.At the the back end of 1999 I was working for Harlequin (database visualisation and print rips) and led a five strong HCI team there. I had an opportunity then to talk at IEEE about the interfaces and politics of HCI and software engineering. I’d already done an article for Interactions in 1998 called ‘The Holistic Product Interface’ so my views were solid that the focus should be on the user experience not just usability.

Anyhow the abstract to ‘Repositioning HCI’ was interesting to refind, as it shows how little my core ideas have changed, even when my ability to deliver and methods have.

My memory of this event, though, is mixed. When I asked for a headcount, I was the only full-time industry HCI/usability professional there, and that annoyed me. Lots of individuals said they did bits of usability, cared a little about customers, read Jakob Neilsen, were interested. But they were all part timers. As my conference piece was about the centrality of HCI, you may imagine my frustration. Was there really no-one else? I remember at the panel session getting animated. Nobody would trust enough to push and take HCI and usability to the next step, nobody would move into that profession.

Times have changed, of course, due to the dominance of the web and mass interaction. But its chastening to remember that its not long since that HCI & Usability was merely an interest and not a profession.

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I have a lot of time for Jeffery Zeldman. He wrote a good book, he has helped me understand web standards, and helped me code a site without a table (this one, and I don’t code). But sometimes he really goes one step beyond sense.

A recent Daily Report article focussed its content on drop-down menus, and vented its spleen on them, I quote:
“When I see a drop-down menu, I know that a committee sat around a table, unwilling to think through the organization of the site?s material into a user-focused structure ? or unwilling to accept the recommendation of an information architect who spent days making sense of the site?s offerings.

A drop-down menu tells me there were too many decision makers, none of whom understood that the user?s needs were more important than their ego-driven desire to win front-page placement for their little piece of the content puzzle.”

Sorry, Jeffery, but you may just be wrong here! We have recently carried out extensive usability and prototype studies for a particular site redesign and found that ‘big’ horizontal drop-down menus are right in this case for these users. They allow the user to see all the content of the site in one go, they allow a direct drill on a deep page in the site - one step not six, and they have a small layout footprint.

Not always, no, but I do think that you should never say never, whatever your own personal preference. The user always comes first, with the research tempered by good design practice.

But, unfortunately the rant goes on, and concludes:
“I look forward to the day when most people who hire folks like us to design, structure, and program their web presences treat us more like the thinkers we are, and less like hired hands installing birdbaths.”

Me too. In fact, I look forward to the day when the self-opionated gurus of this design craft might admit that there is more than just One True Way, and that others, informed both by customers and try-and-see might sometimes know better than they do. When that happens none of us will be installing birdbaths anymore.

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A classic bit of interface, promising much and delivering little!

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At the conference under my title of “Turning Browsers into Buyers” - one of the things I spoke about was the different motivational profiles of ‘Browsers’ … considering who are they are, what do they think … and wondering ? do they even want converting into Buyers? I used a taxonomy of browsers that I made up and split them down into a number of distinct groups, calling them:

Dreamer
is just enjoying having a surf around ? is doing it for fun ? doesn?t intend to purchase anything. He/she enjoys the nature of the web and the way you can go this way and that and just see whats there. And all these places would be hard to get to if he/she were travelling in the real world ? or take too much time. Harrods, Amazon, River Island, Net-a-Porter ? look at shoes, and fashion. Its fun and its immersive.

Data Gatherer
is focussed on finding out about things. Like, I?ve seen one of those key things that go in the laptop ? I don?t know how they work or what they do exactly? is it hard? I?m not a techie ? how much can I get on them? Dabs, microwarehouse, google, dealtime, swissinfo ? do you know you can get a swiss army knife 128MB in it!! This data gathering MIGHT be product focussed, or focussed around other aspects ? like an author ? or researching where things might be bought

Deliberator
is more directed that data gatherer ? they know the kind of thing they want ? Home Insurance perhaps, and have an overall intention to purchase, but now is on a mission to choose. Whose is best? LloydsTSB, Morethan, Screentrade, esure, Direct Line ? all these visits are building up…

Doer
who knows what they want and wants to sign on the bottom line. They go to one place, one place only, that?s where they buy UNLESS they get stumped by usability issues, their expectations are not met, the brand is not credible, or the security not trustable.

So because of the low cost of visit, each purchase is likely to be the result of many multiple visits, which means to effectively make a browser/buyer conversion, you have to satisfy the dreamer, data gatherer, and deliberator ? then, ONLY THEN might you get a doer who will spend money with you.

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In previous note I have been vitriolic about these new crossings, and I am beginning to feel an obsession mounting. I guess one of the problems is I use this damn crossing everyday, so everyday I get a clearer view of the brain-dead design that makes it a danger to safe road traversal.

First up, the single walk/don’t walk display on the crossing has recently been joined by another a bit further up the pole. The displays are both the same except that the top one has no button to request to cross. Why a new one? It seems that the visibility afforded by the original lower may not have been enough, or been offputting as it was so low. The new one is higher. Actually a little higher than eyeline, making you look up and focus close, as the lower one makes you look down and focus close. Take a look at the picture of Simon Crosbie modelling the crossing to see what I mean.

.Simon has done some independant research and tells me that this ‘Puffin Crossing’ as it is apparently known, was designed so that the user would be forced to look the way the traffic was coming as the display was on the oncoming traffic side only. Good idea, if you are about four foot six (or now six foot ten) and stood in the exact right spot to see the traffic past the display. This is also assuming the display and pole are transparent, of course, and you can focus your eyes at all distances simultaneuously, and there isn’t any one four foot seven (or six foot nine) standing just in front of you.

Next, hopefully over the next week, for your pleasure, there will be a video report and triangulated drawings to make it clearer still.

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