Time for a long over due rant on Jakob Nielsen - the usability guy a lot of people loves to hate, including yours truly (nowuseit.com was for one suppose to be sort of a response to Jakob’s useit.com, but I decided it wasn’t worth the battle).

Anyway, I have come to think that when we say we don’t agree, or what he says isn’t important at ALL - deep down we know, at some level, his has been on to something. Yes, some of his projections and analysis are useful heuristics to bring on, but his overall puritanical outset makes him completely one eyed on many of the related “user experience” issues that goes into using/liking/living with technology. He might even be completely blind from his “out-of-the-way” crusade, when it comes to the aesthetics and design issues at large. No problem, if only he himself admitted that his theory (or what the heck it is) has some limitations.
Yet he doesn’t. He does not restrain himself from comparing interacting with an e-commerce website the neilsen-way with a piece of art. In fact in a recent interview on Larry’s World he is interviewed by Larry Magid (his the one that sounds a bit like Daffy Duck!), Nielsen talks about what should happen when your are “going to a play”. I reckon that is a theatre play or a movie play, but it might as well be a show in strip-joint(!?) – the rule applies universially, I guess. Anyway, Nielsen says (around 6.28 minutes in):

“now when people leave that play, your not suppose to discuss WOW the set was great, your suppose to like say, the actors was good, the plot was good, the PLAY was good, not that the set was impressive, that’s the least import part. It should be good, it should fit with the rest of experience, but it shouldn’t get in the way of the experience.”

Eehemm. Right. Not sure I’m agreeing to the full extend of that, let alone I don’t find I reasonable to make that kind of distinctions, there’s no detail, no sense of anything but goal orientation here. So this quote probably tells the full story about Nielsen. He just sees the world as one big usability problem, sadly. to my oppinion the “people” dont-want-this advocacy just went to far here. don’t people me, Mr Neilsen! I imaging that when Jakob goes to shop, he dont shop around, he goes straight for the counter. When Jakob goes to a restaurant he dont order noodles, where everything is mixed op, no no beef here, potatoes there and some pees over here – not touching each other, please! And when he goes to see a play (which he apparently does) he just want the content on a contrasting background, preferably in a three bullet point summary and click here for more link. Come on, Jakob. Live a little!

Well I don’t know I guess I like the opposite, not all the time, but sometimes…!

Get the interview here (mp3)

Note: Actually it was extremely weird to hear Jakob Nielsens voice, he has the thickest Danish accent in his English. I didn’t know that but it makes it even harder to take him serious.