After the most recent facebook updates I started to think about the inevitable and expected angry status messages that always spill into the news feed. I have posted a few of them myself so, believe me; I’m not pointing fingers.
I began to think that this might not be just a resistance to change (though that is a huge part of the anger and frustration) but that the changes come pretty suddenly for the average user who doesn’t spend time following design and tech types on Twitter and thus has little to no warning.
As far as I know there has been no beta site where users can get used to changes weeks before they go live (I don’t think we’ve seen that since 2008 - please let me know if I’m wrong).
This would go a long way toward soothing ruffled users and would work the kinks out early. When the latest changes launched the new sidebar on the right side was sticky but the sponsored links underneath were not so for a few days when you scrolled you couldn’t help but cover up content and I’m glad to see they fixed it quickly.
Now it has been pointed out by thousands that facebook is a free service and if we don’t like it we are free to go somewhere else but to me it is starting to feel as though they are asking us to be the lab mice for their usability studies.
Facebook – Usability From The Point Of View Of The Lab Mouse
After the most recent facebook updates I started to think about the inevitable and expected angry status messages that always spill into the news feed. I have posted a few of them myself so, believe me; I’m not pointing fingers.
I began to think that this might not be just a resistance to change (though that is a huge part of the anger and frustration) but that the changes come pretty suddenly for the average user who doesn’t spend time following design and tech types on Twitter and thus has little to no warning.
As far as I know there has been no beta site where users can get used to changes weeks before they go live (I don’t think we’ve seen that since 2008 - please let me know if I’m wrong).
This would go a long way toward soothing ruffled users and would work the kinks out early. When the latest changes launched the new sidebar on the right side was sticky but the sponsored links underneath were not so for a few days when you scrolled you couldn’t help but cover up content and I’m glad to see they fixed it quickly.
Now it has been pointed out by thousands that facebook is a free service and if we don’t like it we are free to go somewhere else but to me it is starting to feel as though they are asking us to be the lab mice for their usability studies.
from → internet commentary