101 Standards for Online Communication

JoAnn T. Hackos and Dawn M. Stevens' Standards for Online Communication is really just a list of standards in online communication. There are justifications for these standards, which is what gives the book it's impressive girth, but it's still just a list all the same. While I didn't necessarily disagree with the standards themselves, the rebel in me wanted to throw them all out on principle. For a simple summary of the book check out 101 Standards of Communication by Dawn M. Stevens.

Much like other books on technical communication they suggest a lot of research at the beginning of the project. Get to know your users, set up user profiles, create hierarchies of information, etc. I can see why it's necessary for someone who has become to buried in a project to think rationally to conduct these steps. For instance, a code monkey working at Microsoft would probably have a hard time translating system processes for the technically illiterate; however, I would think an experienced, talented technical writer brought onto a project would be able to anticipate people's reactions without spending too much time researching, mostly because he/she would have done this enough times to know how people think. And to prove this point, let's look at the list Hackos and Stevens' compiled. They start with the research component and then proceed to include the following in the design section of their list:

1. Select readable on-screen fonts
2. Avoid too many font changes
3. Keep line lengths short
4. Distinguish important elements from normal text
5. Avoid excessive emphasis techniques
6. Be consistent screens in the format and design of display
7. Use negative space
8. Avoid horizontal scrolling
9. Make the interface easy to remember
10. Use color sparingly
11. Consider limitations of the hardware and your users

So, the question is how do they know these particular design elements would be distracting to a user unless user reactions could be anticipated without necessarily conducting the research ahead of time? Or is it because they conducted the research that they know this? Personally, I think that the research element is largely exaggerated, and the testing after the online text/site/whatever has been created is far more likely to produce favorable results than spending so much time at the beginning of the project planning and plotting, just because I think that user reactions can be anticipated fairly easily with just a little imaginative empathy for other people on the part of the writer/designer.

Print is Dead; Well It's Terminal Anyway

Hackos and Stevens' Standards for Online Communication makes the claim that users (there's a term that I'm finding is over-used and ill-defined) don't want to read a lot of text online; that they'd rather read long text in paper form, so there should be a print option in electronic documentation (50). In addition, that printed material should be visually pleasing; to keep their attention. On the other hand, employers don't want to pay outrageous printing costs either to make printed documentation or from employees printing that visually pleasing, disposal media on the office printer. And that is why print is terminal, much like experienced employees over 40, it's just not cost-effective to continue using the medium. Not to mention new gen employees are more comfortable with multi-media anyway. But how are we going to replace paper and print? Sony's got the answer:

Green Tech: Kinetic Sculpture

While I'm sure there's all kinds of philosophical implications inherent in this video, I'm going to skip it and just say, "cool!"

The big question here: Is this an example of people imitating code-run LCD displays, or are the LCD displays just a representation of what people do on their own anyway? Hmmm . . . either way it's just darn amazing! Why don't we have fans like this in America?

Principles of Web Design Part 2

One quick rant before we get too in-depth:

I don't like being overly critical of a book, especially one two people spent a lot of time and effort writing, but seriously with a title like Principles of Web Design, you'd think the Farkai or the publishers would have sprung for color print in the graphic design chapter. On page 246, there's a black-and-white color wheel; seriously people that's the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen.

Okay, now that that's out of my system . . .

After I'd moved beyond the planning sections of the book, I didn't really find anything insightful or particularly useful. I suppose the Graphic Design section would have been useful to someone who hadn't majored in Art at the beginning of his academic career and had many many design classes, but everything else seemed obvious, which isn't to say it wasn't correct of necessary, just obvious. By this point I think the internet has become so commonplace that most people looking to design a website will already understand buttons and hierarchies even if they can't necessarily vocalize the theory behind these conventions.

Of course, there is the distinct possibility that I'm imprinting my experience on others, in which case, the Farkai do a great job of relating the necessary steps in creating a website, especially if you throw the whole book away and just read appendix A, conveniently titled: Twenty Five Guidelines for Getting Started.