I paid $300 to PR Web to send a press release. They offered me so many options I can't remember what I get. I dunno what's happening. ANd their much-vaunted stats package refuses to reveal my press release's performance to me. SO I wrote to the Help Desk: (I'll let you know what they say.)
......
Dear Sir/Madam
I cannot find a way to access my stats. My account page looks nothing like the one used to illustrate how easy it is for everyone else but me to see their stats. I'm sorry. When I log in I get nothing like that. IS it because use a Mac and Firefox? Or because I'm Australian? Is there a rule that every "user friendly system" is created by people who are so IT literate that they assume knowledge that average users don't have. And because we are isolated and alone when we suffer through the process of trying to second guess the geeks who designed it, that we feel that there's something wrong with us when it's you and your dyslexic system which has all the "obvious" functions hidden beneath some innovative new GUI feature that is the compete idiot? Standardisation? Ever thought of it? HWt don't you and PayPal and Slideshare and all the DIY systems standardise? That would be poison to web programmers. They want to make their mark. And so that users face a barrier to usage. Would McDonald's make their burgers hard to get at? No? They make them easy to get at. That's why they sell so many. Get the picture? Ok. I am finished. I have had this trouble with so many DIY web apps. You guys delude yourselves into believing your system is idiot-proof because the power-users who you normally mix with can second guess what the web programmer was thinking when they hid the "Go" button. Or maybe you build dysfunctionality in as a game. Well I'm sick of playing your games. Just tell me which "obvious" thing I overlooked for getting to my stats and I'll look and feel stupid (again) and get on with my life until tempted to use another wonderful DIY web app. Why don't you put a sign on the home page that says: "This application is for idiots and better. Complete idiots nstay clear."
Thank you.
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Michael,
Your experience is not alone and even techies get dumbfounded. I have had the same experience with Telstra trying to get my Next G usage. I had to register by them sending me an sms even though I was registered as a user and to complicate matters worse, the sim card is in a modem and not in a phone. And a modem can't get sms's.
I also had a real problem understanding Yahoo's web advertising - Google's Adword was bad enough but Yahoo is incomprehensible - and forget about Microsoft.
What I do is send them a link to buy Steve Krug's book on web design called "Don't make me think". http://www.sensible.com/chapter.html
The fact that these web tools are so unusable, is the reason I learned iWeb and do it myself. I also use Google's analytics (free) to capture all the statistics I need.
The Apple Mac philosophy has always been "if you have to get help (or read a manual) it's too complicated. Just compare Apple's website to Telstra's and you can see what I mean.
Finally, there has been a lot of research on our ability to handle complexity from MIT and Carnigie Mellon - we can handle any amount of complexity as long as it is presented in chunks of 3 to 6. So I there are more than six things on a web page it becomes confusing to most of us.
There, I have given you my 3-6 things...
Mike
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