user

What good is design research?

A recent article by Don Norman brings up some valuable and provocative questions about the value of design research. I read it as an extension of his previous shift in thinking about the value of usability analysis, where he concluded that it was vital for good to design, but it didn't lead to great design. In this new article he argues that design research has not led to breakthrough innovations or products, but is better suited for improving existing products and technologies.

I actually agree with much of what he says, though I see the definition of design research … Read more

Why are the CNET user opinions on Samsung Blu-ray players so low?

If you're looking closely at the Blu-ray player reviews on CNET, there's a frustrating trend that complicates buying decisions--Samsung Blu-ray players get solid editorial reviews from CNET, but user opinions are consistently poor. While there are always differences between CNET reviews and user opinions, the differences with Samsung Blu-ray players stand out as being consistent and large.

Ratings have been standardized to a 100-point scale to make comparisons easier.

User opinions from Amazon and Newegg are also included to give some perspective. Their ratings are consistently more positive than CNET user opinions, although we're not sure why.

There are some factors inherent in CNET's review process that can explain why editorial opinion and user opinions are different, and they're worth pointing out.

CNET relies on review samples from manufacturers. CNET gets review samples directly from manufacturers rather than buying them off the shelf like a regular buyer. It's completely possible that manufacturers handpick review samples for us; if there's a problem with a certain "batch," a company can make sure we get the good batch. As much as CNET editors might like to purchase all our review samples, we don't have the budget for it.

CNET's review periods are relatively short. To review as many products as we do, we obviously can't test every product as long as a standard buyer would. If a product has quality control issues that cause it to break down after a couple of months, that's not something we're going to catch. That's why user opinions are so important.… Read more

2011 Audi A8 gets handwriting recognition

Audi's flagship A8 luxury sedan is the company's technological tour de force, and the company says its 2011 iteration will sport handwriting recognition among its many features.

The feature will be supported in the vehicle's Multi Media Interface, or MMI--effectively the navigation/media unit in the car's console. It allows the user to write the destination in freehand and then use the touch screen to manipulate the directions as necessary.

Read more of "2011 Audi A8 adds handwriting recognition to in-car UI" at ZDNet's The ToyBox.

Twitter needs a pretty face to beat Facebook

Twitter and Facebook are duking it out to own the future of the social Web, though users won't have noticed. Indeed, for those who use both, this may come as a surprise, since the two, while both social media platforms, seem to serve very different purposes.

Tell that to Twitter and Facebook, which increasingly have painted big bull's-eyes on each other.

They probably should spend more time painting their home pages. While the two Silicon Valley companies have opted to skirmish in the hinterlands of APIs and data feeds, the war will almost certainly be won somewhere else: … Read more

New Google search UI brings color, search options

Google's new search results page brings more search options to the fore amid brighter colors that nod at recent changes made by its rivals.

Small groups of Google searchers over the past week or so have seen the new design as the company tests the new user interface, but not everybody was able to gain access to the interface. On Wednesday, Gizmodo published some tips on how to force Google into serving the new pages, and therefore we can bring you some screen shots of the new look and feel for Google search.

The first thing you'll probably … Read more

Why to embrace Firefox 3.6's new-tab ethos

Sometimes it's the little things that count.

The most prominent feature of Firefox 3.6 is Personas, which let you reskin the browser with thousands of different looks. But my single favorite change is a subtler change to the open-source browser's user interface.

Specifically, when you open a link in a new tab, it appears immediately to the right of the active tab. Before, the new tabs would appear to the far right of the strip of tabs.

Yup, that's it. For those of us who spend hours a day in a browser, though, the new tab … Read more

Facebook pushes out restructured news feeds

Facebook members will start to see a new look for their home page "news feeds" on Friday, with the design now featuring a toggle view between a main view, featuring the top stories from their friends list based on their Facebooking habits, and a "live feed" featuring real-time updates from their whole network.

"When the user wakes up in the morning, you go to Facebook and you see (the) news feed," product manager Peter Deng told CNET News. "You see the stuff that you missed, the best of the previous day, to basically … Read more

Firefox's future features: 3.6, 3.7, and 4.0

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--Some new fruits of Mozilla's effort to speed Firefox development are about to arrive.

Mozilla plans to release the first beta version of 3.6 this weekend or early next week. But what exactly is coming in the new version and its successors?

Mike Shaver, Mozilla's vice president of product development, and John Lilly, Mozilla's chief executive, detailed some of the browser's future in an interview at the corporation's headquarters here. And the company has an aggressive schedule, with three releases due within about a year.

The present version of Firefox was … Read more

A face-lift for Facebook's Groups

Facebook's Groups feature seemed to have long since taken a backseat to the "fan pages" that the social network has encouraged companies and brands to create. But they're far from obsolete.

In a Monday blog post called "Giving Groups a Stronger Voice," Facebook has announced a number of ways it has improved Groups, to better match the rest of the site and more closely tie to members' activity feeds.

"Group activities, which previously only appeared in the group, will now be delivered to your news feed," the post by Facebook engineer Knot … Read more

Another Facebook redesign: Birthdays are important

Guess what? Facebook is tweaking its home page design yet again--something that invariably seems to tick off members at first before they realize they actually don't mind that much. The company seems to have been previewing the new look to advertisers, one of whom forwarded the details along to industry blog Mashable.

It doesn't look too different. The biggest change is that Facebook's home page news feed will now be divided up into "top news" and a more real-time "recent activity" view.

The explanation:

"Facebook is simplifying the user experience on … Read more