BILLBOREDOM

All this reference to billboards....reminds me that in L.A. (I lived there for 6 years from age 18) they did actually have really nice street signs. They would often suspend them directly over the intersection, nice and bold and right in front of you, so you knew what cross street you were passing over. I really miss those. Here it's more likely that you nearly kill someone scanning the 4 corners of an intersection that may or may not have anything indicating where you are at all. And then you might get lucky and see the names of the streets, or maybe just one, or half of one that is bent downward, as a dying plant.

This is a pic I took while driving one day in L.A. Now what are they selling???

Los Angeles is a moral compass without the needle...

Week 3 Reading

I don't know what happened....my post must've fallen into a black hole...

Websites can be like Alice’s rabbit hole: disorientating, no sense of time or space, quirky, and hard to find ones way out (successfully making the right choices to achieve ones goal/s.) Krug tells of the best methods of assisting one thru such a surreal, time/space-less journey: homepage as the anchor, north pole, Alamo…; “breadcrumbs” that indicate the steps one’s taken to get where they currently are, und thus how to get back if desired; markers that are obvious and not too subtle. And these are tools for the designer, first and foremost.

Chapter 6 starts in on real nuts & bolts, visual and physical strategies for reinforcing his rules on best usability/navigation. This chapter is like a suggestive users manual for web authors, and I'm appreciating his increasing use of graphics now that we have something we need to visualize. I plan to use the tabs suggestion, and have some good ideas for implementing that on my site that lacked an over-all theme, feel, and character. It means more work for me, but hopefully a better finished product, and thus less work for my users.

Also, his trunk test is definitely a good exercise in learning to read your own web compass. Getting a bearing on a site can sometimes be a blind alley with no doors. Good practice to not only find which sites work and which are difficult to navigate, but to use in designing your own sites, in the test run: Make a good map –even the designer can get lost in his own labyrinth. 

3 Sites related to reading:

http://thrashermagazine.com

Too much, too busy, (too obnoxious), too long to load, too many individual Flash files, lack of good structure, easy to get lost, and no easy way to get back aside from the usual: click on the header logo. Dammit -I grew up on Trasher! Get your act together boys.

http://www.dlxsf.com

In contrast: great distribution/parent site for their many companies (all listed at the top, if you want to go to an individual company site....nice!) Delux has a great streamlined site, prominent markers, clean and easy navigation. Nuff said.

http://www.misterart.com

This one is a little content heavy on the secondary nav, but ultimately, it's pretty clean. Big obvious search box, shopping cart on the right, most important ads/sales made huge and front and center, and they make use of tabs. Good job guys. (We'll probably be using this as a model for Daniel Smith overhaul...)

Week 2 Reading

Okay, re-reading the syllabus…I’m going to give a response rather than a summary, as I did last week (in which 200 words was just inconceivable) –make it comprehensive and personal rather than regurgitative....

As guiding principles go (Chapters 1-5), I think Krug is spot-on. Our reading for this week summed up:

·      CHP. 3: Everything rests at a glance.

·      CHP. 4: “3 mindless, unambiguous clicks = 1 click that requires thought.”

·      CHP. 5: Clearcut the words like you should the content.

While I read I am reminded: as a designer, my two major weaknesses are a) prioritization and b) brevity. The former causes the latter. Choosing what to keep and what to throw away, when it is your own handmade material, is like choosing which child to drown in the bathtub. (you choose the scenario) But ultimately, it has to be done. Often, if it’s similar content, like multiple files of 1 kind of my work, I line up the ones that display the best work, most versatile, and wipe the rest. Then, as Krug says (“Get rid of half what’s left.”), I cut it down some more. This I do mostly arbitrarily, as again, I’m terrible at making these choices. They’re my babies.

But when it comes to prioritization in hierarchy, I feel intuitive enough to do this well. Once the stacking is in place, it’s a matter of managing visual cues, (e.g., “The more importantsomething is, the more prominent it is…”) maintaining a consistent and logical design, and editing while you go. As hard (yet swift in many cases) as it is, editing can be the most cathartic part of the process –when you realize and actualize simplicity in its most efficient form, you are left with elegance. And yet elegance –similar to how the trimmed characteristics of the shape of a jet can determine how maneuverable and thus powerful it can be– can make design more stunning, and functionally more effective. 

What I find most intriguing with this book so far, aside from its succinctness, is that it’s common sense that we perceive, but tend to forget to repeat to ourselves. It’s powerful information laid out in the most simple of terms, like a Daniel Pink or Malcom Gladwell book.

Week 2: 3 Sites Related to Reading

1. Clutter: Although I visit their site regularly, as they provide a spectacular amount of good environmentalist info, Grist’s website gives me a migraine. It looks like 2 or 3 sites dumped on top of each other, seemingly at least 2 headers, ads in between major content, inconspicuous lists, etc.

2. "Some sites even have design rules...": My brother's Zen Spider website is about as streamlined as you can get. No graphics, period. As he puts it:

'Content to Noise Ratio'
"I prefer content over noise. As such, I have a minimum of graphics in this site. There should be zero graphics on all regular pages. Those pages that do have graphics should have very very few. If you want, you can use my Cache Optimizer to load all of the images on this site in at once (less than 32Kb) to speed things up.
I have redesigned the entire site to have a good balance between raw content and navigability. I use HTML 3.2 compliant devices to create small fast navigation tools consistent across every page. As a result, my website can be viewed by any browser that I know is still in use (and most that aren't)."
 
Although it could be argued that any site which needs a sitemap is contradicting a sense of simplicity....you rarely see sitemaps these days, probably mostly in part due to the conventions Krug refered to in Chp. 3. I don't even know how old my brother's original site is. Old.

3.  Visual Noise: Although I hadn't visited any Myspace page in ages (until today, and it seems they have overhauled visually in a major way), I remember always being hesitant to go to any Myspace pages due to their colorful body copy and flashing avatars overlaying whatever eternally-tiled background image the host provided. A true source of many a seizure I'm sure. Maybe they cleaned up their act over injury lawsuits. 

Week 1 Reading

Chapter 1 touches on logistical theory (“Why?”) and explores the question, “what makes good usability –and is thus good for both the user (them) and the website creator/author (us)?" 

The goal, he says, is to minimize cognitive workload so that a user goal may be easily achieved. Workload can refer to any element on a page that requires thought: the worse being ambiguity, arbitrary words or images or placement, obscure wordage, etc.

Minimizing space (vs. risking over-minimalism) requires a balanced approach: a logic between the dictum that ‘the competition is one click away,’ (client leaves) and the fact that many-a-user will doubt their own intuition and persistently toil (client stays).

“If you can’t make a page self-evident, you at least need to make it self-explanatory.“ Ultimately, what this means is, eliminating question marks (e.g., 5 W’s attributed to potential site) should be the overarching practice. i.e., “Brevity is the soul of wit” but don’t outwit your viewer...or yourself.

This is theory.

Chapter 2 focuses on practice: actual use and design application. (“How?”)

Krug reminds us we have to keep in mind that people tend to scan or glance, rather than absorb. It’s quicker, easier, and taking in an entire site is unnecessary in terms of getting to the goal/s. People are also obstinate and habitual. Often we do things the hard way, because we don’t take the time to figure out how things work, or “get it.” This irony lends itself to a dangerous (for us and them) duality of sticking around on a non-intuitive site, and yet getting frustrated by having to do so.

Best to make sure, by designing simply and unassuming of the intuition or savvy of the client, they can easily “get it.” If this is achieved, they get what they were looking for and got what you had to offer. They’ll explore your site with more confidence and thus afford more time and attention, and chances are better they’ll return.

This is (good) practice.