Everything is Miscellaneous Ch. 5-6

“The Laws of the Jungle” was all about tagging, which allows you to assign a name to any page, post, photo, video, etc. to help you remember things your way. I understand the importance of tagging with the amount of information we have readily available to us these days. And since there is so much information, it’s clearly difficult to keep track of it all and organize it in ways that work for everyone. While Krug applauded the use of tabs, similar to folders, Weinberger says that folders are a disadvantage because an item can only go in one place. Tags are metadata that describe an item or piece of information, which allows individuals to find that item or piece of information when browsing or searching. Since anyone can assign a tag, there are many opportunities to find what you’re looking for.

When reading this chapter, the first thing that came to mind was Patrick’s reading posts. When we first began our blogs at the beginning of the semester, I wasn’t aware of the concept of tagging, and I was confused as to why he had so many things highlighted in his text, and a long list of random words in a column down the side of his post. I thought maybe Blogger was the one doing it, but then I realized my posts weren’t automatically being randomly tagged too (or what Blogger calls “labeled”). Now I realize that he uses tags to give people further information on what he is talking about or referencing, and also to help people find what they’re looking for easier and faster (and also because he “loves tagging”).

At the end of the chapter Weinberger lists four principles regarding the way we organize physical objects and ideas.

1. Filter on the way out, not on the way in (don’t assume something is of no value right away).
2. Put each leaf on as many branches as possible (makes something easier to find, more usable, and more profitable).
3. Everything is metadata and everything can be a label (metadata is what you already know and data is what you’re trying to find out, makes sites easier to use, everything is connected).
4. Give up control (users are in control instead of the owners of the information).

Other than Patrick's blog, popular websites that use tagging include Flickr and Twitter.

Don't Make Me Think (94-185)

One point I found particularly interesting in the second half of Krug's Don't Make Me think was "Nothing beats a good tagline." It made me wonder if I ever even pay any attention to taglines. So I decided to take a look at some sites I frequently use, as well as some popular ones, to see what their taglines are. My first stop was facebook. Obviously it's one of the most popular sites going right now, so I figured its tagline would be something catchy, humorous, or maybe even quirky. This was not the case, however, and instead I was left disappointed. "Facebook helps you connect and share with the people in your life." Talk about boring (and maybe even a bit vague). My first thought was, "they couldn't come up with something better than that?"

So I went on with my search...

Youtube's "Broadcast yourself" is nice and short, and it certainly works, but maybe they could come up with something more creative. iTune's tagline is a bit generic: "The best place for Games, Movies, Music, and much more - All for iPod." The tagline for the Public Relations example I used for the first half of Krug's book is, "Advancing the Profession and the Professional." I like it, but it kind of blends in with the rest of the page. And one of my favorite taglines that I think is really charming is Kay Jewelers, "Every Kiss Begins with Kay."

Then I came across a neat website all about taglines. Eric Swartz, "The Tagline Guru," offers some more information on taglines, like what they are, their benefits and objectives, and different types of taglines. He also has a list of The 100 Most Influential Taglines Since 1948. Check them out, it's pretty interesting. Some of my favorites include:

• Got milk? (1993) --California Milk Processor Board
• Just do it. (1988) --Nike
• Tastes great, less filling. (1974) --Miller Lite
• Melts in your mouth, not in your hands. (1954) --M&M Candies
• There are some things that money can’t buy. For everything else there’s MasterCard. (1997) --MasterCard
• What happens here, stays here. (2002) --Las Vegas
• The quicker picker-upper. (1991) --Bounty
• Betcha can’t eat just one. (1981) --Lay’s Potato Chips
• Think outside the bun. (1998) --Taco Bell
• Don’t get mad. Get GLAD. (early 1980s) --GLAD

So basically some good things Krug says to keep in mind when coming up with a tagline are: clear, informative, just long enough, differentiation, clear benefit, personable, lively, and sometimes clever. Things to avoid include being vague and/or generic. It's also important to have your tagline placed where users expect to find it (below, above, or next to the site ID).

Another part of this reading that I enjoyed was "The Reservoir of Goodwill." I can't help but agree with Krug when he says, "The reservoir is limited, and if you treat users badly enough and exhaust it there's a good chance that they'll leave....they may not be as eager to use your site in the future, or they may think less of your organization" (163). I think this is so true. I hate to be asked irrelevant information, I don't want to search all over the place for something just to find it wasn't there in the first place, and I don't want to use a website that makes me feel stupid, confused, is unorganized or is unprofessional.

Don't Make Me Think (1-93)

I think Steve Krug is successful at pointing out his principles because he explains them well, and also gives examples to show the reader exactly what he means. I find him credible because he clearly shows that he knows what he is talking about when he backs himself up. While I was reading, I was constantly saying "Oh yea, that's so true." Most of what he has to say really is commonsense, and he explains that anyone can understand web usability. In his Introduction he says, "It's not rocket surgery....Like a lot of common sense, though, it's not necessarily obvious until after someone's pointed it out to you" (5). And Krug is just the guy to point it out to us.

"Don't make me think." These four words seem simple, but they mean so much when it comes to designing a webpage. When I'm on a webpage, I don't want to have to do any unnecessary work. If a webpage makes me feel overwhelmed and/or frustrated, chances are I'm never going to use it again. Design can be simple and still be visually appealing. I'm even a fan of making something original or unique (which was one of my groups rules in our Good, Bad, Ugly assignment). But being creative doesn't mean doing something so outrageous or different that you confuse your audience. Standards and conventions are still important because people like to feel like they know what they're doing or they know where they are. You will end up alienating your audience if you ignore some of the vital conventions that Krug points out in chapter 3, "Conventions are your friends" and chapter 6, "Web navigation conventions."

Noise is another principle Krug discusses. When there's too much going on, it's easy to become overwhelmed. You waste time asking yourself where you should start first. I understand there are some webpage’s that have a lot of important information they need to get to their audience, but there are also ways to design and organize that information so it's user-friendly (you can make tabs or sections, you can space things out, you can introduce stories and have a link to read more instead of making the whole thing available, etc.) An organization that I think does a good and bad job at organizing its webpage is the Public Relations Society of America. This is one of those websites that has a ton of information, but it is relatively easy to navigate around. Some good things about the design include:

• Each "chunk" of information is broken up into clearly defined areas.
• No happy talk (that I have noticed anyway).
• No unnecessary instructions.
• Sections with sub-sections (you can click on just the section header for general information, or go to a sub-section if you have a more specific idea of what you're looking for).
• Site ID is located in the upper left corner, and is clickable to bring the user back to the Home page (and there's also a Home link that can be clicked).
• Search option for those who don't want to browse.
• Page names (although they could stand out a bit more).
• Good use of breadcrumbs. (Home > Awards > Individual Awards > PR Professional of the Year Award).
• Navigation box on the left hand side of the page.

Here are some negative aspects of the webpage that I've noticed:

• Could use a better visual hierarchy.
• Could be more obvious about what’s clickable.
• Could use a "you are here" indicator (maybe the section you're in could be highlighted or have some way of making it stand out once its clicked).
• It's a little noisy. Unless you know specifically what you're looking for, there's a lot going on and many things to click on--you might not know where to start.

These are just a few things I saw right off the bat. I'm not an expert with the site so I'm sure there are more examples of both good and bad design and usability.

The Sticky Embrace of Beauty

I had a similar reaction to Wysocki's article as some of my classmates, being that it was a bit hard to follow. Something that I kept getting stuck on was the whole idea of beauty being a universal thing. I wanted to feel like what I think is beautiful is my own opinion that can be and is different from other people's opinions. And what some random person thinks is beautiful may be something I find disturbing, or even offensive. Why do we all have to think the same way? Don't we appreciate our differences? Don't we say it's good that everyone isn't the same? Our different looks, perspectives, opinions, thoughts, etc. are what make us so diverse, so I find it hard to believe that something like beauty can be applied universally.

This made me think of something that kept coming up in my comp theory class last semester. We discussed the idea of whether our writing is our own and the question of authorship. Some say that we don't own our ideas because what we write about has been written about before, and we get our ideas from the other things we've read and heard. But even though we know that, we still have a hard time accepting that our great story or interesting idea we came up with has already been done before. And just like how we want to believe our ideas and what we write belong to us, we want to believe what we see as beautiful is our own opinion, not what someone else decides for us. We like the idea of independence and freedom, or at least I do, which is why I think I didn't like being told that beauty is universal.

But on another note, there were some points that I found interesting in this article. The idea of visual hierarchy makes sense to me. Wysocki says, "visual arrangement makes easy one's access to what is most important in a layout, will sieve out what is unnecessary or not to the point, will streamline the direction and speed of one's sight to hone in on" (hopefully I quoted that right, but I took it from my notes and since I read the article in the library, my notes are all I have to go by). This made me think of William's discussions of business cards and how your eyes move around the information depending on the design of them (as in pg. 52 where your eyes wander off the card in the first example, and your eyes go back and forth between the bold type elements in the second example).

I also found Bang's principles interesting. Although I may not have thought about them specifically before, they make a lot of sense to me and offer a great perspective. They also make me wonder, though, if they are universal principles. What we (Americans) may think could be completely different in other cultures. Just like colors, words, phrases, gestures, etc. represent different things for us and for other cultures, these principles could be drastically different. We might see the upper half of a picture as a place of freedom and spirituality, but who's to say every other culture views it that way? Maybe pointed shapes are visually important in some other cultures because they stand for strength and battle, while rounded shapes are weak and troubling for them (compared to the fear we get from pointed shapes and the comfort and security we get from looking at rounded shapes)?

This might be a stretch, but the example I'm going to use is from Oprah. She had a show about beauty around the world, where women from different countries discussed what's considered beautiful in their countries. This reveals some major differences in beauty among cultures, which also denies the universal beauty idea.