Experience Everywhere

So here's the thing about going to a UX conference (and the reason Josh had me join him): with UX on the brain, everything exudes an experience.

The experience of my canceled flight and frantic rebooking. (More on that later.) The experience of the first class/Clear security line. The experience of my swanky modern hotel room. The experience of attending a forward-thinking conference in a deliberately old-world venue. The experience of eating lunch. Even the conference itself gets scrutinized--the packet, the registration booth, the timing.

Properly aligned, user experience really does impact all aspects of a consumer-driven society. It certainly makes its home online, where the experience is a heavy majority of the overall opportunity; but the general concept carries through elsewhere. Like customer service phone calls. And ecommerce home deliveries. And....

UX week

Josh and I are on our way to UX Week in San Francisco. I'm looking forward to seeing my old friends at Adaptive Path and soaking up the collective wisdom of our young industry.

Twitter doesn't seem to have a with_friends feed anymore, so check our own feeds (Josh / me) for live updates--yes, Josh, that means you--and check this space for longer thoughts as time allows.

Picture perfect

This morning we gave a first-round design presentation to a client. In order to accommodate all participants and scenarios, we used three computers, four screens, one projector, and a GoToMeeting remote setup, all to show a series of visuals.

Unsurprisingly, every screen looked different. The projector washed out lighter colors and gradients; the widescreen LCD's robust color was dwarfed by the projected image; the folks watching via remote had a smaller screen area with a too-high "fold."

All of which serves as a reminder that visual web design remains an incredibly difficult medium. Colors wash, screens change length, text rendering shifts, scripts and cookies disable: any number of challenges stand between a designer and the effective presentation of designs.

Ai's developers pride themselves on pixel-perfect page outputs that stay true to our visual comps. But even perfect execution does not eliminate the vagaries of millions of users' screen resolutions, color depths, and personal settings. The level of user control that we celebrate online also creates an incredible set of scenarios that, despite 15 years of advancement, still requires clever compromise and broad acceptance.

The nascent mobile revolution will only add to the complications surrounding online presentation. It's a tough job, but fortunately a fascinating one.

UX Critic: tin

Coca-Cola is test marketing new aluminum bottles. I was handed one on Fifth Avenue today by a promo squad.

To Coke, this must be genius: better branding of their iconic bottle, with lower shipping and breakage costs versus glass, and a handsome visual appeal. The majority of the market is already drinking its soda from aluminum cans, anyway.

But to me, it's the inverse of the ideal: I'm drinking soda with the usual tin-can aftertaste, in a lesser form factor. The aluminum bottle has neither the lightweight flexibility of plastic nor the squat sturdiness of a can.

Curious: am I in the minority on this? Certainly Coke could have a big success on its hands, since people are used to aluminum and the design is a novelty. But I don't see the long-term advantage.

Scrabble, Scrabulous and Passion

OK, so I fully understand the copyright implications behind the bald-faced ripoff that is Scrabulous, and owner Hasbro's insistence that its violators cease and desist, which led to the Scrabulous Facebook app going offline. What I don't understand is the way Hasbro is going about its business.

Why, if Scrabulous is so popular, has it been unable to forge an agreement with its creators that leverages the traffic?

Why did a lawsuit get Facebook to shut down the app, while the standalone Scrabulous site continues to chug along unabated?

Why, after many months of legal wrangling, did Hasbro choose yesterday to get tough with Facebook directly?

Why wouldn't Hasbro get its own Facebook Scrabble app out of beta, and check its scalability, before the Scrabulous C&D overwhelmed the Scrabble beta, knocking half a million Scrabble players offline?

In other words, why is Hasbro alienating its users?

Scrabble has a fanatically devoted consumer base. People play competitively, casually, asynchronously--however they can play, they will. Alex used to play via text renderer before the graphic apps launched; I play EA's stupid Scrabble iPhone app that doesn't have a good competitive setting, even though I lose by 150 points every game. A friend of mine taps (tapped) into Scrabulous continually throughout the work day.

Point being, people love their Scrabble. They played Scrabulous simply because it was the best option on the market. With their platform knocked offline without a viable alternative, 500,000 devoted Scrabble fans are flat-out livid, and their devotion is being tested. The same people that love their game have pushed the official Facebook app to a 1.3/5 rating, and the discussion board is full of anger.

Hasbro could have been a hero: test its app's scalability, make streamlined play, and invite Scrabble fans to play on the authentic platform when it was ready for broad release. Only then should they have shut down Scrabulous, forcing people to make a comfortable transition. Instead, their users have lost faith. It will be interesting to see how long their disillusionment lasts.

Update: Apparently the official Scrabble app was hacked yesterday. Which is appropriate. Also in this article: "Analysts say the blow-back from Scrabulous fans, although painful now, will probably be temporary." Which is probably true, and somehow disappointing.

Ai on email best practices

I wrote an article for iMedia Connection that was published today.

5 ways to avoid common email blunders is--well, the title sums it up nicely (thanks guys!). It's a bit of practical advice for the many companies who may be running mailing lists without considering the big impact of little details.

I hope to publish regularly in iMedia Connection and elsewhere and will be sure to cross-link any posts from this blog.

Update, July 28: my article was picked up by shop.org the day it was published, and appeared this morning in their top-5 "most clicked" list. I'm pleased to see such widespread interest. Look for essays on similar topics on the Ai blog as well as elsewhere.

Knowing better

I keep staring and staring at the quote below, which is deep inside an article on New York City's new calorie law. Chain restaurants now have to post caloric information on their menus, giving consumers new--and abrupt--information on what they're eating.

A Starbucks barista revealed his customers' habits thusly:

Some people actually tell us we should take off the labels, because it discourages them from ordering what they want. But I think honesty is the best policy.

Can I say that again? Some people actually tell us we should take off the labels, because it discourages them from ordering what they want.

Think of the logic that goes into such a request. People are more comfortable ordering unhealthy foods when they can deceive themselves into forgetting the drawbacks. I really want that piece of pie. I know it's probably not good for me, but heck, I deserve it, so--d'oh!--what do they mean it's got 900 calories? I can't order it now! If only I didn't know how bad it was for me, I'd have been fine!...

Does the average consumer think that pie is healthier when he doesn't know the calorie count? Probably not. But at least he can pretend that it's something less than it is. Posting calories not only bares the ugly truth, it removes the sheen from the guilty pleasure, turning it into pure guilt.

One more time: Some people actually tell us we should take off the labels, because it discourages them from ordering what they want.

One could argue that New York City has overstepped its bounds in forcing these posts, much as it insisted on banning trans fats in city kitchens last year. Yet this is a terrific example of the benefits of representative government: sometimes, what the typical person says is desired is not necessarily the right answer.

This theory holds true in many areas. Seat belts, for example. Raising taxes to pay for schools. Homeless shelters. The electoral college (not that it saved us the last few times around, but I digress). It especially holds true here: the city has found a way to subtly improve public awareness and, over the longer term, general health. And it has done so with a law that runs against personal preference.

This philosophy applies to user experience design as well. Here, too, the effect can be subtle. But consider the difference between giving the user what he wants and giving the experience that best suits his needs. The effect can be extraordinary.