[Web4lib] Web technologies and public access

[Richard Wiggins]

Wow, Karen -- you know I worship the water you walk on, but I have to say I
think you're conflating things a bit.  A site can be boring and even dated
and still be perfectly usable.   A site can be sleek and Flashy and be
unusable for a large percent of users.  An HTML only site can be usable, or
not.  Most film critics probably could not make a good movie, even if they
can tell you what's good or bad about a particular flick.

I reject the notion that a particular Web site needs to keep up with fashion
or hew to a particular style.  I don't care if a given Web site looks like
it was designed on an Underwood typewriter if the words ring true.  Sure,
you appreciate savvy design, but wise words are wise words.  I doubt Gandhi
would be doing PowerPoint if he were alive today.

One of my favorite Web sites of all time was the Creative Artists Agency,
one of the most powerful firms in Hollywood.  For a long time it was just a
business card.  I thought that was so cool, as in, if you don't know who we
are, well, then, we don't need to tell you.  Sigh, they have changed it.   A
library, for instance, couldn't pull this off, but I think we should judge
Web sites by the content and not by the Flash.

Here's what the entire CAA Web site once was -- the entire site:



[image: CAA Logo]

CREATIVE ARTISTS AGENCY

LITERARY AND TALENT AGENCY

9830 WILSHIRE BOULEVARD
BEVERLY HILLS, CALIFORNIA 90212-1825
TELEPHONE: 310-288-4545 - FACSIMILE: 310-288-4800
/rich

Disclaimer: I recently spoke at a couple of Nielsen-Norman events.





> Other interesting arguments aside, Jakob Nielsen stopped being my gold
> standard for usability some time ago. His website has improved a little
> (someone apparently finally convinced him that letting text flow margin to
> margin makes it excruciatingly difficult to read, as well as ugly) but
> it's
> very hard to take anyone seriously whose website looks so 1995. He argues
> for his "scaled-back design" but misses the point that a site can be
> simple
> and spare and yet elegant. The emotional temperature of his site is
> pre-Glasnost USSR, and its functionality is back there with my Commodore
> Colt.