Saturday, January 22, 2005

Online article archive The folks on the UXNet local ambassadors list expressed some interest in my write-up, in the January/February issue of <interactions>, about the BayDUX gathering last October, so I've posted an online version here: http://www.fredsampson.com/interactions/baydux_1004.htm. It's called User Experience: Why Do So Many Organizations Think They Own It?, and it also previews the May/June issue of <interactions>. 8:11:14 PM    Questions? Comments? Flames? []

Blinking thoughts Before Blink was published, I heard a recording of Malcolm Gladwell talking at Pop!Tech 2004, telling some of the stories that appear in Blink. Like the one about the Herman Miller Aeron chair (ugly but comfortable?) and Coke vs. Pepsi tests (can you really tell the difference?). One of the things that occurred to me while listening to these stories is that they illustrate a well-known principle of usability testing, which goes like this: people are remarkably poor reporters of their own behavior. For instance, ask any computer user to tell you the steps they take to perform a task. Now, watch them actually perform the task. What they say they do and what they actually do don't match. We skip small steps, we report how it should work (not how it does work), we report how we'd like it to be. People's reports of their likes and dislikes seem similarly unreliable. Ask them what they like, they'll tell you one thing; observe what they buy or use or watch, it'll be something else. The lesson, I think, is much like what Gladwell reports in Blink: if you want to know the truth, observe behavior. Don't listen to what people tell you then want, observe what they really use when given the opportunity. Now, isn't that the essence of user centered design? 8:05:26 PM    Questions? Comments? Flames? []

Seriously? Now that's progressive of them: California to install Wi-Fi access in state parks. California State Parks officials said today that SBC Communications Inc. will install Wi-Fi access at 85 state parks during the next six months. [Computerworld News] Note that there's a $7.95 per day cost associated with the state park WiFi, but that beats the $10 an hour you pay some other places. 7:54:46 PM    Questions? Comments? Flames? []

QOTD "A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five." Groucho Marx. [Quotes of the Day] 7:52:11 PM    Questions? Comments? Flames? []

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