[Sigia-l] Are web users more sophisticated

[Dave]

Ok, to the point though of the BayCHI event.

"Users are more sophisticated and thus can handle more complicated
environments--less conventional, more abstracted, etc.).

1. my experience suggests that it all depends. Some users have learned
and some haven't. But what is worse is that the current state of
affarirs doesn't  offer recent to new users an opportunity to really
expand.  Older users used more of computers than more recent users
tend to do, so there is more opportunity to explore and gain different
perspectives that then inform better decisions when faced with new (or
non) conventions.

2. This argument about users being "smarter" is a new one to the RIA
argument, infact when I've made the argument for RIAs in the past it
is for the exact opposite reason. That the current metaphors and
abstractions required for doing complex tasks are not sufficient and
thus by adding richness (that does not = multimedia) you can help
clarify and guide users through these flows.

Also, why does adding richness imply a lack of conventions? Maybe not
web conventions, but in computer systems there are a lot of other
convenions that even go x-platform that are worth exploring in richer
environments that can do them much better than HTML can especially in
a network distributed, X-browser/platform/device environment.

As to the using Yahoo/Google as an address-bar I think there was a
thread somewhere a while back on some list challenging the current
addressing methodologies. But behaviorally I  think that putting an
address in yahoo/google is only bad if it doesn't work. But for the
most part it does. ;)

-- dave