jakob nielsen

Jakob Nielsen's latest Alertbox article, Web 2.0 Can Be Dangerous, reminds us that fancy trick plays in site development don't always bring the same great benefits as good old blocking and tackling.

Nielsen calls out Ajax, rich interfaces, mashups, so-called "user generated content" and online communities -- noting they can be valuable in proper context, but can also distract Web teams from more important user experience objectives. One example:

Jakob Nielsen's latest Alertbox essay, in a nutshell, validates the concept of "banner blindness": people shown pages with graphical advertising units intermixed with non-ad content almost always focus on the non-ad content.

What elements attract attention most consistently? Plain text, faces and "private parts," says Nielsen.

But not most ads, he observes, with one exception:

Jakob Nielsen pretty much validates application development practices from the likes of 37signals when he writes, "Most users have low commitment -- especially to Web sites, which must focus on simplicity, rather than features."

Less really is more, it seems. The usability maestro puts the dilemma into terms every content-site designer should take to heart: