Open Thread: The Internet Is Hard
Earlier today, we had a runaway hit of a post that went viral within a few hours, getting unbelievable pageviews and hundreds of retweets and comments.
The trouble was, it wasn't because of the post's content. Due to some interesting SEO magic, the post was one of the first search results for the term "Facebook login." As a result, hundreds of confused readers bombed us with angry comments about how much they hated the "new Facebook," a.k.a. our Facebook Connect comment login.
We could laugh (and we did), but we could also consider that these are our customers and users - the people we make the Web for.How can we balance making the Web simple enough for all users while still creating tech cool enough to satisfy geeks like us? And who says either group - nerds or users - is "normal," anyway?
Here are some valuable lessons we were taught today by the commenters on the thread. We'll employ the term "user" here to indicate the non-geeky, average person who uses the Web primarily as a way to navigate his or her real life. Feel free to disagree with this terminology or suggest new nomenclature in the comments.
1. Users don't care about what you care about.
This quote from another RWW post pretty much sums it up:
"Especially in Silicon Valley, where it's easy for entrepreneurs to isolate themselves in circles with like-minded techies and fellow entrepreneurs, I feel that a huge amount of startup CEOs and designers... make product decisions that appeal to their own interaction behaviour with such applications or what they think their friends will find cool.
"Building for geeks makes for great customer immersion if you're building something like (the wonderfully useful) GitHub, but that same process doesn't work so hot if you're building a site for middle-aged moms."
You and your geek friends != middle aged moms. And your users are often statistically more likely to be middle-aged moms.
2. Users don't read your copy or look at your branding.
Banners, logos, carefully crafted wordsmithery - this is all filler, we've found out. Users have been calloused by 15 or so years of surfing through bad ads and marketing babble, and they are unconsciously tuning out everything but the one thing they came to find.
For example, none of the 200 or so confused Facebook users who commented on our earlier post read the post itself, the huge logo at the top of the page, the many links to non-Facebook-related content or the huge, all-bold paragraph about how ReadWriteWeb is not, in fact, some ill-conceived redesign of Facebook. They simply searched for "Facebook login" and, upon navigating to our site, scrolled until they found the one button they wanted to click. Which brings us to our third assertion.
3. Users gravitate toward the simple and the familiar.
A ton of the confused commenters scrolled down far enough to find the Facebook Connect button for logging into the comments section - as evinced by the fact that their Facebook profiles were then linked to their comments.
I've often criticized the ripped-off look of social media UIs, but once a UI becomes familiar, is it not a service to certain types of end users to continue in that vein? Two hackneyed expressions will back me up, one about reinventing wheels and the other about not needing to fix things that aren't broken.
As a tech geek of the 12-hours-a-day-online variety, I appreciate innovative and intuitive web interfaces. But a lot of users don't. Even if it's simple, it needs to be familiar. Why do you suppose some of our current, deeply entrenched web design elements - from buttons to text blocks - even exist?
4. Users rule the Internet.
Finally, this is the reason we've stopped mocking the poor folks who left those comments long enough to write this post.
400 million people now use Facebook, and they don't all have CS Master's degrees from Stanford. But if you work in the IT/tech/Internet/online media industries, they do manage to pay your bills. They're the ones who open emails, click ads, make purchases, sign up for subscriptions and generally take the majority of actions that make our whole ecosystem work.
And most of them have no idea what a web browser is or how it differs from a search engine or a social network. They've chosen to be smart about other things, like building cars or making art or raising families. I'll bet some of them are terrific dancers. We have to build the Web for them, too.
As a user, a developer, a designer, a marketer, a startup dude or lady, whatever you happen to be, how do you balance the need to find or create cool tech and apps with the need to build with these kinds of users in mind? Do you get frustrated? Do you get feedback? Do you kill features and make buttons bigger?
What have been your successes and failures, or where have you learned lessons? We'd love to know, so please tell us in the comments.
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"most of them have no idea what a web browser is or how it differs from a search engine or a social network. They've chosen to be smart about other things, like building cars or making art or raising families."
Exactly. That's why the iPad is a foretaste of the future of "computing."
Look, I understand the urge to try to turn this into a teachable experience, but the people that were ignorant enough to not realize that was a blog post and not actually facebook are beyond saving.
The only way we could truly make the internet "friendly" for people like that is to distribute keyboards with three buttons. One that takes you to Facebook, one for Google, and one for "email". Of course then, most of them would probably still push the Google button to get to Facebook...
BREAKING: "Middle-aged moms" are not all "confused Facebook users" and are, in fact, capable of savoring tech goodness.
Your lazy icon-slinging packs a nice one-two punch (ageism and sexism). Way to go.
Very salient points. The question is, how do we as web geeks get into the mindset of an average user? I think the take-away here is LISTEN TO YOUR USERS. Listen both to what they're saying, then listen to what they really mean.
"Middle-aged moms" are not all "confused Facebook users"
Right, but look at the demographics of the confused FB users on that last post. They were almost universally members of two specific groups, but we can't talk about that with being ageist or racist.
Since we're talking about actually knowing who users are ...
Some of my geeky friends are also middle-aged moms. I know plenty of young people who are totally clueless about how the "Intarwebz" work.
It would be a useful exercise for us to get beyond stereotypes, especially sexist and ageist ones.
You may counter with some demographics, but that isn't the point. The point is, using and reinforcing stereotypes is hurtful behavior that reinforces the exact thing your article is coming out against.
really?
RWW's readers are people who can't tell your blog from Facebook? And you're going to cater to that lowest demoninator?
I don't buy it.
If you honestly believe that, you're going to have a tough time selling your demographic to advertisers, no?
This is actually a very real problem. Us "geeks" forget what it was like when we first started using everything that is now second nature to us. When we are creating something we have to think as a user would and not as a "geek" would. This is a very important detail that many companies overlook. My mom has no idea what the difference between a web browser and a search engine are, and she is not alone. For those that say people like my mom are beyond saving are really missing out on a great opportunity.
as educated developer/designers, we all know "don't make me think" principle, yet we still can't think from average joe's perspective: what average joe or middle aged mom's idea of "not thinking" is a far cry from ours.
That being said, they are not your target. You don't want them to read your stuff. You have steady, large, educated audience keep coming back. That is what you are blessed with. Keep up with the good work!
@fuzzyscorpio True, but if you will direct your attention to the post in question, you will notice something. Take a look back through the comments. Notice anything? It appears a large majority of the comments asking for the "old facebook back", etc. are actually from middle age women. I know this because they had to use facebook connect to leave those comments.
Like most of us, I got caught up in the pure, unadulterated joy of watching the non-stop parade of stupid in that comments thread.
However, my first inclination when I saw what was happening (which was about 10 comments in, before it really took off) was to refer back to a comment I made on a post from earlier in the week:
My comment, from the article "Startup Priorities: Is Design More Important Than Engineering?"
http://www.readwriteweb.com/start/2010/02/startup-priorities-is-design-m.php#comment-187178
The key part:
"I've designed scores of websites and hundreds of ads, and in my (anecdotal but substantial) experience, the designs that convert the best are not the ones that are the most visually-appealing. As much as we designers hate to admit it, sometimes people really do need a huge, obnoxious, lime-green "CLICK HERE!!!!" starburst in order to know what to do. It's ugly as hell, but even my mom can see it and know what to do."
That's exactly what happened here. Jolie nails it: Users' eyes glazed over all the content on the page. It was all noise, interfering with the signal they were looking for: the Facebook login button.
The lesson for designers is that we need to resist our natural creative urge to do something "different". We've all seen 1000's of websites, and we get bored with the same old same old.
But what we consider "boring", others consider "comfortable" and "familiar". You might think it's clever to call your shopping cart a "goodie carton" (or whatever), but your users are pulling out their hair because WHERE'S THE GODDAMNED SHOPPING CART?!?!
I once did a site for a band called Bigelf, which have a weird 70's-meets-Tolkein vibe. They wanted to call their fan club page "Rogue's Gallery" and their lyrics page "Musings And Ramblings" or something like that.
I was like, "here's an idea: how about calling the fan club page 'Fan Club' and the lyrics page 'Lyrics'" But that was too mundane for them. And guess what? Nobody could find the fracking fan club page.
To sum up, a paraphrased quote from George Carlin:
"Think of how stupid the average American is. Then realize: half the people are DUMBER than that."
In response to comment 5, the part of the article that talks about middle-aged moms is actually a quote from a different article. That article used an ageist and sexist stereotype that provides no value to the discussion.
It doesn't matter if the people who commented out of confusion were from one particular group or another. This article paints them all with one brush that says they are this-way or that-way and represent the entirety of their group. It's ironic that the point of the article was, "The Internet is hard, you need to know all of your users including the ones who will never understand technology the way you do, and you need to design for them, too." Labeling someone with a stereotype doesn't help you understand them. It is more likely to continue the confusion.
@Warren that Carlin quote is great.
I know it's been beaten to death but I have to agree with Victor on this one. The masses aren't ever going to get much better at tech which is why tech as to get better for them. The iPhone/iPad phenomenon is just getting started.
All of us nerds bitched about how mediocre the options and lack of multitasking were but the fact is I can put an iPad in my Grandfather's hands and he can be up and running inside of five minutes, and probably pretty competent within an hour. I can't help but think the coming sea change will have some repercussions in web design as well.
Labeling someone with a stereotype doesn't help you understand them. It is more likely to continue the confusion.
This is true, and while I do not agree with the stereotype presented, it's similarly unhelpful to call ageism/sexism/racism. To paraphrase someone cleverer than I, everytime I hear "I don't see age/sex/race, I just see people." I hear, "My heart's in the right place, but fuck I'm stupid."
50% of Facebook users log in to the site daily. There are 450 million Facebook users total.
200 or so people Googled 'Facebook login,' managed to click on a a news story, landed on this blog, and found the Facebook connect button and posted a comment.
Don't see how today's incident is evidence that the internet is hard, or that 'it' needs to be simplified for this small subset of internet moms.
My point is, can't we also figure out WHO our demographic actually is, and address that need appropriately? Different businesses have very different audiences, and acknowledging that is important.
No offense intended to those who dwell at the intersection of the Venn diagram of geeks and middle-aged moms. God willing and the creek don't rise, I'll be there in a few more years, myself.
But to designers of complicated web apps, be kind to those who live offline. I guess that's my whole point.
Honestly, how hard was it for them to tell that it wasn't Facebook? Is this just a new generation of idiots or something? And honestly, how hard is it for them to go to the address bar and type "facebook.com"? Ok I get it, we're tech savvy, they're not. But seriously my mother, who is far from computer literate, can navigate to Facebook without ending up on some random site. That had to be a joke, seriously.
@Andrew Sadly, they've already established that it wasn't a joke, we were just witnessing the bottom 1 percentile of computer users.
I loved Addison Ryan's comment about making a device with just three buttons. Hope Steve Jobs read that one.
Getting back to Jolie's original question...at iWantMyName we intentionally took a simple approach to site design because almost every other domain registrar we know has got it so horribly wrong. OK, so you need a certain level of technical functionality to make a registrar site run, but you don't need spammy ads, distracting messages and bells and whistles.
Surprise, surprise! We were able to make sales from day one purely on the basis of offering a clean and simple search and management interface. But because we were evolving iWantMyName into an industry platform-as-a-service product we had to focus most of our developer time on crucial but invisible backend functionality; otherwise we would lose credibility.
As a start-up, ultimately I think that paid off because even though we had a minimal feature set to begin with, making the sales process painless and easy was THE most important feature we could incorporate. And by the way... a lot of our customers ARE geeks and CompSci grads.
Jolie
This is a great article...Wow !!!!
For me you hit the nail on the head....tech designed for tech is a very big problem and one that I think will not go away until we can reach a point where an average users can create an internet application without the help of a developer.....Some of the comments that I see here show the arrogant closed minded attitudes of those immersed in technology....
To me it says a lot about which companies understand this when I see 60 year old using an iphone .....
I also think that this issue of tech for tech comes to the surface when the ipad is discussed...Most tech blogs I read panned it by pointing out all of the tech features it does not have while the rest of the non tech world seems to be jubilant that a company has finally designed a computer for the rest of the world.
http://www.factoetum.com/factoetum/Steve_Jobs_(Technology_Icon)
That's a really great article. And it's a stark reminder that there is incredible asymmetry amongst users' experiences based not only technical prowess, conceptual intelligence, and most importantly: learned behaviors. Every interface that I ever designed without user feedback has failed. Miserably. But only initially. Once I trained people how to use something, they developed a conceptual model and became habituated. Problem solved?
Well... after many years of experience in designing software, I find that even the savviest users are habitual users. And here's the example: Last year, I designed, wrote, and deployed a sales tool with and for a 25 year old VP of Sales. I went back there two months ago stopped in to say hi to the VP of Sales. He raved about a particular feature and wanted to show me some data but along the way I noticed that he was dismissing several application error dialogues.
So I sweated a little and I asked him, "How often do you get those error messages?"
He said , "I dunno... I guess since you left... maybe a month or two after? Jane showed everyone that we can just click Dismiss and it goes away... but forget that... everyone's used to it. I want to talk about these enhancements we can add to..."
So you see someone trained them, they developed a conceptual model, and became habituated.
Wow, i found this post to be really nice towards the common people that use the internet. I know that it has this academic air about it, was it was created for scientists and computer programmers to share information, but as it exploded, it was the common people that made it what it is today.
Thanks for not being mean or condescending to the regular folks :)
Truth is that most visitors that come to RWW and sites like it are pretty technical in nature. So the user interface designers can bend a little bit more for the marketing/advertising folks. Ya know... cuz geeks like us can figure out a UI relatively quickly.
Imagine however, if someone bookmarked/favorited a saved search for "facebook login" for your grandmother. She might be a little confused if she normally clicked on the first link to login.
@Jolie - not sure if it's available or worthwhile - but I would love to see statistics on how many users actually visited that page, how many commented via Facebook Connect, how many users have previously visited the site, and how many have previously commented.
I would wager that the number of first time visitors is MUCH higher than the number of first time commenters.
@Jolie O'Dell designers should work off of actual data. so of course it's relevant to point out the breakdown of users- why design for the less than 1%.
not the best advice to tell designers to just ignore actual numbers and just 'be kind' to
Havent you ever heard if it is not broken dont fix it we all liked the old facebook it was easy and easy to find the icons. But now because of the new alot of my friends are wanting to quit and the class of 197 people I havent heard from since school has gotten together again and other friends that I havent seen or heard from in years so please do something to fix this problem before my friends quit getting on all together.
The comments on that post have to be the funniest freakin thing I've ever seen...
Its maddening how blind folks in the tech community can be. God knows how many VC deals, killer startup teams and energy is wasted on products that only appeal to a narrow geek community. You try to pitch a geek or investor (or geek press ahem) on something for the common joe blow you get nothing but resistance and doubt, pitch them something that makes their petty narrow little niche better and they lavish you with praise and opportunity.
The geeks out there are just as braindead as the idiots who google "facebook login", just in a different way...
..says the guy who owns a site that makes you want to poke your eyes out: http://wherescool.com
Thanks for posting the story. You bring up a great set of questions we need to ask us as designers about how to deal with a group of customers that really wasn't out there until a few years ago.
Quite a few of my non-geek friends spend lots of time on the internet these days, something they didn't do 10 years ago. It's what gives me a job and helps me make money. And I'm probably not the only one commenting here for which that's true.
Sometimes people are also just stressed and tired and don't pay attention for a long list of reasons. Web design is an imperfect attempt at satisfying an ever wider audience. So a kinder and gentler approach might be in order, with just a tad less attitude.
Apple should send all of the commenters on the original article a free iPad!
I appreciate the tenor of this post. I did laugh a lot at the comments on the the other thread, but many of the responses were just mean and snobbish. Thanks for raising the bar and turning the conversation into something useful rather than just pointing and laughing at the folks making mistakes.
you forgot the obvious, the Internet is used mainly for watching free pr0n...most users only want to press a few buttons while pushing their own button. click click click that is it, mind fracking mode. you push button? you want job push button, or you want work Wendy? how long you push button?
Running a website for a firm of architects, I've seen people asking about train times, luggage facilities and even complaints about the toilets at a station we designed. One simple link to the station's website and they disappeared. The same has happened with banks, schools and leisurewear stores.
There must be some mindblowingly stupid people out there, but on the whole they are so focussed on what they are doing (or distracted by the outside world), that it doesn't occur to them they have made a mistake. Have you ever completely missed the no-entry signs into a one-way street?
I've seen genuinely intelligent people type "www.google.com" into a Google searchbox, and then search for "www.whateverwebsite.com" - Google could easily spot these behaviours and take some responsibility for boosting web literacy.
The web's beauty lies in its simplicity and associative nature, but that also means people have to train themselves to use it, making their own assumptions, and repeating the mistakes of millions. But that's also the business that employs nearly every one reading RWW.
Maybe the people who mistakenly thought RWW was Facebook should have their comments removed. They are showing themselves as vulnerable, and why should their mistake be immortalized forever for others to laugh at?
Seriously, I think RWW, and especially Google and FB, need to give their collective foreheads a good whack and figure out how they can make user experience better.
Really? While I think you make valid points (particularly about the difference between geeks and the rest of the world), I think this just points to how stupid and lazy the average person is. Period.
Need we really make the internet dumber for dumb people? How disappointing that the status quo won't just raise their level of intelligence instead of asking us to be dumb with them.
So much for evolution.
Can we please stop with the middle-aged moms don't know anything about the Internet?
Speaking as a 45-year old woman that has a daughter and a 25 year career in software development, this is getting pretty old.
No I am not alone, there are plenty of women my age and older that are in fact not only web-literate, but participated in creating the industry where you are currently making your living. Some of us even have kids!
Wow the comments on the other post are amazing. Good idea writing it up Jolie. I think it all makes a lot of sense. Once a user gets to this page, it does have the words "Sign in with Facebook", so ok click that and a Facebook window pops up.... which is exactly what they wanted! But as quickly as it arrived it disappears again, leaving them with the only option of leaving bizarre comments... does it show the masses are never going to understand facebook connect, oauth, etc?
Now I know why iPhone/iPod Touch are so popular. All they have to do is click on an application. No URLs, searches and blah. I'm not a big Apple fan,but I think Steve Jobs understands normal users pretty well. Most of these people (incl my parents) are out of their comfort zone online and it's not like they don't understand computers. My father's pretty good with a few softwares he uses at work but when he's online it's a different deal altogether
OK Jolie, can you ask the RRW SEO guru to share with us how you managed to get a better ranking than FB on this Google search? If I put on my pointy aluminum foil conspiracy theory hat maybe Goog played a prank?
I'm curious how many of the posters here have actually led any formal training for groups of computer users, especially those in what we'll safely call the "middle-age" demographic? I'm talking about classes where you're leading groups of users step-by-step instructions for software applications? I have, and frankly, Jolie's assessment is pretty spot-on, at least for my user sample. I'd say only about 1/3 of my users pick up interfaces intuitively, and my user group is predominantly 40 and older.
As a geek of 35 years, I recently had the very educational experience of introducing an adult to a computer for the first time ever. She had previously used it to type in the occasional document but her daughter had done everything but the actual data entry (saving, formatting, opening programs, printing, etc.) so essentially she knew the function of the keyboard and mouse and nothing else.
The lessons started with me giving the "The worst thing that you can POSSIBLY manage to do, unless you throw the laptop out your second story window, is mess it the programs so bad we have to spend an hour with the DVD installing stuff again. This is not bad, and also you'd have to be really unlucky to even do that much damage. Be unafraid to explore!" as she was terrified she'd break it by pressing the wrong thing.
She's learned a lot in a very short time and, being a very smart person in general, has taken to it like a duck to water. Thankfully, her style of learning fits with my style of teaching and she's able to take what I've taught her and generalise it to an extent that makes me proud and surprised, so she's probably very much not a typical "non-computer-using" student.
In any case, as much as she's learned I'm pretty sure I've learned more just from the mistakes she made and the way she explores things - which is, of course, totally different to the way I'd explore the same things. So I learned not only which things are obvious to a non-geek, but also how to teach which is something that's very handy to know!
I would highly recommend that every geek whose friends are all geeks finds a motivated beginning student, invests in a $500 netbook to give them, and offers one-on-one lessons. Seriously, your investment will be repaid tenfold in terms of the understanding you will gain from the experience. If you don't know how to find a needy and motivated non-geek, go down to your local public library or place of religious worship and put up a note on the noticeboard - there are needy non-geeks around every corner, "we" just don't interact with "them" very much.
r
great can i just log in now please
:)
Utimately, I think this is about the "SOMEBODY MOVED MY CHEESE" syndrome as I lovingly refer to it anytime anyone finds their stuff rearranged after the housekeeper comes in and does some dustng and cleaning. I prefer not to comment on the original comment. And no, I'm not a gramma who is confused about the topic or a search engine/web browser or where I am in the web of things on the innnernetz.
After reading the George Carlin comment from one of the other commenters, I had to comment my ownself. So much wisdom and cultural observations came out of that man's mouth I miss his sarcasm about U.S. So I'm furthering the George Carlin-isms being bandied about here:
"When you're born, you get a ticket to the freak show. When you're born in America, you get a front row seat."
"When you're born, you get a ticket to the freak show. When you're born in America, you get a front row seat." - A little off-topic: but while everyone else goes to bed with a cough, the Austrians go to the opera ...
I won't ever design for the lowest common denominator. There are certainly good design principles to follow, like proper labeling, those are a given. But these people, they didn't just find facebook, they where shown facebook, by one of us. We showed them how, just like we always have, just like we used to set up their email clients.
It's not about making something so boiled down that a child can find it, and learn it. It's about making things easy to remember, so intuitive, that once we show it to them, they won't forget it. They'll feel comfortable enough with it to start poking around on their own with just a few hours training.
It's amazing how people can not pay attention to the details because they are mad or irritated by a situation. Maybe the were just looking to vent and didn't really care whose site it was.
While I enjoyed watching the idiocy on display yesterday and the contrast of the snark from those in the know, this is not a phenomenon unique to the internet. Anyone who has spent any time in vegetarian restaurants has seen diners walk through the door, under the sign that says "vegetarian"; look at a menu that says "vegetarian" on the front and "we use no meat in this restaurant, the 'chicken' and 'steak' are made with organic soy and gluten" on the inside; talk to the waitress; and still ask why they can't get a real hamburger.
Your responsibility is to the people who you want to use your product. The responsibility to the others is to be honest (don't tell them you have meat and then serve falafel), patient in turning them away and (I suppose) not to laugh at them too hard.
"They're the ones who open emails, click ads, make purchases, sign up for subscriptions and generally take the majority of actions that make our whole ecosystem work."
And I have sympathy with them up to a point, but it's also worth pointing out that they're the ones who make spam profitable by occasionally actually buying junk advertised that way.
Using conventions (not reinventing the wheel) is a basic UI design best practice. That's why mystery meat navigation died - novelty is no substitute for usability.
Gotta object to the characterization of "moms" as muddled, unobservant, dim or confused users. Sooo sick of this stereotype.
Is this the new twitter? Looks just like the new facebook!! How do I log in.
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