Control is Everything

Scott Adams got me thinking. In his blog entry for August 17, he mentions that one of our strongest needs it to feel like we're in control. He used an old example: A genie offers you two choices. In the first choice, "You can eat at the finest restaurants in the world for free, twice a week. The only catch is that the genie picks the day, when you are not already booked, and he picks the specific restaurant." In the second choice, "You can eat at “good” restaurants, again for free, twice a week. But this time you can schedule it whenever you want, up to two places per week, and pick whatever “good” restaurant you want."

He goes on to develop the theme that the first choice probably wouldn't make many people happy, because they would eventually feel the keen sense of loss of control. The second choice, while gastronomically less appealing, is probably a better one for most of us.

It reminded me that one thing users dearly love is control, or at least the illusion of it. This is something that subconsciously irks me about lots of software and websites, I think. It's why I'm irritated with Flash so often. It just takes off and does things without asking me. The same thing annoys me about flashing ads, shifting menus, and other things that don't help me do things, but invade my locus of control. We humans don't seem to resent losing control if we don't expect it. We accept that the good guy may die at the end of the movie, but we'll shriek in fury if we can't change the channel to another movie. And we accept a loss of control when it benefits us. My car's engine does hundreds of things that I don't need to approve as they're happening. But there are some places where humans just won't accept interference. I wouldn't pay less for a car if it decided by itself when it would start. The same thing is true for software and websites, I think.

Decluttering

A group of scientists at MIT headed by Ruth Rosenholtz, a long-time researcher into vision and technology, has developed a prototype application in MATLAB that determines the amount of clutter on-screen (Link). The HCI profession has long needed something that could separate figure from ground reliably. The program is only in prototype, but apparently it's rather promising.

The problem of figuring out what's vital few from trivial many isn't trivial itself. Nuclear facility control rooms are a case in point. Rows of lights can go from being background hum to suddenly becoming extremely important. How much do you expose to an operator, or to a website user? Hicks Law was an early attempt at measuring how much stuff was too much, but the sophistication of control schemes today needs a better way of knowing when you've overstuffed the interface.

Are We The Way of the Future?

Computerworld recently published an article listing twelve job skills that no employer can refuse. The usual suspects hopped onto the list - whatever's hot, that is. Wireless, for example. But one of the twelve was usability. That surprised me, for several reasons.

First, usability isn't a universally-needed skill, at least not at the level a specialist brings. It kicks in only when the stakes are high and failure is all too expensive. For websites, it's primarily for ecommerce and other high-end sites. And those are designed and built on the coasts, not in the flyover zone where I live. Check out monster.com, dice.com, UPA's career page, or careerbuilder.com, and you'll see what I mean. Jobs are plentiful in Massachusetts, Washington State, California, New York, New Jersey, and Virginia. There aren't many in Iowa, Montana, Arizona, Indiana, Alabama, and most of the other flyovers. So how do we qualify as owners of a "can't miss" skillset?

HCI of Casinos and Slot Machines

This is the kind of article I love to read. It's about the human factors that go into designing slot machines and casinos. The article says that a slot machine is designed to be loud and visually appealing, especially when it pays off. The three wheels encourage the victim player to think that he's almost won when two of the wheels align, when there's no such thing as "almost". The slots are positioned just within easy walk of the tables, because table players don't like to hear them, yet the spouses of table players may well play the slots while they're waiting. It also talks about casino design in general, arranging that players can't see the outdoors, or even real outdoor lighting. No clocks, either, no way of knowing how long you've been there.

The slots are insidious in that they pay off only sporadically, which is how positive reinforcement works best. They pay off publicly, so everyone around is encouraged to keep playing. And they keep nurturing that "almost there" feeling.

Usability as a Path to Failure? Surely Not.

Todd Wilkins at Adaptive Path has thrown down a gauntlet to usability professionals, claiming that usability is not only overrated, but even injurious and a path to failure. He cites successful artists who didn't worry about "usability" either. He says:

So, why oh why do people in this day age still hold up “usability” as something laudable in product and service design? Praising usability is like giving me a gold star for remembering that I have to put each leg in a *different* place in my pants to put them on. (Admittedly, I *do* give my 2 year old daughter a gold star for this but then she’s 2.) Usability is not a strategy for design success. The efficiency you create in your interface will be copied almost instantaneously by your competitors. Recently, I’m even coming to believe that focusing on usability is actually a path to failure. Usability is too low level, too focused on minutia. It can’t compel people to be interested in interacting with your product or service. It can’t make you compelling or really differentiate you from other organizations. Or put another way, there’s only so far you can get by streamlining the shopping cart on your website.

Ahem.

Rarely do I see a designer get this blatant. They may think this drivel, but they don't usually voice it before a plunge into happy hour. First, usability here might seem synonymous with "make stuff easy to see". We professionals know this is not anywhere close to being true. Second, it entirely overlooks that websites aren't works of art, unless they're private, non-commercial ones. Commercial (e-commerce) sites are for making money, and every visitor who snorts in frustration and leaves is a financial failure, not a failure to make a friend. Visitors don't need to be engaged, or have fun in most cases. They need to transact. They need to do the tasks they arrived to do. Much "design" merely gets in the way of that simple goal, and ought to be cut out like a splinter under the fingernail, because it provides about as much value. A big-time website isn't an opportunity to dance the visitor about. It's to enable him to act.

Of course any successful design will be copied. But then, there are only a few designs in human experience, and they're all copied every day. Graphic designers tend to think that their designs are unique and powerful. Most often the ones that are sold this way are actually glitz with no go, at their core simply reproductions of past designs with a few cosmetic changes. There are only so many ways to arrange elements on a surface.

In my view, websites are not akin to artworks, but more like cars. First you make sure the damned thing drives properly, and then you dress it up. Not the other way around. We tolerate few physical objects in our lives that are as poorly designed as "cool" or "artistic" websites, yet we complain about the physical and work our way around the virtual. This seems asinine to me.

In The Same Room, But Apart

It's possible that the next frontier for social technology is to connect people locally, rather than across continents. When I work at home and my wife is in an adjacent bedroom/office, it's easier for us to use IM and email that goes out to servers from Memphis to Mongolia, than to use our own little network. Laptop users in public places can't readily recognize each other in cyberspace, not even through cell phones. Bluetooth has some limited capability, but it has a short range.

The problem is everywhere. If I see somebody with a cell phone and want to talk to them, I can't look up the number or ping them, even from just yards away. I have lots of occasion to be with people in short bursts of time, such as conferences, classes, professional group meetings, and the like. These are people I see rarely, but may desperately need to contact with questions or to have them render quick decisions. I may not even know them by sight, or by full name. For example, I'm a member of the local UPA, and we put on a yearly conference for World Usability Day. It attracts speakers I don't know, members I haven't seen in a long time, sponsors, attendees, and many others I might not be expected to pick out in a crowd. Another organizer comes up to me and asks "Does Dr. Willoughby (a speaker I haven't met) still need this wireless mouse?" Beats me, and I can't just ping him to find out. What would help is to have a short-distance option in my cell phone that would operate much as my laptop does when it enters a wireless field. My laptop seeks out whatever signal it knows, and if it doesn't find one it knows, it tells me that. Otherwise, it just logs on. I'd like to see something similar in cell phones. I could haul out my phone and open a screen that lists the profiles of everyone within, say, 100 yards. You could hide your profile if you wanted, so the phone would show only "Hidden Account". But prominent people who speak at conferences usually want to be noticed, so I would scroll down until I found "Dr. Lance Willoughby", highlight him, and press the "Go" button. I'm connected to his phone.

Keeping a Usability Portfolio

When I scan the want ads for people in the design end of usability, I often see language like "Must show portfolio". Huh? Most of us would find that requirement very hard to fulfill, no matter how long we've been in the business. It's not like we're artists in a garret, and our work endures down the centuries. It may last only days or weeks. And it may be buried in the overall design of the site. Further, we may not be the graphical designer, who will get credit for the look of the site. Perhaps more importantly, websites are inherently team affairs, largely produced by committees. After the wrangling is over, any usability person might question where his or her work might be found and pointed out. Add to this the short life spans of many design companies or design departments. Even if the company name sticks around, the personnel turn over rapidly in some places. After we've been gone for a year or so, nobody there remembers us. The lesson here is that when a site goes live, we should take screen shots and put them away on a CD somewhere so that later we can make up "portfolios". Forget, and the opportunity may slip away forever. Put it into your design process.

When the Least of Us Are Ignored

I was made a convert to the cause of accessibility a few years back when I attended an STC conference with a progression that dealt with handicaps. At each table was a different handicapped person. One was blind, another deaf, another with only limited use of his legs, and so forth. It sounds like a freak show, but it was shockingly enlightening. I never forgot the lessons I learned at that session, and if you ever get a chance to be taught those lessons yourself, I suggest you take it.

One big lesson I learned was that accommodating the handicapped is not necessarily a big or expensive proposition, but simply being conscious of them. Widen aisles a little. Don't use slick flooring everywhere. Give optional paths that are not demeaning. In my view, this applies to all of us in human factors.

Then I walked on the Sakai project, and was jolted again. The one person on the whole big, extended team who was thinking about accessibility for the visually handicapped was almost literally crying out in the wilderness of Ann Arbor, Michigan. Sakai's interface was a long way from being handicapped-friendly. Tests proved that screen readers couldn't use it. It's been improved, but it's still not exactly ready for screen-reader prime time. Portals are often difficult for screen readers to use. Flash, text in graphics, and scripts can be real headaches, too.

I've since been struck several times by how little attention is paid to accessibility online by any website owner. Even e-commerce sites are often impenetrable for the blind, and unnecessarily so. (This may change. The National Federation for the Blind is suing Target Corp. to make its online suit accessible, under the Americans with Disabilities Act. Very preliminary so far.)

But I also found out something else interesting -- concern about the handicapped is generally in direct proportion to how much contact a designer or marketing manager has with the handicapped. If someone in their workplace, church, or family is blind, deaf, or has physical problems, they're usually far more interested in making the blind welcome online. If they've never run across the handicapped except in movies, then they're often not just blind themselves, but dismissive.

Eye-Tracking of Multiple Images

A user experience expert will often want to know where users’ eyes are going on a page. The early equipment for “eye tracking” or “eye gazing” was cumbersome and unpleasant for users, but I’m seeing a lot of work being done nowadays with lighter and more easily available gear. This is an example of one research report on eye-tracking I ran across recently: http://psychology.wichita.edu/surl/usabilitynews/91/eyegaze.html

Eye tracking maps are often known in the user experience trade as “heat maps”, because most of the time they’re shown as websites with superimposed patches of color that go from light blue to blazing red, depending on how long a user has stared at each spot. Current research is revealing interesting things about how people look at sites. Text almost always shows an F-shaped pattern of scan. We’ve known for a long time that visitors don’t read text online, but scan instead. This is old news. But the research reported by Usability News looked into patterns of search on pages with lots of images, and there the gaze patterns break up rapidly into individualistic styles, especially when searching for something in particular. Otherwise, when browsing visitors show much the same orderly left-right, up-and-down zigzag pattern we’d expect to see. During visual search of multiple images, the eye hops rapidly about in unpredictable patterns as the brain works in overdrive to spot patterns, just as it might in an unfamiliar room with too much furniture.

The research didn’t investigate further, but from my own experience I’d say that the hippity-hoppity effect can be neutralized with proper use of boxing, labels, heads, and other clues that let the visitor quickly narrow down choices.

Web Analytics

One of the things I wish my colleagues knew more about was Web analytics. We've ceded this important facet of usability to the marketing folks, and we need to get a piece of it back.

Web analytics is the ability to get constant data on where users have been in your website, what they looked at, where they came from, what they bought, how long they lingered, and so forth. Much of this stuff used to be in log files, but they proved to be too feeble for prediction. Current analytics packages have much more functionality than log files ever did. For example, in WebTrends I can see what proportion of users went in one of several directions from the main page, and where they went after that, and after that. I can see what keywords they used in searches, both on the site and in search engine queries to find the site.

Web analytics has become the province of marketing departments everywhere, but often they don't know how to use the data for usability or IA purposes. We do, but most of us never look at the data, or don't know what to do with it when we do. When you can see clickpaths through your site, you can begin to optimize your navigational structure. You can gradually make the site better. If you're using a WA package now, I'd suggest you start mining it for every bit of gold you can find.