July 18th, 2008
What makes an experience good? Meet and exceed expectations. Allow the user to complete a task so efficiently that the system is almost unnoticeable. Here are two contrasting examples from recent excursions to Houston:
1) Good: Renting a Car
As we deplane we easily find and follow signs to “Rental Cars” and locate
Kristin Hodgson
July 17th, 2008
Interaction Design, User Research
If you haven’t yet read Prototyping 101 you may want to do so before proceeding. While it is widely considered a pre-requisite for Prototyping 102, experience may be substituted. (more…)
Kristin Hodgson
July 15th, 2008
Interaction Design, User Experience Design, Visual Design
Have you seen this site? It’s a listing of what Netmag believes are the 20 best Flash sites ever. Number one was Vodafone’s Future Site. For a site that was launched back in 2003 (5 years ago is an eternity in the Web world), it’s quite impressive even by today’s standards. What do you think are some of the best Flash sites around today? What would you say is your all time best Flash site ever?
Navaro Kim
July 14th, 2008
I was thinking about content governance this morning. My current project, a government Intranet, needs revised CMS workflows, prompting me to remember a lesson from a recent presentation: Use just enough content governance. (The presentation was by Michael Edson, Director of Web and New Media Strategy at the Smithsonian, at the June meeting of “Web Content Mavens“.) (more…)
Justin Borntraeger
July 14th, 2008
Information Architecture, User Experience Design
I ride the Metrorail in DC (and Virginia) almost every day, and sometimes I have a hard time figuring out which stop my train is at. The trains’ windows are heavily tinted, and the underground stations are significantly darker than the interior of the cars, making it difficult to read signs through the windows. Also, the text on the signs is not particularly large—certainly smaller than the ample signs in many NYC Subway stations. My intention in this post is not to bash my home transit system (which, it should be noted, totally smokes NYC’s in several important ways). Rather, I bring up this issue with the signs because it can make for a frustrating user experience. I also bring it up because I’m fascinated and obsessed with public transit.
Matt Winters
July 1st, 2008
Web strategy is the determination of how a business or organization’s web presence will manifest its overall business strategy. Whereas a Web site can accommodate the needs of its users and contribute to a company or organization’s bottom line without a pre-defined strategy to follow, informed pre-planning and thoughtful execution of that plan can only increase your odds of success.
Douglas Brashear
