community

Sat 14 Sep 12:37 | John S. Rhodes | Webword Statistics - Rogues Gallery

Sat 14 Sep 12:46 | Mac | Daniel, you might like to look at the Rogues Gallery.

Sat 14 Sep 14:21 | Matt Round | Blimey, didn't realise that pic was linked to my name! (it was a pic of me originally, but taken by leaning over a scanner, then heavily distorted and modified to add the tattoos and beard)

Sat 14 Sep 23:40 | Oscar Neville | This Linux user/expert has the same contempt for us Windows users that all the other geeks/retards on Slashdot have. He thinks that just because he can tweak his Linux PC, all other non-geeks must automatically be able to do the same. Not all of us have the time or the patience to learn a new operating system, Mr. Chitnis. Linux on the the desktop is still a pain in the ass. It may be OK as a server, but it sucks as a desktop OS. How many people here use Linux on their desktop?

Sun 15 Sep 06:56 | daniel szuc | Great & love it! Thanks John and Mac.

Semantic What? | Tue 10 Sep

...my view is that the Semantic Web is the attempt to replicate the forward-leap of the web by decentralizing metadata (data about data) on the same very large scale, with all the benefits of having a lot of machine-processable and data-minable data.

Fri 13 Sep 15:07 | Mac | I'm afraid that I have taken to calling it Satanic Web.

Sun 15 Sep 01:17 | Gary | I have what is a better idea - 'Whatis' the 'Whois'. http://donotgo.com/whatis.html

Macromedia MX Developer Resource Kit | Thu 12 Sep

The Macromedia MX Developer Resource Kit has all the extensions, components, and resources that make it easier for you to build web applications. (Comments: Im confused. You dont get this stuff for free when you buy Flash, Dreamweaver and ColdFusion? It sounds like a game expansion kit. What do you think?)

Fri 13 Sep 11:04 | Bill | The DRK has a number of Flash components that are useful to developers as well as archived copies of the articles on DesDev. The components are ones created by Macromedia that aren't available generally. It's an enhancement to Flash Remoting

Fri 13 Sep 15:03 | Mac | I guess, it will evelve into something like MSDN , and an attempt to move towards generating some subscription income (in the future)? Oh, and I hate the way the underlines disappear on the link when you move over it, why don't they go the whole hog and make the text white as well!!

Sun 15 Sep 00:30 | John Dowdell | Thanks for the interest. Tutorials, code samples, examples, articles and components are ongoing work. Much of this material is available for free reading on the Macromedia Designer & Developer Center, and there are many components available for free download at the Macromedia Exchange. This Developer Resource Kit includes those web-distributed materials collected together in a local CD, as well as some additional high-value components developed after release. Not everyone will want them, true, but we're trying to prove there's a business case for post-release materials to make development faster and easier. (For what it's worth, initial demand for this CD has been higher than expected... gratifying response.) Regards, John Dowdell Macromedia Support

What's wrong with Yahoo? | Fri 13 Sep

For many months now, I have tried interacting with Yahoo, trying to get problems fixed at all levels of their services. I failed to make any headway, and I give up. The only way left for me now is the public route, and I am taking it. (Comments: I think a better title would have been Atul Versus Yahoo. Interesting rant.)

Fri 13 Sep 22:57 | Jack Schonchin | Maybe the spam issue is related to Yahoo's opt-out privacy flap. I'll gladly abandon my yahoo mail account if someone can point me to a comparable service that uses javascript to auto-place my cursor in the login box. (excluding HotMail)

Sat 14 Sep 03:30 | MadMan | Hey Atul, you got the MadMan to thank for this. I didn't post it myself because I know you - conflict of interest and all that...

Sat 14 Sep 09:56 | Matt Round | Yahoo drifted off track years ago. It's now an ugly, cluttered mess and I don't know anyone who regularly uses the main Yahoo directory any more.

Sat 14 Sep 10:19 | MadMan | Matt brings up something I've believed for a long time. I think it's time for another Webword poll: How often do you use the Yahoo directory now? a) Never b) Seldom c) Occasionally d) Often e) All the time. It's my main search engine (I thought of quantifying the above, but decided to leave it open for discussion.) What do you say, John?

Sat 14 Sep 19:25 | TimW | I think they may have drifted off track on purpose... I'm sure their other service bring in much more $$ any potential then the directory did.. It was just the method that got them popular and off the ground.. I think another poll to go along with Madman's should be... How often do you use any directory now?

Sat 14 Sep 19:27 | Anonymous | I think they may have drifted off track on purpose... I'm sure their other services bring in much more $$ and potential then the directory did.. The directory was just the method that got them popular and off the ground.. Sorry for the double post.... should have previewed to catch all my errors...

Sat 14 Sep 21:56 | John S. Rhodes | MadMan wrote: 'What do you say, John?' See the home page!

WebWord Posting 836 | Fri 13 Sep

Your Mama, very creative!

Sat 14 Sep 01:48 | Jack Schonchin | John, when a jackass comes along (you know, a jackass even bigger than me) and starts posting meaningless messages -- compare his IP address with that of previous posts. Ban the kiddie. Is WebWord on an Apache server? It would be super easy to block all access to specific IPs via htaccess.

Sat 14 Sep 06:54 | Mac | Jack, I disagree. I think people should only be banned if they cause offence or nuisance that is condemned by the majority of webworders after discussion. If someone is unable to express their argument without resorting to abuse or childish behaviour then it could just be that they are inarticulate. Maybe they have got something useful to say? However I generally only ever give a person one chance, then I would gladly get my can of whoop-ass spray, and use it mercilessly.

Sat 14 Sep 09:46 | Jack Schonchin | 'could just be that they are inarticulate' 'get my can of whoop-ass spray, and use it mercilessly' Dang, and I was about to call you Gandhi, then you get all George W. on me.

Sat 14 Sep 10:14 | MadMan | Sounds like 'Kung Pao' (or Mr. Kung as he calls himself) to me. Jack, banning IP addresses works only for permanent connections. Dial-up users get randomly assigned IP addresses anyway.

Sat 14 Sep 12:47 | John S. Rhodes | Jack, I enjoy noise. It makes each signal seem so much better. (Just kidding.) Given the level of traffic on WebWord and the number of postings, there is no need to ban any person. Similarly, I've never removed any postings, except for one or two that were mistakes. For example, MadMan asked me to remove a posting once. Other than that, I say let people post what they want to post. Hell, how often do we stay on topic? Does it really matter?

Sat 14 Sep 15:13 | Jack Schonchin | MadMan, I'll bet many web designers, at least in the U.S., have cable or DSL -- and thus likely have static IPs. My simple rationale is that of all people who pay for fast access, it would seem likely that people who design for the medium would be willing to pay for speed. But if the kiddie is on dial-up, and he uses a local ISP (e.g., not AOL), he'd be easy to pick out from the crowd. John, a conversation that flows naturally from one topic to another is fine. Adults acting like kiddies is another. It troubles me that there are such people and that they design web pages. But on the other hand, I'm sure there are always job openings on Sesame Street (but I hear that Oscar's cubicle stinks up the whole office).

Sat 14 Sep 21:43 | MICK | First Rule of Fight Club WebWord: Don't feed the trolls.

WebWord Comment | Sat 07 Sep

Who is Timo Arnall?

Mon 09 Sep 02:00 | Jack Schonchin | MadMan, know of another bookmarklet, one that will force all font colors to black? You know, so that Timo Arnall's page, boxesandarrows.com, etc. are readable? Grey on grey is ridiculous.

Mon 09 Sep 07:52 | MadMan | Well, I do have one, but it doesn't work for CSS sites. :( I can't for the life of me figure why the people at BoxesAndArrows.com, who are supposed to know their shit, refuse to make this basic change in readability. What is so cool about 'I can barely read it' grey? Dammit, any half decent designer knows the importance of CONTRAST in good design. So why bleed our eyes. I don't visit that site even when John points to stories there. It's just too much for me. And I'm not going to fiddle with my monitor settings just so that I can read a site's articles. Nuh uh. Here's the bookmarkllet. Drag it to your links bar. Change Text Colour

Mon 09 Sep 07:54 | MadMan | Grrr... fixing what I screwed up.

Mon 09 Sep 08:03 | MadMan | BTW, a very dark grey like #333333 on a white background (or something like #F8F8F8) can actually improve readability. Wait a minute! B&A has made their grey darker - to #333333. Sneaky. I'm pretty sure it was a couple of tints lighter earlier. Or am I just imagining it? Look how this thread has got sidetracked... :)

Mon 09 Sep 09:08 | Jack Schonchin | Ya, I found that bookmarklet, but it prompts me to input a color. Good in some situations, but I really just want it to, by default, switch to black. My feeble attempt to edit it did not work. I disagree about the dark grey / white background observation. IMHO, sooner or later people adjust their monitor brightness to a level that is comfortable for reading black text on a white background because 99.9% of sites use that convention, their word processor uses it, etc. Throw a poor contrast site back into the picture and it's hard to read.

Tue 10 Sep 02:29 | George Olsen | Umm, it's been the darker gray since just about Boxes and Arrows' launch (I honestly can't remember whether it was changed the week before or after launch). Flame first and ask questions later...

Tue 10 Sep 10:59 | Timo | Nice to meet you, John S. Rhodes. I have in fact been visiting webword since 1999 or some crazy long time ago, many thanks for the continuing effort. My work is design, in a broad sense, rather than usability. About text legibility & contrast - I think it is much more of a personal preference than a big usability issue. Many of the sites that I visit day to day have similar or lower contrast ratios than elasticspace or b&a, and all are much easier on the eyes for extended reading. Having said that though, I am gradually evolving the visual design of the site, which is adding more contrast and definition.

Wed 11 Sep 13:23 | Jack Schonchin | It's not a 'preference.' It's the difference between me reading your content and enjoying your site ---and me getting eye strain, a headache, and blasting off an angry e-mail to you. If it were approached from an accessibility standpoint, and I could make that case, it would be considered discrimination. (Violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act are considered to be a civil rights issue.) Within 5 or 10 years we'll see lots of web access lawsuits.

Wed 11 Sep 15:47 | Lydia | I don't remember boxes and arrows changing their main article color, but I do seem to recall that some of their subheadline colors were (and some still are) too light to present an effective contrast. But, as long as I can read the article I don't much care.

Thu 12 Sep 12:28 | Timo | Jack; yes, its your personal preference. When it comes to disabilities and accessibility, you will find that elasticspace is written to be totally compliant with the Web Accessibility Guidelines. Sounds like you should be using Opera or Mozilla and applying your own styles to the entire www, or even using a screen reader if on-screen reading gives you a headache.

Fri 13 Sep 02:03 | Jack Schonchin | A physical limitation is not a preference. Instead of adapting your site to accommodate the dominant browser, you've decided to screw 'em instead. Good job.

Fri 13 Sep 07:04 | Timo | Just posting this, in case you missed it here. CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) is a technology that Boxes & Arrows and elasticspace use to enable a strong visual design, while also allowing user choice and preference. For anyone having trouble reading the dark grey on white text, it is a simple matter of going to preferences, and asking the browser to apply its own colours (it defaults to Black and White). Thus rendering the site readable to anyone. If you are feeling tricksy you can also apply your own CSS style sheets to the entire www, rendering 40 pixel, black fonts on a bright yellow background if that suits you... That is exactly what CSS was invented to do. Rather than using dodgy hacks, why not use the internet in the way it was intended. You can then thank the authors for complying with w3c and web accessibility initiatives.

Fri 13 Sep 14:39 | Jack Schonchin | Just pointing out in case you missed it here. I find your reasoning to be baloney. No, more than that. Baloney with horse radish. I am offended because 'poor contrast design' is a very very Bad Thing.

Fri 13 Sep 19:46 | god | Jack wrote '...and me getting eye strain, a headache, and blasting off an angry e-mail to you.' Quit whining, go take some asprin and shut off your computer. wanker.

Fri 13 Sep 19:48 | god | oh, and i forgot... it's the internet. nobody is holding a gun to your head and making you view a site. if you don't like it, leave. it's just that simple.

Fri 13 Sep 20:00 | Your Mama |

Fri 13 Sep 21:13 | John S. Rhodes | Your Mama, very creative!

Fri 13 Sep 22:41 | Jack Schonchin | Ahhh, true colors. I can always make 'em come out.

Fri 13 Sep 23:45 | Jack Schonchin | I let slip my baloney comment because I was quite offended at the idea that a physical limitation - a limitation that induces headaches when reading poor contrast web pages -- is a preference of the user. To me, that's the same as saying, 'Sorry you don't like that our wheelchair access ramp is located at the rear of our building in our loading dock area, but if you would prefer, we have stairs at the front of the building. Please don't complain. We meet the legal requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Your preferences are your own problem.' Uh huh. Horse radish.

Sat 14 Sep 01:27 | god | jesus, that gave you a headache?!? you either need glasses or need to update your prescription. better yet, just stop bitching.

Sat 14 Sep 01:29 | Jack Schonchin | I don't know what's more fun. Reading this yahoo's blatherings, or egging him on to amuse me some more. Go ahead, say something else funny.

Sat 14 Sep 03:47 | JDB | Jack, if you hate a site's CSS so much, just turn it off. This can be done in all major browsers. Or, alternatively, you can use this bookmarklet to toggle the CSS on/off (the styles will reload upon a refresh of the page, or the click of a link): Toggle CSS Be grateful that the site should be built in a flexible CSS, and not crummy tags, which aren't so easy to tweak in a browser.

Sat 14 Sep 06:41 | Mac | Boxes and Arrows did used to be Black on White 16 Nov 2001. I can read white text on a white background by selecting the text and copying it into notepad. But I don't think I should have to.

Sat 14 Sep 09:10 | Timo | It's still your own preference Jack. Out of the 21,000 unique visitors to elasticspace each month, for the last 6 months of that design, I have received 55 emails praising the design, and over 100 email praising the content, and one complaint (from you Jack) about the contrast. Now you think the whole internet should be black and white for your sake? Thats what I call arrogance. And all these rude comments are not from me.

Sat 14 Sep 09:51 | Jack Schonchin | Well, Timo, you must be right then. I'm sure everyone who was disgusted with poor contrast spent their time to find a link to e-mail you their thoughts in detail. You're making judgements based on feedback from the choir. As you've seen, there are people here who find boxesandarrows difficult to read and have developed coping mechanisms (such as reading the print versions of pages). I'm curious how many of these 'coping' users (or people like me who don't even bother coming back) ever submit feedback.

Sat 14 Sep 15:01 | Jack Schonchin | I went outside and got a breath of fresh reality. I'm arguing with a web designer that #1 text contrast is good so that people do not have trouble reading a page and #2 a person's physical limitations are not a matter of preference. Yeah, ok, this is a waste of time.

Sat 14 Sep 16:00 | Timo | Glad we agree on something.

Big Brother watches you drive | Fri 13 Sep

(news.bbc.co.uk) So our technology could be used to determine that a person is not checking the instruments in a correct scanning pattern, not looking at the road.

Fri 13 Sep 07:26 | John S. Rhodes | Computers and Email on the Job: They're Watching You -- 'Advances in technology now make it possible for employers to keep track of virtually all workplace communications by any employee -- on the phone and in cyberspace. And many employers take advantage of these tracking devices: a recent survey of more than 700 companies by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) found that almost three quarters of the companies monitored their workers' use of the Internet and check employee email.' (Comments: This would be just one more way to watch people working.)

Fri 13 Sep 08:53 | Jack Schonchin | Someone didn't ingest caffeine this morning.

Fri 13 Sep 09:27 | Mac | My new worry, is that a webam could sit on top of my PC and monitor my physical status (blinking, movement etc..) to deside whether or not i was being 'productive'. At the moment i can stare out of the window for 10 minutes and take a break, but if they knew when I was not paying attention to my work then I would start to get even more paraniod!

Fri 13 Sep 11:38 | MadMan | When actually doing serious programming, I have had long periods of staring at the screen. Measuring productivity... that age old exercise, still not possible.

Fri 13 Sep 16:36 | Vincent | This is a driving aid not linked to any where so it does not fall under the big brother label.

Fri 13 Sep 16:36 | Vincent | This is a driving aid not linked to any where so it does not fall under the big brother label.

Fri 13 Sep 19:17 | JB | Most companies that want to spy on their employees have so much data to wade through that the only time they use it is when they want to get rid of someone - and expedite the process. At the end of the day, it is only one more piece of technology that would be used without a real use. BRING IT ON! Oh, Mac…you could easily fool it by wearing those plastic glasses that have the cardboard eyes stuck in the lenses…. You could be asleep and it wouldn’t know….but your boss would think you’re a nut!

Sat 14 Sep 02:16 | Jack Schonchin | the only time they use it is when they want to get rid of someone The IT department could also use the data for political means. If you're fighting for funding on your projects, it would do wonders to know what other managers are planning, what they're saying about you, etc. Who watches the watcher?

Sat 14 Sep 10:06 | Matt Round | If someone monitored me at work, they'd find I often spend hours doing nothing or surfing the Web. What they wouldn't notice is that when I'm in 'work mode' I get things done quickly, efficiently & with attention to detail. I'd burn out in days if I tried to work non-stop all day every day, I need to pause to think, research and yes, laze around every now and then. Crude monitoring of employees fails to take into account this kind of working pattern. Many companies would probably fire me within a week.

Lessons to be Learned | Thu 12 Sep

(Boxes and Arrows) There are serious problems with the way user experience-related programs are being taught. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against academic degrees. My father was a professor and I’ve been an instructor myself. But that experience makes me worry that current academic programs aren’t well-suited to serving the needs of their students, nor our professions. Let me count the ways…

Thu 12 Sep 22:16 | Jack Schonchin | Anyone got a mod for the bookmarklet that forces font color changes? I could use one that forces all text to black by default so that I can read boxesandarrows on-the-fly, instead of bitching every time John posts a useless link like this one.

Fri 13 Sep 01:16 | Kung Pao | I'd like one to change that horrible sky blue colour used for hyperlinks (sky blue? ugh) to something more legible. Mr. Kung finds the site unreadable and actually supports Mr. Schonchin.

Fri 13 Sep 02:35 | Ian | The biggest problem is what people thing University should be. In a traditional sense University is a place were you learn how to learn as an undergrad. If you expect to come out known how everything your wrong, you will learn a little about a lot. Then you are in a position to make one of two step, that being apply your learning skills in the so called “real” or learn how to conduct research as a post grad. If you want to do a course were at the end you are spat out ready for the workforce do a certification or some other for of institute course.

Fri 13 Sep 03:55 | Timo | Sorry to derail the thread even further: CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) is a technology that Boxes & Arrows uses to enable a strong visual design, while also allowing user choice and preference. For anyone having trouble reading the dark grey on white text, it is a simple matter of going to preferences, and asking the browser to apply its own colours (it defaults to Black and White). Thus rendering the site readable to anyone. If you are feeling tricksy you can also apply your own CSS style sheets to the entire www, rendering 40 pixel, black fonts on a bright yellow background if that suits you... That is exactly what CSS was invented to do. Rather than using dodgy hacks, why not use the internet in the way it was intended. You can then thank the authors for complying with w3c and web accessibility initiatives.

Fri 13 Sep 14:22 | Jack Schonchin | I love it. Have the world change for you, instead of you change for the world. As if we're going to reconfigure our browser for one web site and then change back for the world, and change back again every time we want to visit this one site. As if. What arrogance. This measure would only make sense for someone with a severe disability that cannot cope any other way. Oh, but wait, that's right, Timo thinks disabilities are a preference.

Fri 13 Sep 14:28 | Jack Schonchin | My new nihilism web site will be all white. White text. White background. White images. The images will have alt tags, so they're ok. And if you have trouble reading the text, you can always reconfigure your browser to apply its own colors, or event apply your own CSS style sheets. You can thank me for complying with W3C and web accessibility initiatives. That's right. Meeting technical guidelines doesn't mean squat if you can't see the forest for the trees.

Fri 13 Sep 14:30 | Mac | I sometime work with programmers who respond to all user requests with a comment like 'that's not a problem, they can change line 74 in the config file to 0x6h and then it will work the way they want it to' I don't work with those programmers for very long.

Fri 13 Sep 14:35 | Jack Schonchin | Is there a name for when you think one word and type another? Like 'event' instead of 'even.' I find that my typos often emphasize a word I use more often than the one I intended to type. (Not so in this instance.) For a while I found myself calling MadMan 'ManMan.' And please don't say pargh. There must be a medical or psychological name for my affliction.

Fri 13 Sep 14:50 | Mac | Back to the topic: I was invited to go and talk to some college students about 'the real world'. Once I had explained what my 'talk' would consist of, the lecturer quickly backtracked, apologised and didn't continue the relationship. It seems that my views (based on my experience) just don't match up with what some of the Computer/Technology/New Media courses want to 'teach'. Jack: I always read the print versions on BandA, but of course even that doesn't work if you want to read the discussions, as the 'print' option just redisplays the article (aarggggh). Jack: I always blame being left-handed for my lack of hand-brain-coordination (or HBC Syndrome, as everthing seems to be a syndrome these days) oops parghon me..

Fri 13 Sep 14:56 | Mac | Oh, and another off-topic thing: I do wish Kung Pao wouldn't refer to himself as Mr Kung. It's creepy and makes my skin crawl. And Erasmus doesn't like it either. no i bleedin dont mac

Fri 13 Sep 15:05 | Jack Schonchin | I'm curious what the credentials are of someone teaching 'user experience' and why they're spending their time in the classroom. In my observation, there are generally two types of professors. Ones who have worked almost entirely in academic circles, and ones who come to a university after 15-30 years of private sector experience. What constitutes expertise in 'user experience' and who's doing the teaching?

Fri 13 Sep 21:24 | John S. Rhodes | Jack writes: What constitutes expertise in 'user experience' and who's doing the teaching? I am an expert in my experiencing my experiences. There is no teacher; there is no spoon.

Building the Beast: Talking with Peter Morville | Thu 12 Sep

(Boxes and Arrows) We pretty much did a complete rewrite and added lots of new chapters too. Major additions include chapters on thesaurus design, business strategy and selling IA, as well as a couple of in-depth case studies.

Fri 13 Sep 04:08 | Mac | Thanks for this, I have been trying to find out if it's worth buying the second edition if you already have the original. The amazon pages show all the reviews for the 1st edition which implies there's not a lot of change. This article is exactly what i needed, and I shall now order it with confidence.

Fri 13 Sep 09:53 | John S. Rhodes | I reviewed the book. It is quite a bit better than the 1st edition because it includes many more details. Similarly, they have included some useful examples based on their experiences. Disclaimer: I'm a bit biased; I'm quoted on the very first page. ;-)

Fri 13 Sep 10:44 | Mac | What was the quote, and were you happy with it (-:

Fri 13 Sep 11:39 | MadMan | From Lou's site: John Rhodes of Webword.com likes our new edition: 'If you own nothing but the shirt on your back, sell your shirt and get this book'. A bit of hyperbole, IMO. No offence, John.

Fri 13 Sep 14:42 | Frank Lynch | You should see John's blurbs on the movie ads!

Fri 13 Sep 15:59 | John S. Rhodes | Actually, the first page of the book has a different quote on it. I'm serious. A cookie goes to the first person who writes the quote here...! HINT: Big and throbbing.

Evolution Trumps Usability Guidelines | Mon 09 Sep

(UIE) Even if you dont have many comparable sites to look at, you can still use evolution to your advantage. Create your own mutations by trying out ideas and seeing how they work. This is exactly how sites like eBay and Amazon have gotten to where they are today. (Comment: Evolution, Usability, and Web Design.)

Mon 09 Sep 19:28 | Ron Zeno | Embarrassing. A very poor straw-man argument. Certainly doesn't give much credibility to the author or his company. Information quality: Very Low - Invalid tests prove nothing. Propaganda quality: High - Entertaining self-promotion targeting the credulous. Propaganda level: Very High - Self-promotion and pseudoscience.

Tue 10 Sep 02:27 | Lyle Kantrovich | Ron, I think Spool's article was pretty good. I'll admit it contained a fair amount of self-promotion and clearly didn't point out initiatives like that of the NCI where they are trying to rank guidelines based on research. Even so, Spool raised some good points -- even if he could have provided more detail. Not sure from your comment if you disagree with everythin he said or just the way he said it. Do you think guidelines are a Good Idea or what? I don't think Spool did a good job of proving the 'evolution' theory he proposes. I put more stock in processes like UCD. Evolution is a variation on a 'iterative development' theme, but in reality I don't think companies have the resources to just 'try stuff' and see what works -- they can't even figure out what success looks like in many cases -- but that's a bigger non-usability problem. I agree with John's article on evolution -- he reminds me that guidelines limit creativity, and sometimes we need to encourage new ideas (and other times we need to stick with 'proven' ideas). Best line: 'Let your ideas have sex; you want offspring.' Anyway, I posted some of my thoughts on problems with usability guidelines. Let me know what you think.

Tue 10 Sep 09:59 | MadMan | Let your ideas have sex; you want offspring. 'Have sex' is so... pedestrian. You should say, 'Let your ideas make love...' :)) Lyle, I'll get around to reading your stuff, but my own view of guidelines is that when they become dictatorial, you should abandon them. Something like 'Make error messages helpful - suggest a way out' is acceptable, but telling me that there is only one way to create good error messages is not acceptable to me. I agree on the UCD part. I'm amused when I see something posted to a UCD-related list like 'when we tested 20 users, 18 didn't know that the logo was also a link to the home page.' (Recent discussion on SIGIA-l.) Oh sure, if the audience consisted of people like my mum, that probably would be a valid assertion. If the audience were people like you and I, I dare say 18 out of 20 people would know that the logo had a hyperlink to the home page. Er, the point of my rambling is that rigid guidelines without context are mostly useless. And when guidelines become rigid, they cease to be 'guidelines' because they no longer guide, they dictate. (Remember how the Brits on this site pointed out that 'shopping trolley' is more appropriate for British e-commerce sites than 'shopping cart'? That's what I'm talking about.) And we all know that despite Nielsen's competence and experience, his uncompromising 'guidelines' are why he's hated by so many.

Tue 10 Sep 11:30 | Ron Zeno | (Nice article, Lyle!) Spool selects poor guidelines to attack, and even then his (fatally flawed) arguments show a lack of understanding of the guidelines and how to properly test them. Nielsen promotes his guidelines without (freely, if at all) giving the pertinent information for people to determine the soundness of the guidelines, their limitations, and how to properly apply them. 'Guidelines limit creativity' and this is a very good thing to do. By focusing creativity, by properly constraining it, we are more likely to produce better results. Good guidelines, properly applied, allow us to build upon the knowledge and experience of others.

Tue 10 Sep 11:30 | Ron Zeno | (Nice article, Lyle!) Spool selects poor guidelines to attack, and even then his (fatally flawed) arguments show a lack of understanding of the guidelines and how to properly test them. Nielsen promotes his guidelines without (freely, if at all) giving the pertinent information for people to determine the soundness of the guidelines, their limitations, and how to properly apply them. 'Guidelines limit creativity' and this is a very good thing to do. By focusing creativity, by properly constraining it, we are more likely to produce better results. Good guidelines, properly applied, allow us to build upon the knowledge and experience of others.

Tue 10 Sep 14:09 | Eric Scheid | Selecting a guideline which tests as generally correct to prove that {sometimes guidelines can be wrong} would be non-sensical. The point of Spool's article, imho, is that some guidelines are good, most need testing, and some can be harmful if untested. The fact that some guidelines are written in a bogus form (ie. vague or subjective, rather than specific) is also noted as a black mark against guidelines as typically encountered. In conclusion Spool recommends either *testing* the guideline, or if you don't have the resources/opportunity to do so effectively to use an *alternative* approach, one which is driven bottom-up rather than top-down.

Tue 10 Sep 19:50 | Ron Zeno | Testing guidelines is hard. Spool himself doesn't appear to know how to do it properly. (At least he doesn't demonstrate it in his article.) Instead of testing guidelines, critique them to determine if they will be valuable to you. Read Lyle's commentary to learn about some of the limitations of guidelines. Don't reinvent the wheel if you don't have to, and don't throw wheels away just because you don't understand how to use them or properly evaluate them.

Wed 11 Sep 05:40 | Eric Scheid | Critiquing a guideline still boils down to an untested opinion. Sure you could winnow out a fair bunch of dubious guidelines, but you'd still be left with the ones you hope, untested, will actually deliver the goods. Yes, testing is hard to do right, and would need an article in its own right. I wasn't expecting his article to be a tutorial on how to do the tests. Did you?

Wed 11 Sep 14:16 | Ron Zeno | ...you'd still be left with the ones you hope, untested, will actually deliver the goods I assert that a practitioner with some basic critical thinking and research skills can do far better just by examing the guideline and the supporting information. Otherwise, you are just arguing that you don't have these skills and at the same time will not rely upon others who do have them. I wasn't expecting his article to be a tutorial on how to do the tests. Did you? No, but I expect the author to give credible evidence that he knows how to properly test guidelines. He did not do so. Instead, by choosing a completely invalid hypothesis to test, the author shows he does not understand the guideline in question and shows very poor judgement on how to test guidelines. (Perfect example of why not to test guidelines, or at least how not to.) Further the guideline in question is based upon rigorous testing - far better than any practitioner has the time, budget, (and perhaps ability) to do. Why waste time to test it again? (Why embarrass yourself by showing that you do not know how to test it properly?) Until guidelines improve, practitioners have a number of options: 1) Demand better guidelines. 2) Stop using guidelines. 3) Become researchers and then test current guidelines and research new ones. 4) Critique current guidelines before deciding to use them. 5) Help others critique guidelines. 6) Share critiques of guidelines.

Wed 11 Sep 19:07 | Lyle Kantrovich | Ron, Can you be more specific about what hypothesis was invalid (and why) and how exactly Spool tested things incorrectly. Not saying I disagree - just not following your comments. Thanks.

Wed 11 Sep 20:01 | Ron Zeno | just not following your comments Fair enough. I had commented about the article in my weblog here. I should have noted it with my first comment. The only hypothesis that can be checked for validity is the one in the case study, 'if sites place these common elements where users expect, we should see users purchasing more from the sites.' It's not a valid hypothesis to test the guideline. The author of the guideline didn't even mention that it would effect purchasing, and even gave a caveat on applying the guideline. Spool introduced purchasing and ignored the caveat. You can appear to prove anything if you can get people to overlook an invalid hypothesis...

Fri 13 Sep 15:15 | Mac | Ron, I am finding it difficult to read your weblog with that flickery woman in the corner. I have been to Las Vegas once and I daren't go near the slots again.

E-Tail Customer Service: Finally Working? | Tue 10 Sep

However companies decide to respond, all the analysts agree that follow-through is key to ensuring that the customer returns to the Web site for future purchases.

Tue 10 Sep 20:06 | JB | Yes customer service is still an issue. If offline merchants see it as a huge cost that they try to drive down as much as possible, how can eCommerce sites seriously think they will be able to do this without tremendous cost to them. I think returns are a bigger problem (maybe part of the entire customer service issue). The question should be are you willing to cop bad/inferior service for lower prices?. What is your price sensitivity for this tradeoff?

Fri 13 Sep 13:45 | Mac | One kind, human-like, or thoughtful action has the potential to turn me into a happy return customer. Example: I have just bought the NNGroup Intranet Design Annual for 2002, but was unhappy about certain aspects of the report. I then looked on the NNGroup web site for their returns policy and couldn't find any reference to it at all. This annonyed me, so I mailed the author of the report with my concerns and asked them how I could get my money back. I got a personal response after a few hours which offered me a full refund and then went on to respond to most of my citicisms, and promised to look into the returns policy and its appearance (or lack of) on the site. Because of this positive experience I then replied to tell NNGroup that I wouldn't take them up on the offer of a refund because of their positive response.

Electronic publishing, usability, and a free lunch | Thu 12 Sep

(IBM) Publishers who want to create an electronic book have to choose: try to protect it against piracy or make it usable. In this article, I contrast the extremes of the philosophy and argue for open standards and accessible data in electronic data products. The impact of these decisions on usability is also considered.

Fri 13 Sep 13:34 | Mac | I have been reading e-books on PDAs (Palm and PocketPC) for a couple of years now and have been on the whole disappointed. I don't like the fact that I cannot any of the text from the book if it want to quote it. It's much easier to scan in a paragraph from a print book. I have found only two advantages of e-books that apply to me: 1) Bookshelf Space Every 18 months my wife and I have to clear out our bookshelves to make room for more books. If I want to read a book but am not willing to give it shelf space for even a short period then I may get an e-book version. 2) Holidays I generally take three or four print books on holiday. As I usually read those halfway through the holiday I like to buy three or four e-books to take as they don't take up any more space in my suitcase, and I can try some genres or authors that I wouldn't normally read. Every other aspect of e-books has been a disapointment to me.

The Recording Industry is Trying to Kill the Goose That Lays the Golden Egg | Wed 11 Sep

(Dan Briklin) Given the slight dip in CD sales despite so many reasons for there to be a much larger drop, it seems that the effect of downloading, burning, and sharing is one of the few bright lights helping the music industry with their most loyal customers.

Thu 12 Sep 03:31 | Mac | Latest figures from the British Phonographic Industry show thta year on year sales have dropped by 15%. Alan Giles the chief executive of HMV said, 'Believe it or not the World Cup had a very big distracting effect on regular music buyers.' This explanation is as ridiculous as the ones that cite downloading or piracy in the third world. There is definitely a lot of bootlegging going on in poorer countries, but do the record companies really beleive that people who earn less than 25p an hour (average Moroccan manual labourer) would be paying pull price for CD's? The downturn in music sales is easily explained by two thing: 1) The Recession. When people are worried about unemployment and job security they cut back on so called 'luxury items' like CDs. 2) Marketing. A few weeks ago the Guardian newspaper revealed that record companies pitch their sales of CD singles to 14 year olds and below. This has resulted in a glut of short shelf life manufactured bands.

Thu 12 Sep 04:20 | Alan Fisher | Excellent article, but the telling part is the comment about record industry executives not wanting to look at all the evidence because they have convinced themselves that copying and downloading is the cause of their problems. Data like this proves otherwise, as does the anecdotal evidence they'd get if they talked to consumers more. Take me, for example. I regularly get copies of CDs from friends. Having listened to them, I do one of two things - go out and buy the album or throw it away. I've actually bought more CDs this year because I can listen to copies than I would otherwise have done, and there are many more like me.

Thu 12 Sep 11:56 | JB | Heaven forbid that the music industry thinks decreased sales are from crap records! Let's blame something else and ensure our jobs for another 12 months. The industry is so fragmented and stale today.... I mean how many Britney albums can I buy before I get sick of her near naked body on the cover? - that's a rhetorical questions by the way ;)

Thu 12 Sep 12:16 | Jack Schonchin | Naked body on the cover? And the RIAA is concerned about p2p networks? Oh please. Yeah, sure, I could probably download a scanned copy of the cover, but could I print it out with Britney's *embossed* nibbly bits, too? I think not.

Thu 12 Sep 13:16 | JB | So that would make you a Britney fan, as the music is not the same without the 'nibbly bits'?

Thu 12 Sep 15:42 | mcw | The discussion assumes music is a commodity with constant value, one song or album is as good as another. I disagree. I think there is a lack of good new content that people find interesting enough to purchase. Radio stations play lots of music from the 60's and 70's. I saw on TV the concert for New York, held after the 9/11 attacks. Most (not all) of the artists had been in the business for years, and performed their old material. Mick Jagger, Billy Joel, The Who, James Taylor. back in 1975, who would have thought Pete Townshend and Roger Daltry would be on stage in 2001? The 'classic rock' stuff has persisted for decades longer than anyone would have forecast. So, why do I need to buy new albums? Where's the good new stuff?

Thu 12 Sep 16:24 | Lydia | Well, in a way the appeal of music is constantly renewed because the audience is constantly renewed - there is always a fresh crop of teenagers every year that will listen to Britney Spears and N'Sync. Even if you stop buying music, there will be someone to step in and take your place. That's the constant, not the individual's purchasing habits over a lifetime. Most people stop buying 'new' music at some point, mostly because an individual's musical taste gets developed and set by a certain point and new music does not remain in a constant state. It evolves to mirror current trends. If you look at the type of bubblegum pop that appeals to teenagers vs. the more folksy, angst-ridden pap that appeals to twenty-somethings and early thirty-somethings, you see the evolution right there. Obviously, not everyone fits the traditional mold, but in most cases that is true.

Thu 12 Sep 17:38 | JB | Music is all about the marketing and not the substance...we can't be angst ridden or teeny- boppers all our lives.

Thu 12 Sep 22:28 | Jack Schonchin | JB, Britney is a package deal. No nibbly bits, and she's just another voice box. Do you think she'd be anything at all without music videos?

Fri 13 Sep 04:09 | Alan Fisher | MCW - there is good new music by new artists being made, you just have to dig a bit to find it. The article makes some reference to this, with record companies and radio stations being criticised for pushing and playing an increasingly smaller part of the music which is actually being recorded.

Fri 13 Sep 11:44 | MadMan | Britney Spears can't sing to save her life. Her voice is so guttural that it puts me off. She's just slick packaging, lots of 'virgin' publicity, with a bit of breast implant controvery thrown in for good measure. It's criminal that she made $40 million last year.

Comforts of Home Yield to Tyranny of Digital Gizmos | Thu 12 Sep

(New York Times) Of all the forces that permeate daily life, perhaps nothing has become more of a tyranny than the bits and pieces of technology that are meant to help one get through the day more easily, but instead are a source of frustration. Relatively simple devices that were once controlled by twisting a knob or pushing a button are now endowed with digital commands that can take hours to master. (MadMan comments: I know people who buy products based on more features, even if they never use most of them. What has your experience been? Are things really becoming too complex for our own good, and if so, what is the solution?)

Thu 12 Sep 16:11 | Lydia | I tend to simplify myself, so if I see an update to a product that I use I (try to) carefully consider if enhancements will actually make my life easier, or just more high-tech. It comes out about 60/40 with slightly more items just more high-tech rather than useful. It helps that I kind of like retro things. Most people I know also upgrade mindlessly.

Fri 13 Sep 03:16 | Mac | As I get older (and stupider) I have developed a real fear of complicated looking products. I have become a bit of a luddite and will only adopt a product if it is simpler to use, or allows me to do something that makes my life easier. Three years ago I bought a new calculator. I don't use the one on my PC or PDA. I bought a TEXET for £5.99, which is nice and big at 5 inches by 8 inches, it has lovely big buttons and no 'scientific' functions. It is solar powered and I have been using it very happily ever since. Another benefit is that I can't lose it on my messy desk.

Fri 13 Sep 04:34 | sherlock_yoda | Joel's recent post on Joel on Software discusses a similar problem, customers wanting features that will reduce the usability/quality of the product: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/ (12th September 2002) Sherlock

WebWord Comment | Tue 10 Sep

I need some development help. The project requires skills with PHP, MySQL and some other backend stuff (e.g., automatic emails). The functionality includes things such as a registration system, item catalog or directory, user profile pages, feedback system, and an affiliate program. There are a couple of other things too, but nothing major. If you are serious, send me a note: john@webword.com. Or, post your comments about this topic. Thanks!

Thu 12 Sep 16:02 | dade | What are the time lines? Are all the requirments ready? Let me know, i'd like to help you out.

99.9% of Websites Are Obsolete | Wed 04 Sep

We can only conclude that the company wishes its site to look exactly the same in 1995-era browsers that dont support CSS as it does in modern browsers that do. The irony is that no one beside Yahoos management cares what Yahoo looks like. The sites tremendous success is due to the service it provides, not to the beauty of its visual design (which is non-existent).

Thu 12 Sep 15:41 | Nick Finck | Jack, what makes you think that the designers are fixing the font size? The W3C makes no distinction between the behavior of a font specified in pixels, points, ems, percents or whatever other metric you may use. Point: Most recent browsers support font resizing for any metric. Unfortunately Microsoft's Internet Explorer on Windows does not have this functionality... yet on the Mac it does. This is not a pitch for the Mac, this is a pitch for getting all browsers to interact with markup in a consistent way. The standard, as it would be called, is to allow text sized based on pixels to be resized. Why alienate pixels? I don't know... ask Microsoft's IE for Windows team, the Mac team got it right. Summary: it's not the designer's fault, it's the browser manufactures fault for creating exclusionary functions. - Nick

WebWord Comment | Wed 04 Sep

Im working on a new web site. Should I use tables or CSS? For what it is worth, Im favoring CSS right now for the layout. Pros and cons? How has CSS worked for you for layout and positioning? What about graceful degradation? Are there other issues to consider? Im mainly looking for advice from people that have used CSS instead of tables, and Im curious about how they made their decisions.

Thu 12 Sep 07:07 | Tim Parkin | The big caveat on most non-trivial (ie not borrowed) CSS designs is that it DOES take a LOT longer to develop them. This means money. The advantages that are usually lauded are accessibility but WAI says tables are ok if coded suitably, page size but one of the most important pages for customers is the home page which tends to get bigger for a large CSS site and maintainability which you can do a LOT better with a Content Management System. CSS only layout is a great idea but is not really ready for typical commercial use. There are still a lot of people out there with older browsers (more than browse with PDA's and WAP phones) and each one of them ignored or 'left out' is money lost for a client and you don't see many companies saying oh ok we'll ignore 3% of our customers because it's cool to use CSS Layout. Most companies profit margins are around 5-10% so losing 3-5% of customers can mean losing between 30% and 100% of all of their operating profit. My suggestion (and one supported by Zeldman now) is to use tables to layout the scaffolding of your site and then CSS to format and position a lot of the internals, possibly resorting to tables again for complex internal layouts (complex forms, custom borders/edgeing, etc). My own website (www.pollenation.net) is XHTML 1.0 Strict/CSS2 and uses tables in a way that is accessible and is very light. Maintenance is very simple and the content management system behind it manages very well with all content. I've cheated with Netscape a bit by using a search and replace tool in my content management system that converts the XHTML1.0Strict to netscapish code. This means I only have to maintain one site, I'm fully compliant and accessible and my site works in Netscape 4. ps I've developed a fully css layout site 2 years ago (for Citria, a company I worked for) which you can see at http://www.htmlbyexample.com/ when my ex work colleague gets his java fixed :-)

WebWord Comment | Wed 11 Sep

One Year Ago.

Wed 11 Sep 08:09 | Mac | White Poppy by Neil Meitzler

Wed 11 Sep 09:42 | Jack Schonchin | Leap by Brian Doyle. (No, not a repeat. I killed my earlier post last week.)

Wed 11 Sep 12:42 | Matt | 110 Stories by John M. Ford.

Wed 11 Sep 12:52 | Jack Schonchin | If you have dignity, the terrorists have already won - 'The Cheesification of 9-11-02' 9-11 Scorecard. If you have your TV tuned to memorials all day, do not follow those links. You will not like them.

Wed 11 Sep 14:14 | Jack Schonchin | WTC Tribute - a Flash file is the presentation, which you may not like because it begins with tragedy photos... but what I liked was the flags at the bottom, and the letter from an American-Afghan.

Wed 11 Sep 15:37 | Lydia | What I like about Ted Rall (referring to Jack's don't-follow-if-you're-watching-memorials links) is that he always gives us the straight scoop on even the most painful topics. I have always gotten kind of misty on memorial day (celebrating war veterans) and on 4th of July (celebrating America's independence). Prior to 9/11, I got laughed at every year by friends and colleagues. Yes, you heard it right - I was made to feel ashamed of feeling patriotic. I didn't even display flags, just mentioned that it was a certain day and got choked up at those old guys who would come out in their uniforms. Post 9/11, those same friends were falling all over themselves to get their flags up for 'good old America' just so they could fall off their shaky mounts into the mud or (worse) in the road for other cars to drive over. One would hope that the irony of that situation was not totally lost. I don't have TV service and I'm avoiding the radio today, I think. I'd much rather spend the time with my family in remembrance. That said, I really liked what Joel Spolsky did at his site (http://www.joelonsoftware.com) - it is low-key and very moving.

Thu 12 Sep 04:30 | Alan Fisher | In the UK, the Guardian newspaper devoted the first 3 pages of yesterday's edition to an essay by Simon Schama, a British historian who works most of the year in New York. It's the most thoughtful piece I've read about 9/11 all year. It's at http://www.guardian.co.uk/september11/oneyearon/story/0,12361,789978,00.html - I thoroughly recommend it.

Z in Vegas | Tue 10 Sep

(Kottke) ...youll never guess who we saw featured up on the huge Caesars Palace marquee.

Tue 10 Sep 22:53 | Jack Schonchin | I rest my case.

Wed 11 Sep 02:08 | daniel szuc | Who is Zeldman? Is this Filbert in disguise?

Wed 11 Sep 07:19 | John S. Rhodes | Zeldman Bio

Wed 11 Sep 08:13 | Mac | Zedman and friends

Wed 11 Sep 09:08 | Jack Schonchin | He's Z Man, the cool hepcat who tells designers what they want to hear. Oh, and the arch enemy of Filbert. Sort of like Mothra and Ghidorah. Sometimes they're enemies. Sometimes they're friends. It doesn't really much matter if you're the guy getting squashed in the trolley car. Where is Godzilla when we need him?

Wed 11 Sep 09:42 | Mac | Godzilla has joined the silicon age, and I have tracked down a picture of Jack with Godzilla! I never knew you were that tall!

Wed 11 Sep 13:04 | Jack Schonchin | You know, I'm anatomically correct under those shorts. You've found a still from the classic scene where I cut off Godzilla's hand and tell him I'm his father. Then Godzilla turns away from me in shock and disgust. It's a bitch when your kids hit their teen years and hate you.

Wed 11 Sep 15:51 | Lydia | Man, that is nuts. Does anyone remember him when he was a well-liked, slightly maverick website designer with long hair and cool Mac icons he gave away for free? Before he went all nuts with the standards stuff? I'll never forget talking to someone about Zeldman last year or so (after not having read him for a while) and saying that I thought he was a good designer, and having the guy I was talking to absolutely freak out.

Who needs eBay? Tradio is the real deal | Wed 11 Sep

A kind of on-air swap meet that has been a fixture of small-town radio stations from Florida to Alaska for decades. ... Our volume is even larger because of the invention of the Internet.

Wed 11 Sep 09:45 | Jack Schonchin | That's my post. Blame me for posting a different topic on September 11. At the end of the day you'll be exhausted from all the retrospectives coming from all media sources.

Wed 11 Sep 11:18 | Jack Schonchin | I recently sold some computer components, stereo equipment and furniture -- all at my asking prices. I considered Ebay, but it seemed like too big a hassle. I didn't want to fuss with packing each item, waiting for checks in the mail, giving Ebay a cut of my sale, etc. I held a garage sale. It was advertised in the local newspaper with a URL where photos and detailed descriptions were available. I posted five cardboard signs in town. I only had 80 page views (about 10 people), but the Ebayable items were sold in the first 30 minutes. I have not read any books about garage sales, but here's my theory... Label everything with prices. All of your small stuff goes for 25 or 50 cents. Your mint condition wide-screen only-viewed-once video of Monty Python and the The Holy Grail goes for, at most, one buck. People scoop up your bargains. (They are bargains because you don't sell crap at a garage sale. Why embarrass yourself in front of your neighbors? And certainly never sell clothes. You don't want to see Mr. Foggerty from across the street wearing your old Hawaiian shirt.) Anyhow, after your marks (definition #13) have been sweetened with armloads of good deals, they're like moths to a flame. They pay your asking price on your big items without bartering.

Wed 11 Sep 11:33 | Mac | When I was about ten years old, I ran a stall in a jumble sale to raise money for some good cause that I can't remember. At the appointed hour a horde of old ladies rushed into the church hall at a speed that illustrated the excellent hip replacements you can get on the NHS. In the space of ten minutes they reduced me to tears by destroying my stall and insisting that as they were 'just a poor old pensioner' they shouldn't pay more than 5 pence for anything. I felt like a small mammal that had been ripped apart by a school of piranah This experience has put me off ever selling anything again. I would rather give my stuff away then re-live that experience ! Thanks a lot Jack, I'm shivering just thinking about it.

Wed 11 Sep 12:05 | TimW | I usually end up listening to these types of shows on long trips around the holidays.. makes for some good entertainment and break in normal radio action...

WebWord Comment | Sat 07 Sep

Am I Jakob Nielsen Or Not?

Mon 09 Sep 01:45 | Jack Schonchin | John, WebWord needs sex appeal. Nothing hardcore. Just bikini shots. Nah, better yet, sit on a bench at your local mall and snap shots of the skankiest mall walkers. Snap shots of men, women, and 'ambiguous pedestrians.' Use a cookie to save our sexual preference, then show us the 'Walker of the Week' in the navigation column. If some users complain, explain to the prudes that usability is about observing people and that's what you're doing, and that's what you're helping WebWorders do. Come on John, give us a legit source for softcore porn that we can view at work.

Mon 09 Sep 14:35 | Mac | I have just noticed that someone has put Lydia on there ! And me ... And MadMan And I just found a picture of Jack as well (He's the one on my left) Hey, who's been adding all the Webworders pictures ?

Mon 09 Sep 16:47 | John S. Rhodes | I'm out there as well. That's the price we pay for being in the Rogue's Gallery, no?

Tue 10 Sep 14:59 | Mac | It's just a bit of a shock seeing yourself somewhere strange.

Keeping children safe online | Mon 09 Sep

(bbc.co.uk) It is not that I do not trust her, because I do, and I also believe that part of growing older is exploring the things your parents tell you to avoid. (Mac comments: When is it acceptable to snoop on your children ? )

Mon 09 Sep 09:17 | Jack Schonchin | As long as you are legally and/or morally responsible to care for your children, it is acceptable to invade their privacy. A child is learning to become a responsible adult, and you presumably are a responsible adult giving that guidance. Sure, as the child gets older it will despise that invasion and feel it doesn't need your guidance. On a practical level you have to adjust your methods to compensate for your child's brain, and find an appropriate level of functional trust. Related link: Police raid nets $12K from boy's room. 'This is certainly a rarity and, obviously, I would be concerned about a 15-year-old dealing drugs at this level without his parents being aware of it,' Dwyer said. 'It seems somewhat suspicious. If you have a 15-year-old kid and thousands of dollars in cash out where we could see it, 'Hello, where are you?' 'Snooping' is an appropriate word. Teenagers are extremely adept at deception. I know I was.

Mon 09 Sep 12:31 | Lydia | Gosh, that is a difficult one. As parents you want to foster trust with your kids so that they will come to you when something upsets them. However, what do you do for the stuff that doesn't necessarily upset them, like homophobic propaganda? The beauty of kids is that they are open-minded, but I wouldn't want my child reading stuff like that without having a balancing viewpoint. I doubt that I would go so far as to filter content. Those types of programs just aren't going to be comprehensive enough to really make a difference. But would a heart-to-heart talk do the trick? Most kids don't want to hear that you worry about this and that. They think they're invincible - hell, I know I was at that age!! I guess all I can say is, you have to do what makes you feel right as a parent, and if filtering software gives him some peace of mind, go for it. At least he is being open about it with his kids.

Mon 09 Sep 13:44 | Mac | As Lydia said, this is a very difficult subject, but it is interesting to know where people (I guess I really mean parents) draw the line. In the UK there has been a recent case of Kiddie-Chipping which is an extreme example of the lengths some parents will go to in order to 'protect' their children. Is it OK to monitor their chat-room conversations? Would you read their personal diary? As a child I did many things that were either illegal or dangerous (or both), and I know that my parents didn't know about all of them. Looking back I find it difficult to decide which experiences I should have been protected from, and which ones helped me develop into the person I am today.

Mon 09 Sep 13:57 | Frank Lynch | Did anyone else click on his other articles in the right margin? I read 'the need for speed,' and in it he argues for broadband connections more for the 'always on' aspect than for the speed of data delivery. Do I not understand the energy issues of a computer in standby mode, or isn't it always using some energy? (As I am under the impression is is always using some energy, and have long thought Europeans more environmentally conscious than most Americans, I was surprised...)

Mon 09 Sep 14:50 | Mac | Frabk: Standby Loss is indeed a big electricity consumer (10%+ ?). The main culprits are TV's and VCRS's but I'm sure computers are racing up the charts. Us Europeans are definitely more enviromentally conscious than Mr Bush, but I don't know about the rest of you colonials. I for example have energy efficient halogen light-bulbs that automatically turn themselves off when you blink, as well as a TV that turns itself off during ad breaks. And I hope to get hold of one of the new clockwork wrist-watches that don't even need a battery ! Although I still haven't managed to track down a fridge that turn's the light off when you close the door.

Mon 09 Sep 15:37 | jan | I have a 13- and a 10-year-old. I and my husband are very opinionated & are quite free in expressing those opinions. Our children, in turn, have developed their own opinions and are equally secure in expressing them (sometimes to my dismay). They are learning to think critically, learning that their opinions are valued and valuable, and building an enormous amount of self esteem and assertiveness. My children have learned that actions have consequences, some of which are painful. And they know that I can't protect them from everything, much as I'd like to try. We have discussed personal safety and online safety, & the teachers discuss it at school. No filtering system can replace common sense and a powerful sense of self-esteem. Children have to develop those over time. My advice to parents: Start early talking about subjects that make you uncomfortable. Your children don't know that the subjects you're discussing are supposed to be uncomfortable topics. Once they learn that, they'll remember that you brought those subjects up, & they'll be more likely to come to you about other things should the need arise. Information is the only thing we can give our children to protect them. --------- I always turn off my PC, my lights, my radio, my TV. I don't think conservationism is a national trait--it's individual.

Mon 09 Sep 16:08 | Frank Lynch | Mac, your link reminds me why I unplugged every clock, microwave, TV, VCR etc before we took our fortnight trip to the UK this summer (oops, usability issue -- not all readers know 'fortnight,' maybe I should put a link to a 300K page that restates what a fortnight is...) I remember a '97 HBR that showed the 'environmental footprint' of an American vs. someone from the Netherlands, and ours was 8 times larger. So, is having your computer on 24x7 SO incredibly convenient that this guy would not only recommend the additional energy costs but also the additional costs of broadband? (I don't think so myslef, I have DSL and turn the machine off at night & when I leave.)

Mon 09 Sep 19:52 | Lydia | I couldn't see myself reading my kids diary. My parents never did it, and they always made sure I had a private life. What they worked hard at is building trust and not welching on the deal when I called them to say my friend was stoned and I had had a couple of drinks and didn't feel safe about driving. They picked me up, thanked me for not driving myself or letting my friend drive me, and tried to figure out how drunk I was surreptitiously. It was actually kind of cute. They always answered my questions about the birds and the bees without flinching. Things that would make my friends pale and say 'You asked your mom? What if she thinks you're doing that?' ha ha I like Jan's idea of starting early with kids. These days, especially, it seems you have to! ---- I read the side article, but didn't see anything about not shutting down your computer. From what I saw, he was just talking about how nifty it is not to have to worry about dialing in or losing a connection - it's just there whenever you are.

Mon 09 Sep 21:19 | Frank Lynch | Lydia, perhaps it's different in the UK than it is for me in the US, using DSL. He writes, 'the real difference broadband makes is that it is always on. Whenever your computer is running, then your internet connection is active.' Every time I shut down my machine, my connection goes away, and I need to re-connect once back up. (Also, many US ISP's bill at a flat rate as it is - - so theoretically you could have dial-up and be on all the time.) So I see how I may have misread him, but by paying attention to the 'always up' emphasis, it looks like I may have misled myself.

Tue 10 Sep 14:03 | Lydia | Oh, OK - I get you now, Frank - sorry I didn't see that at first. I'm on a network, so I can shut down my machine but when I start up I am instantly connected again. At home, my computer can be set to automatically connect me whenever the computer is turned on. Therefore, I didn't immediately draw the conclusion of having to have the computer in stand-by to get immediate access. Perhaps he is operating under the same assumption?

Ten Best Intranets of 2002 | Tue 03 Sep

(useit.com) 158-page Intranet Design Annual with 104 screenshots of the ten winners is available for download.

Tue 10 Sep 12:52 | Mac | I have bought this report (and last year's) with my own money ! I am disappointed with this report for the following reasons: 1) Where are the users? It is stated in the annual that 'we do believe that intranet usability studies are best conducted with users'. Whilst none were carried out for this report, you can buy another report in November (Intranet Usability) that will contain results from 'proper' evaluations. Have I been offered this other report at half price, or even free? No I haven't. I cannot find any mention of this 'Part 2' anywhere on the NNGroup site, whilst it is clearly trailed in the report itself (although by then you have already paid for 'Part 1' dohhhhhh) In last year's Annual the following statement was made 'Although usability testing was beyond the scope of this first exercise, we plan to integrate this into our next intranet review.'. Yeah, and you'll charge me twice for the privelidge. There are examples where whole sentences have been copied intact from last years annual, so I think they should have provided Part 2 free. 2) I want some more proof to back up some of the statements in the report. Many of the sites featured feature customisation options that allow users to subscibe to different channels so that they can personalise their experience. I want to know what percentage of users actually use the customisation features or have they been mentioned because the desginers put a lot of effort into them, or because the CMS salesman sold it as a 'sexy feature'. 3) What didn't work? I want to know about this disasters and dead-ends that were followed by the design teams. There is a short section at the end of the report that gives examples of common issues why some intranets were not selected for the report, but this is not good enough. We all know the most popular alertbox article of all time is Top Ten Mistakes in Web Design. I need so see the dirt under the fingernails! 4) What about the methodology? I want to know how the Selection Criteria and Process changed from last year? What lessons were learnt? At first glance the main change is with the numeric rating criteria: Last year there were eight criteria, this year there are seven, with Clear labels and Clear links (names and marks) being replaced with Home page in the 2002 annual. The only common theme across the winners from both Annuals is Limited use of graphics. I want to know why the common themes are so different this year. Arrrggghh, now that I've re-read this post I realise I am actually very angry and feel that I have been ripped off.

Font Sizes & Font-Family | Mon 09 Sep

Using inline styling, testing the following font-size properties and units...

Tue 10 Sep 06:01 | Alastair Campbell | That's not much help, it only shows your system. Owen Briggs showed how the various sizing methods work across several systems: http://www.thenoodleincident.com/tutorials/box_lesson/font/

Are Safety Experts Killing Our Kids? | Mon 09 Sep

(asktog.com) I dont remember kids dying in cars very often when I was a kid, unless, of course, the car was moving at the time. Back then, my only crash protection was my mothers swiftly moving arm. (Mac comments: Does technology sometimes provide a false sense of security ? )

Tue 10 Sep 04:04 | Chris Lowe | Have you heard of 'risk homeostasis'? This is the idea that people tend to take more or less the same risks, even when safety technology is introduced: http://i2i.org/Publications/IP/PersonalFreedom/RiskHomeostasis.htm (I'm not saying that I agree with the theory, just pointing out something along the lines of your comment on Togs article)

idontsmoke.co.uk | Mon 09 Sep

We play around on the internet, like we know something important. We learn from other people’s mistakes, and laugh at yours.

Mon 09 Sep 18:37 | dean | perceived (linked to on the home page) was a good web log with some insightful entries on various web technology related topics. there is a new web log by mr sowden within 'idontsmoke' though (not linked to from the home page) called nondescript. also if you're into dhtml and standards you may find his delete.me.uk interesting too.

A blind computer user's thoughts on news Web sites | Wed 04 Sep

(Adrian Holovaty) As I have argued time and time again in this blog, its sadly ironic that the same news organizations that historically have trumpeted freedom of information tend to produce Web sites that make that information inaccessible.

Mon 09 Sep 17:02 | Philip Chalmers | 'it's sadly ironic that the same news organizations that historically have trumpeted freedom of information tend to produce Web sites that make that information inaccessible' confuses 'freedom from' and 'freedom to'. If you can remember the Cold War, the West gave priority to 'freedom from' (i.e. from oppressive government) while the communists claimed they gave priority to 'freedom to' (allegedly to have a decent standard of living for all, but we discovered what a lie that was). In more concrete terms, freedom of information is about preventing those in power from covering up their mistakes and misconduct, and is a prerequisite for democracy. Web accessibility is a social engineering objective, like mobility for the disabled. No-one expects car makers to make all cars suitable for drivers with all types of disability. Instead governments assess the needs of disabled individuals and then make a financial contribution towards the purchase of a suitable vehicle - and have to account to the public for the costs and benefits. The web accessibility lobby is trying to get its objectives met without having to account for the costs and benefits, by pushing the costs on to the budgets of all web sites. In other words, it is behaving undemocratically.

Email This to a Friend | Fri 06 Sep

(CHI-WEB) But I did read the responses and was intrigued by the one that said having email in the phrase was critical the one thing the recommend-it buttons dont have. I changed the link to a text and graphic link the text saying CLICK HERE to Email this site to a friend! , the graphic being a customized version of a familiar mail icon. I made the change on Wednesday. Total recommends for last week (with standard traffic patterns)? Thirty-five. Total recommends for just yesterday? Fourteen.

Mon 09 Sep 05:25 | Anonymous | Is there a guideline here: Use 'click here' for actions (e.g. e-mail a site to a friend'(or use buttons) Don't use 'click here' for links to information Not sure.... Sherlock