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LETTER FROM THE PUBLISHER
Welcome to the holiday edition of the gotoreport. It's hard to believe the year is coming to a close already. This year has been one of both external global expansion and internal focus. Our research network now includes resources in Finland, Hong Kong, Germany and Spain, with channels into various other countries and cities within the U.S. This year, we completed projects for clients in Japan and Mexico and continue to dedicate ourselves to integrating best practices in strategy, research and user-centered design for web-based applications, web-portals and product interfaces.
In this issue, we focus on "The New Usability." We begin with Dave Rogers, who knocks down our traditional notions of usability in his article On Beyond Tinkertoy and challenges us to take a new approach to web design through storytelling and dialogue-focused techniques.
Guest contributor and usability veteran Lance Loveday writes about Usability 2.0 in this insightful article that focuses on the disparity of the 'old' usability where testing was a task on the checklist, and the 'new' usability where testing is now a cultural paradigm. We also welcome Ellen Ferlazzo of Sprezzatura who states, "My role in both writing and user interface design is to arrange and communicate, question and combine things, such that they make sense to others." With this in mind, Ellen contributes her thoughts in a fantastic article on Handheld Devices and the Flow of Functionality.
Kelly Goto,
Principal,
gotomedia
ARTICLES
Introducing Usability 2.0
By Lance Loveday
Many organizations are only paying lip service to Web usability in the same way they previously paid lip service
to the Internet itself. More enlightened organizations, however, are now starting to practice Usability 2.0, which moves beyond the utilitarianism of Usability 1.0 toward a more holistic approach.
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On Beyond Tinkertoy
By Dave Rogers
Call it whatever you want-"design patterns," "usability heuristics" or "best practices"—but our sites are beginning to look an awful lot alike. To solve this dilemma, Dave Rogers presents two approaches: storytelling and hospitality. Storytelling and narrative is strongly compelling, "because it is at the center of human experience". Dave also proposes that hospitality—how we make users feel when using our sites—will be a key differentiator of the future Web.
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Handheld Devices and the Flow of Functionality
By Ellen Lawson Ferlazzo
Handheld devices and small appliances pose a unique challenge to the interface designer. Ellen Lawson Ferlazzo proposes that when using a well designed piece of software, "the user enters a state of flow as it relates to their job and is unaware of the computer as being a barrier getting in the way of accomplishing a task." To achieve this state, an appliance or handheld device needs to have: appropriate functionality, consistency within platform and application, and intuitive flow of functions.
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