Re: www.agranat.com: get a small, teeny, tiny, CLUE!

Dan Connolly (connolly@w3.org)
Mon, 10 Aug 1998 12:38:36 -0500


Scott took my flame in the sense it was intended...
in remarkably good humor, in fact...

Scott Lawrence wrote:
>
> Dan Connolly wrote:
>
> > I have no reason to believe that you personally design
> > that home page, but... well... I hope you don't
> > take my blowing off steam personally.
>
> Not at all.
>
> > I'm just sick and tired of web sites full of technology
> > for the sake of technology. When I saw it on
> > FoRK, it was just too much.
>
> I actually had nothing to do with it, but to be perfectly frank I'm not wild
> about a lot of it myself - I'd love to hear more specifically what bothered
> you so that I can pass it on.

I hope you don't mind my copying FoRK on the response, so
other folks can pass it on too...

Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox for August 9, 1998 is incredibly
timely. Basically, his column sums it up:

=========
The Web Usage Paradox: Why Do People Use Something This Bad?
Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox for August 9, 1998
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/980809.html

The Web is bad; really bad.

My estimate is that at least 90% of all commercial websites are
overly difficult to use due to problems like:

bloated page design that takes forever to download

internally focused design that hypes products without giving any
real info about them

[...]
=========

To be more specific, here's what I get when I visit your
site with lynx:

==========
Embedded Web Server Technology: Agranat
Systems, Inc.

REFRESH(8 sec): http://www.agranat.com/index.html

Click here
==========

It's even worse in Netscape, since I usually have images
turned off. I just get an image icon with "CLICK HERE"
next to it.

So I don't learn much about Agranat Systems, Inc. Nor
do search engines, blind folks, etc.

- "click here" is bad
http://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/ReadableText
- using images for text is bad
"Use style sheets rather than converting text to images."
http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-WAI-PAGEAUTH
- big images (that load slow) are bad
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9703a.html

-- 
Dan Connolly
http://www.w3.org/People/Connolly/