[Sigia-l] Re: Dual-Audience Sites

[Dmitry Nekrasovski]

No disrespect intended, but I am not exactly sure how this page can be
considered to have "world-class information architecture". Apart from
the issue pointed out by Elizabeth, there is no indication as to
whether a given state actually has any listings. Thus clicking on Have
Hay >> Maine gives you listings in New Mexico and Arizona, not to
mention a page entitled Have Hay Available in Maine - not exactly the
clearest way to word this. But I think the major issue here is that
grouping listings by state is a crude means of expressing geographical
proximity. A visualization or distance metric-based display might work
a lot better.

Dmitry

-- 
Dmitry Nekrasovski
http://www.cs.ubc.ca/~dmitry

On Fri, 01 Oct 2004 16:20:11 -0700, Elizabeth Fuller <zilf at leapinliz.com> wrote:
> Steve Mulder wrote:
> 
>  > Current favorite home page, with world-class information architecture:
>  > http://www.fsa.usda.gov/haynet/
> 
> 
> Just one nitpicky problem with this one.  As a user presented with the
> choice "Need Hay" or "Have Hay" on the front page, I'd click whichever
> category I fit into (e.g. if I needed hay, I'd click on "Need Hay"). But
> that takes me to a list of ads posted by others just like me...instead
> of ads posted *for* people like me (in other words, I might need hay,
> but I get sent to a page of ads from others who also need hay, not
> people who have hay, which is what I was really looking for).
> 
> Since there are only two choices, I can easily back out and pick the
> other one once I've realized "my" mistake (though was it really mine?).
>   If a site were built for a more fractured audience, however -- say six
> choices instead of two -- that kind of labeling problem could be really
> annoying.  So how would you overcome it - label the categories in a way
> that more clearly specifies content instead of audience, such as "Need
> Hay Ads" and "Have Hay Ads"?
> 
> Liz
> 
> 
> ------------
> When replying, please *trim your post* as much as possible.
> *Plain text, please; NO Attachments
> 
> Searchable list archive:   http://www.info-arch.org/lists/sigia-l/
> ________________________________________
> Sigia-l mailing list -- post to: Sigia-l at asis.org
> Changes to subscription: http://mail.asis.org/mailman/listinfo/sigia-l
>