Why The NYT Usability Article Was a Good Thing
Matthew Oliphant writes I Can Exist Now. The NYT Said So. where he tells us how he feels about the NYT times article on usability. For the most part, he’s frustrated with the New York Times article. Here are some snippets:
“Had it been written 5 years ago, I’d be really pleased about it. But it isn’t a very well written article and has some mis-information as well.”
“Our role has been viewed as expendable in the past and the companies that have cut us in budget shortfall times have still been profitable.”
“User-experienced people. People who are experienced with users? This is either an editorial issue or Harvinder doesn’t know what he’s recruiting for.”
“The article is written in the style of an Emerging Job, but should have been a Job Trend piece. I think you could make a good case in writing this article about Experience Design or Design Strategy, but not about “traditional” usability professionals.”
Despite criticism by other folks as well, I stand by my statement that the article is good. My reason is quite simple. When you see articles in major publications it raises the awareness of usability, which is a very good thing.
There’s another reason the article’s flaws don’t bother me. I’ve seen crappy reporting on usability for years. It hardly phases me. If you look at the composite of articles, they do paint a reasonable picture of usability. Not perfect, but they help people “get usability” which is extremely important.
Would it be better to have no exposure or flawed exposure? Personally, I’ll take flawed exposure as long as nothing is grossly wrong. In the case of the NYT article, nothing was so wrong that I had to head to bathroom to visit the toilet.
Look folks, the NYT article was not a good educational piece on usability or user experience or accessibility. In that respect, I agree with critics. It was a steaming pile. But from an exposure and awareness perspective, it delivered a reasonable punch.
I’m not a glowing optimist. I’m more of a practical realist. In this case, I say that on the whole, usability practitioners should be thankful for the NYT article, even with the moles and warts.
July 12th, 2007 at 4:30 pm
I agree that the NYT article was A Good Thing. Big picture perspective is needed here. Given the general audience reading the NYT, many aren’t even aware of the difference between a designer and a marketer, or a software engineer versus a network administrator. They don’t know what search engine optimization is.
The readership needs a very general intro to usability, and the details are not critical. I don’t care if the article gave short shrift to the history of human-computer interaction or cognitive psychology. Like you said, it’s about awareness.
July 12th, 2007 at 4:59 pm
I also view it as a positive. Why are we so glass-half-empty in the usability world? I think we’re still struggling with the problem of too often being the people who have to come in at the end of a project and say, to put it bluntly: “here’s why what you did sucks”. Unfortunately, this has a way of making us a bit unpopular, and as a result, we’ve become more and more defensive.
The answer isn’t to hide our heads in the proverbial sand and lash out at anyone who doesn’t represent us 100% accurately in a completely positive light. The answer it to move our expertise and efforts up the production cycle, providing input when it can really make a difference and helping people in other disciplines do their jobs more effectively.
July 13th, 2007 at 12:18 am
Joshua and Dr. Pete:
Great comments.
The audience of the NYT will now have a better idea about usability which is really a good thing. I try to keep in mind that readers won’t remember much about the article, maybe 1-2 vague points. We’re not trying to reach our smart, focused usability peers via the NYT.
~ John
p.s. I really do like some of Matthew’s comments, for what that’s worth. It’s important to know what’s going on out in the wild. He did a much better job than I could, pointing out the flaws of the article.