[Web4lib] Paradox of Choice

[Hankinson, Andrew]

I don't know how many people have seen this video, but if you've got an
hour to spare I would highly recommend it.  It is Professor Barry
Schwartz at Google doing a Tech Talk about the Paradox of Choice, and
why "More is Less."

http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=6127548813950043200&q=paradox+of+
choice

The recent (and ongoing) discussion on liquid vs. fixed-width layout
reminded me of it, but I think the implications of what he discusses are
far reaching.  (One of the things I thought about when watching this was
how this affected OPAC design - too much choice of what to do in the
OPAC overwhelms the user so they go elsewhere where another body
(Google) acts as a choice agent taking care of most of their decisions.)
I saw many other implications for libraries as well.

With regards to the liquid layout argument, I think that sometimes,
although it seems counter-intuitive to our democratically and
freedom-oriented mind, we have to act as 'benevolent dictators.'  We
have to make choices (based on research) for users because that frees
them to concentrate on their specific concern rather than the noodly
little bits in-between their information need and the information
source.  

So, yes, users get more freedom over choosing how their content is
presented with a liquid layout, but really they don't care if the page
is 800px wide or 2000px wide - they just want the content.  The
benevolent dictator part comes in where we give optimal environments
based on research and understanding of information presentation, but we
don't force the user - if they want to change it, they can.  I would be
willing to bet 99% of users won't.