Executive Summary
Web2.0 has given birth to a lot of sites with very poor usability. They’re pretty! but they’re difficult to navigate and present way too much content in a manner that is confusing to many users.
What is the web2.0 of which I speak?
No I’m not talking about the technology. Forget AJAX.. forget the new cool applications and everything. I’m just talking about the look and how sometimes the look translates into poor usability. One author coined the term “2.0 Culture”.
The Web2.0 “look” has really taken off. Everywhere you can find sites that showcase this look.. the basic strategy of the look is:
- Use CSS for everything
- Gradients are in
- Usually very brightly colored
- Huge header graphic art
- Lots of visible, often overlapping, boxes. Generally a lot of multi-column usage
- Lots.. and lots.. of text
If you’d like some examples of where you can find.. examples.. of everything that I’ve listed above and below check out these sites:
I’m not going to dis the Web2.0 look. A lot of websites sporting such a look are really beautiful and that’s why they get so much attention. There’s been a huge design craze with this and it’s really taken over the web in many areas, particularly blogs.
The problem I have with most of web2.0 is usability.
2.0 Brought with it a plague of fantastic artwork and design mixed with very little thought for usability. I’m not going to say this is the case for *all* 2.0 styled sites, but I would readily say it’s the majority of them. Here are some of the major problems:
Too many columns and boxes
There are so many sites absolutely packed with boxes! It’s amazing. It’s also probably because boxes and content in them really help to enhance the look of a page. They make it look like something is going on.. but really all that’s going on a lot of the time is making users more confused.
Here are some examples of what I mean
- PHPNuke 2.0 - this is your classic example of just a newer, more nicely styled version of the PHPNuke look and feel. Instead of things being slotted straight up and down two columns on the right and left side of the page though, everything is spread out all over the place.. in the main column, side columns.. bottom of the page.. “highlight” boxes.
Lots of content.. big portal of information all contained in a bunch of boxes spread out throughout the page. A lot of the information contained in the boxes is useless to most users and really all this is is something to take up space, look pretty and make you feel like you’ve got another “feature” on your website
- Faux-Feature Boxing - This is when designs end up using lots of seemingly boxed areas for nothing but the purpose of design. It gives the user the false impression that there is something worthwhile in the box that they should read or could help them get where they want to go.
- Columns shpolems tallems - Too many bloody columns. You see this all over the place. I’m actually not really sure why this became popular only in 2.0 because you could have easily pulled off the same annoying, confusing stunt just as easily with tables-only web1.0 styling. Anyway. Generally one column is pretty easy for users to figure out. Two columns to a lot of users means navigation+content - not necessarily so in 2.0. Usually columns fall into the same category as all boxes in that they often present the user with information he/she doesn’t really care about and they’re really just there to make the design look cooler.
Too much navigation
It would be one thing if it were redundant navigation, but things are just way too spread out. With 2.0 it’s common to see 3+ methods of navigating a website. Two forms at the top.. one on the side.. one at the bottom..side navigation with subtext that makes it look like a news flash box.. It’s a really common thing to see in 2.0. Now, it’s certainly better than just hiding things in your website, but this really can confuse people.
Don’t think that just because you place an obligatory base of navigation at the bottom of every page that people will use it if they can’t figure the rest of your site out. Most people don’t click down there unless they have to. If they can’t figure out how to make it around your site easily the way it seems it’s supposed to be done they probably won’t take the time to scroll to the bottom of the page.
Very unorthodox organization of content
A big trend in 2.0 is to reorganize how content is displayed by putting it in different parts of the page. Navigation box over there.. a latest news box over here.. contact us at the top.. random mission statement box in the middle.. login box mixed with things. Yeah quite honestly from a design perspective it’s just bloody awesome; things look great! It’s really original and innovative and la la la who gives a shit. Yes people’s eyes jump around websites like jackrabbits but people also have a sense for where they expect things to be. Just because they throw their eyes around the page doesn’t mean you should throw your content too.
Too many words
Clouds, navigation, captions, text-ads, news flashes, blog posts, news article, features, links, corporate messages, random little snippets of text AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!@)(#* What does it all mean? It means you’re injecting way too much text into a layout purely for overall visual appeal. These sites look great as pieces of art.. hell you could probably print them out and frame them, hang them on your wall and everyone would be like, “wow that’s a really cool piece you’ve got there.. how much did you pay for this wildly abstract art?”. Stop with the text There’s too much to read, too much trying to grab the user’s attention and too much worthless bullshit. Just.. stop.
The good news?
A lot of 2.0 sites are really nice.. some are extremely simple and lie on the completely opposite end of the spectrum than those that I speak of here. A lot of these sites actually do push for greater usability and are the antithesis of bad-2.0.
Most of bad-web2.0 is currently contained in blogs.. many of these blogs never get any hits anyway and a lot of the time when they do it’s only because people are interested in one article and have no reason to navigate through the rest of the site.
There’s been a little creep out into the rest of the world, but it hasn’t been significant yet. Will we see more of it? Yeah probably.. actually probably quite a bit more. How can we stop it? Who knows.. probably won’t for quite awhile.. it’s an artistic movement and an entire design style of a generation. Maybe we’ll get back lucky and see an era of super-usability design next.
