[Sigia-l] photos on personas?

[Stew Dean]

On 4/4/07, Andrew Boyd <facibus at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 4/4/07, Davezilla <davezilla at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Um, OK. Cartopon was actually a typo I made, but if it's a real word
> > too, then cool. ;^)
>
> And I claim first deliberate use of the word :)

Nooo  not another buzzword :)

I like the idea of representation of a group.  Personas I feel are
best when they are kept as honest as possible.  If real users have
been interviewed then real users views should be used and referenced.
As soon as non realistic elements are added, such as photos of non
real people or arbitary facts like they drink coffee from Starbucks
and drive a Toyota then the personas stop becoming a factual source
and become part guess work.

The composite person persona I feel is fine for communicating with
clients and for marketing but I don't see them as much use as and
Information Architect or for creating the User Experience.

I recently had a situation where I was given some beautiful personas
that someone had spent a couple of weeks creating but could not tell
me who the key groups for the project where, what tasks they wanted to
do (I agree with the need to link tasks with groups) and what their
priority was in terms of the project.  As an IA this is the kind of
thing I'm really after.  I prefer the idea of user requirements over
personas myself.

Stew Dean