So that's why government has no time for usability analysis?!

Slashdot reports a Washington Times story claiming that one senior executive at a government agency spent at least 331 days looking at pornography on his computer. It's important to to remember that the Sun Myung Moon-funded Times has its own very conservative axe to grind. But if this is true, I wonder if it's a contributing factor to why many government Web projects seem to have no requirements for the evaluation of digital media while funding same.

The larger, sadder, more expensive issue is the ongoing loss to American government - and business - from poor use of technology. Bad decisions, bad builds, lack of objective evaluation. No oversight. No accountability.

The for-profit world moves too quickly for its own good sometimes. The non-profit and government sectors may not feel the same sense of urgency. Time for them to address important issues - like why technology projects need a plan, a purpose, and objective evaluation. We've expressed this sentiment in many environments; it seems to fall on mostly deaf ears. Fiddling while Rome burns, or rather, supporting poor overseas online sex workers (the executive's excuse).

Execs give Web 2.0 thumbs-up? Doh!

"Companies that use social media applications say they’ve seen clear benefits from the technology." - McKinsey via Elizabeth Lupfer's The Social Workplace. Check out video sharing numbers - way in the lead. Given what our usability studies have shown recently, no one reads any more, so this explains it. Sort of.

The "big numbers" all revolve around the sharing of knowledge - speed of knowledge acquisition, effectiveness of marketing, reducing communication costs.

Many Web evangelists have spoken to the power of social media. The McKinsey imprimatur may reach those last holdouts who refuse to play. The real hidden value: Boosting the brand, which is harder to measure; its presence is inarguable regardless.

Regardless, check out Elizabeth's savvy site, formerly Geeky Grrl. She's got an incisive combination of wit and expertise. She's also the most hilarious dinner guest of all time.

NY Daily News: Web's worst offender for intrusive ads?

Worst offender: Best Foods ad that can't be closed AND covers content. I promise to boycott this brand forever.
The temerity to cover the entire masthead. UNbelievable.


So, what's up at New York Daily News? I have not seen such an onslaught of intrusive ads in, well, ever. They cover the masthead. They cover content. AND you can't close them. I would love to see the metrics on these ads, then I'd love to test it so I could demonstrate just how many of those vaunted click-throughs are actually invoked by users trying to exit these ads = which break every rule. I feel as if I just had to toss four pushy salespeople out of my living room. I bet a lot of readers at http://www.nydailynews.com feel the same way.

Ads that interfere with navigation are bad for everybody

Can we all agree that ads should not display in front of dropdown navigation? Check out this Suave (not) leaderboard covering up top-level dropdown navigation. By the way, the nav on the left of the page does not correspond in any sane way to the dropdown nav, so God help you of you actually want an alternative way to find that item you now can't reach in top nav. Who wins here?

Bamboozled by Wacom's set-up UI

I finally got round to setting up my Bamboo graphics tablet from Wacom... probably the sixth Wacom I've owned. Love the product, package design, functionality. Here's the glitch: You have to run the visual tutorial to set up the tablet and pen (okay), but what happens when the UI locks up? I got a Director error twice, restarted the tutorial, and was finally stymied by a "press space bar to continue" dialog. This is a great tool, but the tutorial for install of the product suffers from overdesign. I understand that someone designing a tutorial for this very slick product would be tempted to make it as cool as the tablet. But you know what's *really* cool? When you can actually complete the tutorial without aggravation.

"Perhaps the next iPod will send telegraphs and teleport people."

Alison Southwick quoted in the LA Times: "Perhaps the next iPod will send telegraphs and teleport people." Ripples in technology, forward and back? Maybe the next iPod will feel like steampunk.

My friend Dan Rosenbaum, eyewitness to 9/11

My friend Dan Rosenbaum is a true friend. The kind you slug it out with, just to realize you can't live without them. We met in New York at FOLIO: Show 1999, so it is our tenth anniversary of friendship.

I learned a lot from Dan, about business and the Web world, where he's a true pioneer. One of the best nights of my pre-Web-crash life was at Jack Powers' Internet World LA party in 2000. Dan wore a suit, I wore a black vinyl ballgown, and we all exulted in the rush of the Web.

Dan is a devoted husband and father. On 9/11, when Olivia was pregnant with their twin sons, Dan had an eyewitness view of the maelstrom at Ground Zero. I will never be the writer Dan is, so I will let him tell you the story of what he saw on 9/11.

Always remember. Never forget. Happy birthday, Dan.

Top 1 Percent of Americans Reaped Two-Thirds of Income Gains in Last Economic Expansion

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities reports: "Two-thirds of the nation’s total income gains from 2002 to 2007 flowed to the top 1 percent of U.S. households, and that top 1 percent held a larger share of income in 2007 than at any time since 1928, according to an analysis of newly released IRS data by economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez." Why am I writing about this? Because the long-term implications for the digital divide in this country, and thus American competitiveness, are appalling.

"The incomes of the top one-tenth of 1 percent (0.1 percent) of U.S. households have grown more rapidly than the incomes of the top 1 percent of households as a whole, rising by 94 percent — or $3.5 million per household — since 2002." This surpasses 1928 data.

If people want to scream and cry at Town Halls, or about the President addressing schoolchildren, it seems to me that they should be screaming and crying about THIS. Who is addressing this grotesque inequity?

Even if those at the top of the economic food chain don't have the ethics to see this inequity as wrongheaded, they should at least have the pragmatism to understand they will lose the consumer class that fueled their success. Once people are too busy surviving, they won't be spending. Look around you and ask yourself if this is the state in which we should be living.

Bad Web Site of the Day: Trinity Railway Express

I literally keyboard-stumbled on to this Web site today and was frankly amazed to see something as outdated as Trinity Railway Express - check it out at http://www.trinityrailwayexpress.org/. Hard to believe that a company offering rail service between Fort Worth and Dallas can't afford a better Web site. The best thing about trinityrailwayexpress.org is that it links to Fort Worth Transportation Authority's the 21st-century Web site, http://www.the-t.com. Trinity, we can help.

Consequential strangers: An underpinning of social media?

While I don't like the title of the book (Consequential Strangers: The Power of People Who Don't Seem to Matter - But Really Do), I was compelled by the argument. "The term 'consequential strangers' captures a fascinating paradox about casual relationships: They are as vital to our well-being, growth, and day-to-day existence as family and close friends." Author Melinda Blau, interviewed by NPR's Neal Conan, explained that we may be likelier to find validation in our relationships with relative strangers than within "close" relationships. People are even likelier to accept advice on serious topics like relationships and health issues from "strangers."

This makes perfect sense to me. This is a significant part of what fuels social media. Many consider social media to be an exercise in narcissism, and it certainly can be. For me, it has often provided a way of expressing myself when calling a friend and making the same statement seems like an intrusion. Perhaps the tree wants to be heard when it falls in the forest.

If Facebook were a country, it would have the world's fourth largest population

Interesting discussion on how the over-35 online audience has fueled the growth of social media. NPR Science Friday's Ira Flatow interviewed Sean Corcoran of Forrester Research last week. On Facebook: "If they were a country, population-wise at this point globally, they would be number four behind China, India and the United States." What can we do with this unchanneled power? Only 30% of usage is from the US. Follow this always-worthwhile show on Twitter @scifri, or better yet, join the Second Life meeting concurrent with the show. Great combination of intelligence and snarkiness. It's one of my favorite spots in Second Life.

But back to Facebook. What will all of us do, collectively, with the power of the network? It could be argued that we (social media users) are already a nation.

Southwest Airlines extends great customer service with call-backs

Once again Southwest Airlines proves they get customer service, and the way you think. If you are going to be on hold for more than three minutes, they allow you to leave your number and recorded name, and they tell you EXACTLY how long it will be before they call you back ("three to six minutes" in this case). When they call back, they use your voice recording to say, "when this person is on the phone please press 1" (which means they realize the caller may not be at their regular number). They called me back before I had a chance to finish this post, and I will continue to choose them first! Spiffy new site design, too: Makes you look forward to flying, instead of dreading it.

Why it's crucial for social networks to make privacy obvious

In today's Science Daily: Many Online Social Networks Leak Personal Information To Tracking Sites, New Study Shows. Science Daily does an excellent job of explaining the technology; our usability studies show that users are acutely aware of being "tracked" in some way. This is as true of the 13-year-old "digital native" as it is of older late-adopters. If you want people to adopt your social network, you MUST declare privacy policies - particularly at interaction points such as registration fields and profile set-up forms.Kudos as always to Science Daily.

When FREE is a lie - personal info and privacy, astrology.com

Back to my favorite (of late) whipping boy, astrology.com: This iVillage site should not assume its loyal readership will stick around. The outdated visual design now suffers even more from intrusive advertising that I close immediately (if a popup). The term FREE on "today's three special offers!" is deceptive, because as soon as you click through, you will see it -is- FREE - but you must submit personal information, which these days is worse than asking for money. How many people exit the transaction at this point? iVillage, are you looking at your stats?

Word on the street is that astrology.com is about to face some stiff (and contemporary-looking) competition. Time to review metrics, conduct usability testing, and redesign this very outdated interface. I visit regularly and it seems someone has decided to experiment with varying placement of elements on the home page.

Other problems on astrology.com: No dates on items like Tarot readings. If today's cards are the same as yesterday's, why should I trust the site?

In closing: Clicking through to the Numerology offer, which requests full name at birth and full name used today, as well as email, does not offer a visible privacy policy. Oh, and the browser window titles don't match the pages.

iVillage's success with this site is at risk.

Are publishers killing Web advertising? Yes!

Are publishers killing Web advertising? We think so. Check out this piece on how publishers are killing Web advertising by Jim Spanfeller, the outgoing president and CEO of Forbes.com. Spanfeller argues that the industry is devaluing its own online ad presence, and we agree. "A publisher can and should price their inventory at levels that will meet the market expectations and drive their business model. What they should not do is allow some sort of invisible hand (or should I say hands) to price their inventory against a backdrop of objectives that can and often does change at a moment’s notice. This practice has fundamentally driven pricing down across the web and, perhaps more importantly, changed the success metrics from ones based on 'demand creation' to ones driven by 'demand fulfillment.' " Amen! This is what happens when you don't have a Web strategy, which means you have no ad strategy. We see this disastrous trend in too many places. How is your company addressing this issue?